From this point on the pace of activity increases dramatically, as you may expect. We left the last page at July 1955 therefore there are less than two years to completion. The level of available documentation has increase comensurately with this increased level of activity. To present this in the clearest way, I will separate the monetary aspect from the decisions taken in relation to the building itself.

As ever the problem in presenting monetary values is relating them either to present day values or to set them in some sort of meaningful context. It is a problem that I am not confident in solving. Rather than trying to relate them to now I will tell you that in 1955 a gallon of petrol (4.56 litres) cost 4s 6d (22½p); the weekly wage of an agricultural labourer was £6.4s.10d (£6.24p) and his pint of beer cost him 9d (4p). The average price of a house in 1955 was £2,064. The anticipated cost of St Marks was £6000 or 3 houses.

With the above figures in mind here is a transcript of a set of hand written notes, 8 pages in total, dated 17 September 1955. (Reproduced as close to the original as possible)

PAGE 1
Some notes for PCC meeting on item "New Church Hall"


NEW CHURCH HALL

Programme

Aim : Building to be done in Summer of 1956 & the Hall to be in use in Autumn of 1956. Order to be placed as soon as we see our way financially to meet loans.

Financial Position
Min  £6000
Present Position £1000 grant sanctioned by Salisbury Board of Finance & Accepted by us
£1000 loan interest free - repayable in 10 years, as grant
£500 Donation received
£3000 loan interest free if instalments repaid as due - granted by
  Ch C'mmision & Accepted by Bd of Finance
£5500
  leaving  £500 due to be raised by us in cash

PAGE 2
Suggested method of raising money required

amt required is £500 cash in first year

and £100 per an for ten years to repay Bd of Finance loan
£150 per an for 20 years to repay Ch Commisioner
loan per Bd of Finance
i.e. £250 per an for 10 years & then £150 per an
for a further ten years.

methods :-
 Church collections £50 per an PCC arrange see separate note
 Sale of work etc £50 per an Mothers Union (with
help at sale etc) First
sale Autumn 1956 when
hall open thereafter one
a year & other entertainments.
Covenants¹ &} aim at £100 per ann covenant contributions
Subscriptions} earning £66 per an I.Tax Recovery at estimated
?????? of 8/-s in £ for the seven
years. Subscription (annual)
by those who cannot covenant
£1.13.4 each is requ'd for £1 covenant

PAGE 3
 Donations :initial donations are required to
make up the £500 not covered
as ????? actual receipts & sanct loans.

obviously there is room for elasticity in the
above, increase in one head can permit reduction
in another. If we can complete the work under
£6000 we shall not want so much.
If we don't have to pay first instalments on loans
in 1956 then collections,covenents subs of 1956 can
go towards this £500. For that we must start
right in early to collect - say let D day be
1 Nov 1955 (or earlier).

PAGE 4
Raising Money for the New Church Hall

Collections in Church

  For 1956 (& onwards until our financial position allows us to revive our contributions to charitable?? works
  & societies) limit special collections as at present fixed very securely. One new Hall may be said to
  rank as a Home Mission & we have to concentrate on that.

  Retain :-
At Easter - April 1 1956Easter offering
Rememberance Sunday Nov 11 1956 Earl Haigh Fund
Dec 25 Xmas DayC of E Childrens Soc
One Sunday forOverseas Missions
Have 5 or more special collections for the new church hall
aim £50 per annum
1st Sun in LentFeb 19
Whit SundayMay 20
3rd after TrinJune 17
9th after TrinJuly 29
Harvest Fest SunSept 30 if £50 not reached by Harvest Fest sunday then have another in Oct.

PAGE 5
on Trin Sun (May 27)1956 we have normally in the last 2 -3 years a special collection for ordination candidates but the funds required for this purpose are included in the ???? The special collection is really only recommended by the Diocese as an extra stimulus where parishes collect for the Church by special collections. It is not so in this Parish is not required.

If the Good Friday collection is by any church to be given to a Palestine mission this could be continued. The results are not as much as our ordinary Sundays collections.

