Wednesday 18 July 2012

Max’s Walk, July 12

If I seem to be obsessed with the weather at the moment - well I suppose I am. The day of Max’s Walk was the first morning I  opened the curtains to blue skies and so it remained.

Max Nicholson was the father of Piers Nicholson the current Master Tyler and Bricklayer.  Under Max's chairmanship the Silver Jubilee Walkway, as it was known then, was originally laid down in 1977 as the main feature of the work of the Environmental Committee, set up by the London Celebrations for The Queen's Silver Jubilee. Her Majesty The Queen opened it by unveiling a plaque, on the night of the Thames fireworks celebrations on 9 June 1977.

Starting in 2006, a number of people who knew Max have commemorated this by walking a section of the walk and this year was no different, except of course that his son was Master of his company. Accompanied by a number of Masters of other Companies, Piers led the walk from the front of City Hall through the City, past the Guildhall, to the banks of the Thames, just in front of the City of London Boys School. We met up with the Lord Mayor accompanied by Sheriff and Alderman Wendy Mead by the large sundial above Tower Hill tube station and continued on our way and they accompanied us for part of the way.

The sun shone and as we were all wearing our badges we attracted some attention.  The Lord Mayor was side-tracked by a group of school children and stayed behind to talk to each of them before catching us up.

This is one of the quirky things that can happen during one’s year as Master. What was also interesting is that where the walk ended was in front of a Polar Sundial, designed by Piers and built by the Royal Engineers to present to the City Corporation for the Millennium.  You can see more information about the sundial here.

The photographs below show the opening of the Sundial in 1999 by the then Lord Mayor; the current Lord Mayor addressing the group before we continued on our way and Piers and the Lord Mayor, haloed by the sun.  Not the best quality photograph but I like it.







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