and welcomes Fiona McReynolds as the new Chair.

2022 sees BUSCA celebrating its Golden Jubilee and 50 years of championing, entertaining and enriching Barrow life and also heralds the beginning of a new era.

After 20 years as BUSCA Chair, Judith Rodgers is pleased to be handing over the leadership baton into the very capable hands of Fiona Laywood as the new Chair and Nicola Noble her Vice.

This is far from a goodbye though, as Judith will be as active as ever on the BUSCA board of trustees, the library, Barrow Voice and website management committees and on the Parish Council, from where, as always, she will be ready to help and share her knowledge and experience.

Always active and with a distinct sense of fun, Judith has been at the fore-front of community activities and events for more than 50 years. From the earliest days of the 1970s she has been a member of the Association Committee. She took the Chair in 2003 and has led BUSCA through the increasingly turbulent and distressing years of the 2010s through the closure of the Community Centre, the abandoned search for a new one and the pandemic and leaves it now on the cusp of a bright new future.

Even in the gloomiest times Judith somehow managed to keep us looking forward, to be upbeat, celebrate and grow what we still had – The Panto Group, Murder Mysteries, Youth Theatre productions, a Community Library, Barrow Voice, the Heritage Group, Twinning Association, five Village Websites the Scarecrow Festival and a new events team who are already planning some exciting future village events including a river festival. So, no time for regrets, what is lost is lost – time to embrace the new.

Many will recognise Judith by sight as a parish councillor, or as she cycles round the village, tends the planters outside the library, when she played with the Charnwood Orchestra Concerts or even as the sometime elf-hatted, hi-vis jacketed person revelling in the excitement of the Christmas Street Market, but I don’t know how many know or appreciate how much she does behind the scenes as the instigator, enabler and the person ensuring that the often boring essentials are covered and events are a success. She is an assiduous negotiator and communicator, keeping people informed mainly through articles in Barrow Voice, the collective word count of which would fi ll a sizeable book.

Judith and BUSCA have benefited from the support and efforts of the many people who have travelled this journey with her, including her husband David Rodgers, who has also played a pivotal role, including a stint as Chair and now as Treasurer making sure that financially and legally all is well in the BUSCA world (see article on page 12 of Judith’s reminiscences).

Lin Webb