Boxes
It would be well to try & get help from visitors to our church. If to save expense no ????box is installed, we might indicate existing box as ???? to W P Church & one near Hall & divide proceeds 50/50. (Proceeds might be considered as taking the £50 aimed at from W Parley church collections.

PAGE 6
Organisation

At the Head of the central direction is
The Rector


The success fo the Appeal will depend however not only on his lead but on the help he receives.
The money raising sub committee has been appointed and these notes, subject to decisions
at the PCC meeting are for their consideration.
They will make their proposals to the PCC

  I suggest divide the Parish into certain areas e.g Golf Links Road
New Road above site
New Road below site & ch
Have one chief organiser for each area who would personally canvas for Covenants
Subs Donations (he can arrange for anyone else to help him in his area)
Covenants offered to be intimated to whosoever takes on office work of Covenants & he would

PAGE 7
deal with these

Query is a separate Treasurer or an Asst to the PCC Treasurer required? A separate account should be arranged at the Bank. We have already over £500 and it should be on deposit.

It would be difficult to have a separate Secretary for the Church Hall Appeal Fund. The church Hall will involve the secretary PCC in quite a lot of extra work & he should not be expected to take on any other jobs in this appeal. or ??????, if he does its secretarial work unless of course he wishes to. Covenants generally come from from people one knows or who knows one, hence value of local appeal organisers in small areas.
Arrange for someone to take up Furniture (chairs & tables) & fittings (crockery, curtains). We need to know what exp. additional to cost of Hall we have to meet.

PAGE 8
Publicity
To revue expenditure, with the permission of the Rector use the Pariash Mag as far as we can.
Say Have a two page article in the November issue,which could be reprinted as a separtate leaflet (include receipts to date)
Put copies of the Mag (or the leaflets) in every house in the Parish - charge cost of extra copies to the Appeal Fund.

Subsequently show in Magazine results of the Appeal under Covenants Subs & Donations by name with amts all down to £1 and competed by smaller amounts ????? without name.
Aim at gathering support from shops in West Parley - have some one person responsible for this query the Par Mag See who is in touch with the shopkeepers for refurbishment purposes
dated 17 September 1955

For those of you who wish to see the original notes follow this link,opens in new window.

Some comments on this document may be appropriate. First, not included in the transcript above is the note in the margin on page 8 which says "PCC members to be asked to give their contributions now, so as to give the Appeal a good start off". Being a PCC member then could mean you needed some ready cash available. There is a signature at the end of the document, it does not appear to be the Revd Freeman nor Charlewood but the tone and contents of the document suggest Charlewood the PCC Secretary, though it may be the signature of Mr Canning who was active in church affairs in this period. As these notes are amongst the historical documents it is likely it was adopted as a working document. The donation of £500 is a mystery at present. There is no record where this came from.

On page 5 reference is made to a "Hall"; this is West Parley Hall not far from All Saints church. See the map on page 1 of this history. This hall is no longer in existance.

The task facing the Rector, Churchwardens and PCC in monetary terms was enormous. The £50 collections represented 1333 pints of beer or 222 gallons of petrol. I remember that in those days I felt well off if I had 5s.0d (25p) in my pocket. Even though the bulk of the money came without difficulty, but a lot of red tape, by way of loans, the parish still had to repay them. At a time when the collection plate would contain pennies (old) and silver coins the writer of the notes above was right to be concerned regarding their servicing. Let us go to page 15 and briefly look at the formalities concerning the loans.

Go to Page 15

Go to : 13 : 12 : 11 : 10 : 9 :

¹COVENANT : This was a tax efficient way of making charitable or similar donations at that time. It worked like this - the giver had to undertake (covenant) to give the same monthly or annual amount to the receiver for a period of 7 years. A document was signed to this effect which stated that the amount was coming out of your taxed income. At the end of each tax year the receiver would submit a claim to the Inland Revenue (now HM Revenue & Customs) who would then pay the tax originally deducted to the claimant, the receiver of the covenant. At the time of writing (2007) this has been replaced by the Give As You Earn scheme.