We recently held our second virtual lunch due to the current restrictions, and 44 Burgesses attended to hear an excellent humorous and informative presentation by Lord Provost Barney Crockett on the US voting system.
For those who were unable to attend the meeting was recorded and placed on YouTube, the link can be accessed by clicking the link below:
It’s been a while, but we are delighted to announce a virtual lunch to be held via Zoom on Tuesday 1st December at 12.00 noon.
People in the UK are often puzzled by elections in the United States. They take a long time, methods of registering votes and counting vary in different places. There are delays in implementing results. Counts can get involved. All so different from the UK. How did it come about and what is the big problem in the future?
Lord Provost Barney Crockett will give a personal and light hearted take on this.
If you wish to hear the Lord Provost please email Clerk Garry Stevens at clerk@aberdeenburgesses.com
Details of how to join via Zoom will be sent out to you before the date.
I am seeking helping hands and particularly so from any Burgess with an interest in local history and Aberdeen as it is today. ‘This is our City’ and this is the 700th year of the Freedom Lands which were gifted to the Aberdeen by King Robert the Bruce on 10th December 1319. This was a significant moment in our history which, with the support of Aberdeen City Council, should be and will be recognised by a number of actions and events.
The Burgesses of Guild have been given the opportunity to take the lead on a few activities which will include :
– Planting of 700 trees within the City boundary
– Siting of decorative ‘Book Benches’ at most if not all of our
schools, each to be scripted with a story or snippet of our history
– Replacement and/or maintenance of the March Stones
– Possibility of a NUART feature on the Burgesses and/or the Freedom
Lands and/or Robert the Bruce
– Placing of a plaque at the King Robert statue outside Marischal
College, with an explanation for it being there and the King’s contribution to the City and why
– Possibility of a street name or names with relevance to the
Burgesses of Guild
– A website focussed on the Freedom Lands, March Stones, Robert the
Bruce and local history including the Burgesses
These ideas and suggestions have come forward and discussed and now I am asking and encouraging Burgesses to join the project team, please. Isn’t
it entirely appropriate that Burgesses should be involved ? Please give
this some serious thought and either email or call me if you have any
questions.
Colin G.Taylor
E : cgtlor@gmail.com
M: 07765 232 557
Lord Dean of Guild of the City and Royal Burgh of Aberdeen
We still have places available for the evening with the Scottish Ambulance Service. Numbers are quite low to date and the Lord Dean is keen that like other emergency services we have asked to present and have had a good attendance, we do the same for the ambulance service. Hopefully we can get a few more attendees along to the evening including the usual excellent buffet at the Aberdeenshire Cricket club.
Tuesday 25th February – 6.30pm
Location – Aberdeenshire Cricket Club
Cost £15pp – includes buffet supper, guests welcome
Donald Montgomery, Community Resilience Facilitator with Scottish Ambulance Service, is our guest speaker and he will give a quick history of the Ambulance service and how they work today with all different departments within the service plus the voluntary First Responder Scheme that Don is involved in.
If you wish to attend any of the above events please email Clerk, at clerk@aberdeenburgesses.com
Payment can be made by cheque made payable to Burgesses of Guild of the City of Aberdeen and sent to Garry Stevens, Clerk to the Burgesses, 6 Craigarbel Crescent, Inverbervie, Montrose DD10 0SJ. Or you can pay online to Sort Code 826011, Account Number 50325609 Ref Surname/Events
We have, or are in the process of arranging events for the next 5 months, details are below.
Tuesday 25th February – 6.30pm
Location – Aberdeenshire Cricket Club
Cost £15pp – includes buffet supper, guests welcome
Donald Montgomery, Community Resilience Facilitator with Scottish Ambulance Service, is our guest speaker and he will give a quick history of the Ambulance service and how they work today with all different departments within the service plus the voluntary First Responder Scheme that Don is involved in.
Tuesday 24th March – 6.30pm
Location – Council Chamber, Town House
No cost Tea/Coffee will be served from 6.00pm, Burgesses only
Chief Financial Officer at Aberdeen City Council will, give a briefing to the Burgesses on the annual budget settlement for financial year 2020/21.
Monday 20th April – 6.30pm
Location – Elphinstone Institute, Aberdeen University
Cost – To be confirmed, as is situation with guests
We are currently working on a visit to the Elphinstone Institute – https://www.abdn.ac.uk/elphinstone/
A centre for the study of Ethnology, Folklore, and Ethnomusicology at the University of Aberdeen. Established in 1995 in celebration of the quincentenary of the university’s founding, the Institute researches and promotes the culture of the North and North-East of Scotland in context.
Further information will be issued once the visit is finalised.
Tuesday 12th May – 12.00 noon
Location – Council Chamber, Town House, Broad Street
No cost Tea/Coffee and Butteries served from 11.15am – Burgesses only
Our Annual AGM will take place as above, papers will be issued online and via mail in due course.
May – Date to be confirmed
Location -Aberdeen FC’s new training facility at Cormack Park
Cost – To be confirmed as is situation with guests
We are currently working on a visit to view the new facilities at Cormack Park https://www.afc.co.uk/2019/10/31/cormack-park-facts/
Further details will be issued once a date etc is agreed which is likely to be at the end of the current football season.
