Eye - 26 May 2023

From A touching thank you to Joyful service

A touching thank you

Jean Scott-Barr, of Reading Meeting, shared a heartwarming tale of a Friend’s bequest with Eye.

She writes: ‘Many Friends knew, or knew of, Ted Milligan. He died in 2020 at age ninety-eight.’

Edward H (Ted) Milligan, among numerous Quaker connections, was librarian at Friends House for nearly thirty years and widely published on Quaker matters.

Jean shares that: ‘In his will he left, among other bequests, £25,000 to Faith Christian Group in Reading. This is the group that runs the “Readifood” food bank as well as “Bed for the Night”, offering shelter to street homeless people in the depth of winter. They also have a van that goes out to provide food and hot drinks to homeless people.

‘Faith Christian Group were so thrilled with the bequest that they used it to buy a new van for the nightly food run.

‘When they bought the van they arranged for it to have their logo and other details on it. I was asked for advice on how they could acknowledge that it was because of Ted’s bequest.

‘I have a pen and ink drawing of Ted and offered to lend it to them to copy his image onto the van. I was also asked what they might write to acknowledge the gift. I said it must just be something very simple, such as “Thank you Ted”.’

And here is the result Friends! (see above).

Channelled through songs

There are kind-hearted Quakers in Wales
Who will visit offenders in jails.
All those prisoners’ wrongs
Will be channelled through songs,
Any other way punishment fails.

Alec Davison

An inaugural recording

Friends House, on Euston Road in London, caught the eye of John Hall, of Clacton Meeting, in an unexpected place.

In the April 2023 edition of Gramophone he found a piece dated 1957 written in appreciation of Dennis Brain, a well-known French horn player. The piece was penned by Walter Legge, who founded the Philharmonia Orchestra in 1945.

Writing two months after Dennis Brain passed away, Walter Legge said of Dennis that he ‘was still officially an airman when I realised my long-laid plan of forming the Philharmonia Orchestra… The first time the orchestra met was to record the Tchaikovsky Concerto with [Benno] Moiseiwitsch, [George] Weldon conducting, in the Friends Meeting House. In the interval Dennis came to me and said, “This is going to be good. I didn’t think we should ever have an orchestra like this here”.’

Joyful service

Eye was moved by the ministry of Friends who spoke of the joy they found in Quaker service and gatherings. We hope that the sunshine pages could be a place to share rays of this light if Friends feel so moved. Get in touch via email to eye@thefriend.org!

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