Welcome
Early History
Buildings - Prior Months
Families - Prior Months
Our Group's First Book
Group Members
Commercial - Prior Months
Social - Prior Months
Apr - Destructive Fire in Ock Street in March 1879
May - William Watkin Waite and his family
June - Rant & Tombs - Abingdon Grocers
Sep - Joseph Argyle (1817 - 1901)
Links for Ock Street Heritage Group
Message Board
Guestbook
Mail Form
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Welcome!
 | May we first apologise for neglecting to update this site during the last couple of months. As most of you will know, our group has been actively involved in putting on a second exhibition this year – our current one being in St Helen’s Church in Abingdon.
The current exhibition is billed as “Ock Street ReVisited – A pictorial history of this Abingdon community”. It has been very well received among local people and the town’s visitors alike. It includes much new material – in addition to the material first used at the Trinity Church Hall in 2006 and the information researched for The Museum Exhibition earlier this year. It has been open to the public since the beginning of August and will remain so until Heritage Weekend, i.e. closing on Monday 15th September.
Members of the group, along with St. Helen’s church stewards, are doing their best to ensure the church is open daily, except during services.
There are no further exhibitions planned in the foreseeable future and there will be a hiatus in the group meetings for several months. Accordingly, it is unlikely that this website will be update on a regular monthly basis – relying mainly on material we may receive from our readers.
We are still actively gathering new material and look forward to hearing from you if you can help us in this respect.
The new article which appears this month is a perfect example. Our thanks go to Sandra Lewis from Toronto, Canada, who shares with us some intriguing insights into the life of some of her ancestors, based on the journals of one, Joseph Argyle. Joseph was born in 1817 and died in 1901. He lived and worked in Ock Street and was a great uncle of the well-known Abingdonian, Leslie Argyle.
September 2008 |
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In the beginning ...
The Ock Street Heritage Group first evolved in 2004. During that year, the Abingdon Buildings Record - a group primarily interested in the architectural history of the town - held a meeting about Ock Street and decided to open it to the public. The response was unexpected and so many people were turned away that a second meeting had to be held. The interest and enthusiasm generated led to the formation of the group, which now unites local historians with a variety of specialist skills in an effort to recover and record the history of this unique community.
In 2006, as part of the celebrations to mark the 450th anniversary of Abingdon's Charter, the group mounted an exhibition of its findings to date. This was held in the Trinity Church Hall in Conduit Road, off Ock Street, and ran for 3 days starting Friday 29th September.
The exhibition was a resounding success. From the feedback we received, it was clear that we needed to find a way to share our findings and this website has been set up with this in mind.
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