It is with great sadness that we announce the death of one of our Brimstone authors, Ron Hansford, author of the poetry collection Flying into the Blizzard. The only consolation is that he was fully active mentally and physically right up to the end, and, like many of us, would probably have preferred to go this way rather than remain incapacitated and bedridden. Sebastian Hayes, one of the Brimstone Directors and a personal friend of the deceased, attended the moving funeral service. It was largely a ‘secular’ service, doubtless because of the expressed wish of the deceased and the vicar read out several of Ron’s poems and gave an account of his very active and, it would seem, generally happy life. As the vicar mentioned it is very unusual these days to come across someone who lived practically the whole of his life in the house where he was born and brought up, a house which was itself built by his builder grandfather. Ron was a well-read person who had many intellectual interests but he retianed a taste for manual work, looking after the house and extensive garden himself and keeping prize bantam hens right up to the end. He will be greatly regretted and he was such a well-liked person that the funeral was attended by such a large crowd of people that over half of us had to stand as there were no vacant pews available !
We extend our sympathies to his widow, Sylvia Oldroyd, also a Brimstone poet, and to his only son, Roger, currently doing research at Southampton University. An appreciation of Ron’s poetry, entitled Ron Hansford : Countryman Poet can be viewed on the Brimstone website, Shorter Works section, and if you wish for a printed copy you can get in touch with me via Brimstone Press and send sae. I distributed many of these booklets at the Reception after the funeral.
Sebastian Hayes
