Haughton Village News

Haughton Village News

Church and Village Magazine

Haughton and Derrington's Church and Village magazine last edition was produced and printed in December 2019.  In the last edition, Geoffrey Smith published a brief history of how the magazine started and developed over the years.  This website is a 'spin-off' from the magazine,  we hope it will at least provide some of the articles and details of village life as the magazine did.

A SHORT HISTORY OF HAUGHTON PARISH MAGAZINE
The very first issue of Haughton Magazine appeared in 1891 under the rectorship of Gilbert Royds who advised readers "to have it bound at the end of the year as a valuable book at trifling cost". Members of the Royds family were rectors of Haughton from 1831 until 1946!
At this time Parish mags were becoming very popular nationally and various 'national supplements' or inserts were available to add to the local content and supposedly make a more interesting publication. From 1891 until 1895 Gilbert Royds used one called the "Church Monthly" which was changed in 1895 to "Home Words".   Incidentally, 1895 was the year the first Haughton Parish Council was elected as recorded in the magazine.
It would appear that the magazine continued in this form almost unchanged until 1940 when, due to the high cost of printing and shortage of paper during the war, the magazine nearly came to an end. Home Words was dropped and the magazine became a four page leaflet entitled the "Haughton Herald". In 1944 Home Words returned, but with only a single sheet of local news inserted into it, a reversal of usual practise! This continued until 1948 when the traditional magazine reappeared using a page size, then popular, of something smaller than the present day A5 size. This remained until 1951 when the then rector, Frank Oliver, replaced Home Words with a different supplement called "The Sign".
So it continued until Roland Jackson, rector from 1954 until 1961 got rid of "The Sign" saying it was a 'waste of money' and increased the local content. However, "The Sign" is still being published monthly to this day!
A few years later commercial printing became prohibitively expensive and in Stephen Cooke's time as rector the magazine became an A5 size publication. It was printed on a duplicator in the Rectory what Stephen described as a "homespun effort".  It was at this time that the title "Church and Village" was first used reflecting the idea of a village and community publication rather than just a church magazine.  By now the parish of Ranton had been joined with Haughton, but continued to have its own 'Newsletter' until 1988 when it was combined with "Church and Village". By now it was being photocopied in Haughton School.
Derrington church, until 1989 a church within the Parish of Seighford became a new parish, but linked with Haughton.   It could no longer share a magazine with Seighford and for a short time produced its own magazine in A4 size, but proved not to be viable, a meeting was held and the decision was taken to combine it with what had become the Haughton and Ranton magazine.  It was decided to use a paper size of B4 for the 'new' magazine which retained the "Church and Village" title and required 800 copies a month. Printing had returned to the rectory!
In 2003 Ranton became a part of the parish of Seighford and so the magazine became a publication for Derrington and Haughton required about 650 copies a month.  It then became A4 size to reduce paper costs! And so it has remained until this issue which will represent the end of an era! 
Thanks must be recorded to those who have so diligently produced it over the years and especially those responsible since 2003 when the editorship and production ceased to be the responsibility of the various rectors of Haughton.  But who knows, it could still be resurrected at some time in the future, either on paper, electronically – or both.
Geoff Smith (Rector 1987-2003)

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