Thursday 18th June – see below for timings
North East of Scotland, Aberdeen Planetarium, North East Scotland College, Aberdeen City Campus, Gallowgate. Aberdeen. AB25 1BN
Cost – £16 to include a finger buffet, guests welcome
We have arranged a visit to the Aberdeen Planetarium. To accommodate anticipated numbers the timings are below:
5.30pm: Planetarium Show One
6.30pm: Finger Buffet
7.30pm: Planetarium Show Two
If you wish to attend please can you advise which time you prefer. We will do our best to accommodate this, as each show is restricted to 30 attendees maximum.
If you wish to attend any of the above events please email Clerk, at clerk@aberdeenburgesses.com
Payment can be made by cheque made payable to Burgesses of Guild of the City of Aberdeen and sent to Garry Stevens, Clerk to the Burgesses, 6 Craigarbel Crescent, Inverbervie, Montrose DD10 0SJ. Or you can pay online to Sort Code 826011, Account Number 50325609 Ref Surname/Events
Excellent lunch held at RNUC on Wednesday 22 January with over 60 attendees with guest speaker Hon Lt Men Gurung giving a fascinating talk reflecting on his life. Born in the Gorkha district of Nepal which is a big recruiting ground for the Gurkha regiment which he joined in 1986, Men served them proudly for 20 years, then on leaving his regiment subsequently settled in Aberdeen and formed the North East of Scotland Gurkha Association (NESGA) Following his presentation, through Lord Provost Barney Crocket, an Honorary Gurkha, Men presented the Lord Dean with a commemorative plaque to the Burgesses from the NESGA which was gratefully received.
Reminder below of forthcoming lunches held at RNUC. If you wish to attend please email Clerk Garry Stevens at clerk@aberdeenburgesses.com Cost is £14 and payment can be made via cheque sent to – Garry Stevens, Clerk to the Burgesses, 6 Craigarbel Crescent, Inverbervie, Montrose, DD10 0SJ or via online banking to sort code 826011, Account no 50325609 Ref Surname/Lunch.
Wednesday 5th February
Gregory King, guest speaker, lived and worked in Moscow for 3-1/2 years and then for four years travelled extensively for business in Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan. He continues to take a keen interest in current affairs in Russia and the cultural heritage of the country as well as the states of the Former Soviet Union. Gregory will share some of the perceptions he has formed after his extended exposure to the life and work in the country and how these might differ from some of the ideas we see in the media.
Wednesday 4th March
Neil Powers is guest speaker and will give a talk on his role with North East Rider Volunteers Scotland SCIO (NERVS)
He will be talking about the history of Blood Bikes and their inclusion in the day to day running of NHS healthcare facilities across the whole of the United Kingdom.
He will explore:
The vast array of the consignments that they carry
The slight differences in the way that they and groups south of the border operate
The never-ending challenges that every Blood Bike group face in order to provide the totally free of charge services they offer
The constant need to recruit volunteers from all walks of life
His reasons for getting such a group up and running in Grampian
Wednesday 1st April
Ian Burnett is guest speaker and he is the Bereavement Services Officer for Aberdeen City Council and have been connected with Cemeteries, Crematorium and the Public Mortuary for some 38 years. The talk will consist of a rundown of the cemeteries that the Council are responsible for and some interesting facts and history.
Wednesday 6th May
Councillor Phillip Bell is guest speaker, his talk will focus on the conversation around climate change is getting rather warm. The Paris Accord and subsequent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) special report of 8 October 2018 entitled ‘1.5degC global warming’ discusses a maximum carbon budget that our planet can tolerate. The report goes on to say that the reduction in green-house gases should be ‘staged’ such that by 2030 the emission of CO2 and general green-house gases has reduced by 45% on 1990 levels and that net-zero is achieved by 2050. The cost for the UK alone, producing a mere 1% of the worlds CO2 is estimated at between £1 – £2 trillion. The future is looking increasingly like it will be electric and hydrogen, the most abundant element in the Universe with an energy density of 1/3 of that of petrol or diesel, is an energy vector that is gaining much attention to help make this happen.
Wednesday 3rd June
Guest speakers are Ian Grosz/Steve Smith. Trading Faces was an independent, collaborative Social Documentary project between writer and researcher Ian Grosz, and photographer Steve Smith, which set out to document the lives of Traders at Aberdeen Market during 2018 / 2019. Initial funding to undertake the project was through an Aberdeen City Creative Funding Grant to carry out the research phase. The work was subsequently brought to exhibition through a commission by Look Again Aberdeen. Ian’s role during the project was to conduct audio-based interviews with traders to record their stories and experiences. These recordings were edited down for an audio installation, which worked alongside large-format film portraits taken by Steve Smith. The audio told individual life stories, as well as giving the public a sense of the challenges faced by traders with the market building under threat of redevelopment at a dynamic time of change in the city’s evolution, and documenting the dramatic changes to retail shopping habits seen over the last decade. Overarching contextual narrative text for the exhibition was also provided.
The Lord Dean, Senior Assessor and Clerk attended a very interesting talk by City Archivist and fellow Burgess Phil Astley and Professor Steve Boardman from Univ of Edinburgh, at Cowdray Hall, Aberdeen Art Gallery marking the 700th anniversary of the Stocket Charter granted by Robert the Bruce to Aberdeen on 10th December 1319. “By our present charter confirmed to our Burgesses and Community of Aberdeen” Many visitors to Aberdeen are familiar with the statue of Robert the Bruce outside Marischal College holding aloft said Charter. Phil and Prof. Boardman gave some background to the granting of the Charter and the work done to preserve it in its current state for display. The Burgess will be involved in organising events throughout next year to celebrate the 700 years. Photo shows the Lord Dean and Phil Astley with the Stocket Charter.
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