Replies, or lack of from 'buddies'

BrianK · Replies, or lack of from 'buddies'

Advice is asked for from the Forum. When the buddy system idea was first floated I put my name down straight away and duly recieved my four names and addresses. Did a 'one covers all' letter and sent them off. I know at least one person got his, Brian Neill of Stockport because Tom Neal said he'd told him via his Christmas card. In my letter I said that we could all keep in touch via paper and quill or the good old fashioned telephone. Explained in great detail how the system would work and sat back awaiting replies. Not a word from any of 'em! One of two things I believe, they no longer live at the address given or they aren't interested. I know I'm not the only one this has happened to, so any ideas people? Had a word with Ernie and he suggested I phone these four people. Really don't feel like going to the time and expense and at the end of the day, why should I? (I was brought up with the expression, manners maketh the man). I must say that I feel rather agrieved when people like Marlene and Ernie go to great lengths for these people and this happens. Any ideas people and what would you do? Perhaps its happenend to you? Await your replies with interest.

shorep

Ditto all that,I can understand that not everybody is living the internet dream,or have not got computers,considering all the problems,(get the latest,pay the earth,next day out of date.)
When the postman walks up the garden path at four miles an hour in overdrive,plops a letter on the mat with a return address and that person cannot be bothered to respond,what is one supposed to think.
I also feel that after all the hard work of Marlene,Ernie and co,chasing up a brilliant idea it shows a very sad lack of COMMON courtesy,and lord knoes I can be identified with the first bit!!

harold hirst · Buddies

I too contacted the 4 buddies sending a short letter explaining why I was in contact enclosed with a Christmas card, but have not heard from any of them. Will see what happens when I send the first News Letter.

Harold Hirst.

Bill Fry

Me to, but I am not going to be put off by a zero reply, I to enclosed a Christmas Card and short note. However I do wish to make any comment other than I will post off the news letter when published. I know that Marlene and all involved have put in loads of their time etc. But In the spirit of things I for one will do my bit - however come the second issue it might be different.

kerby

My four buddies all replied very quickly and one I have spoken to on the phone for an hour having not communicated for 53 years. As a result more photos have arrived on the site, one of which included myself. I have been grateful of the opportunity to contact old comrades. Keith Laughing

GerryK · Buddy List

Must say I have to report the same apathy, havent had any replies from my four buddies either. Can only hope that the News Letter, when it goes out will generate a little more interest. Keep smiling Marlene. Smile

Tom Neal

One of my buddies I was already in contact with but not hearing from the others I sent out another letter enclosing a SAE asking them to confirm receipt.
I received one letter back from the current occupant saying the person I was writing to had not lived there for a least four and a half years.
I also received an email from one whose mail had just caught up with him as he had just moved to Belfast.
From the fourth still nothing heard.
Tom

RonB

I thinkTom's identified the problem. Unless people are active members or very well organised they probably wouldn't think of notifying the group when they change address. I've had one reply out of three, but will send the first newsletter anyway to the addresses I have. Cast your bread upon the water........
(The cynic would continue with " and it will go soggy." but we're not cynics are we?)

Best wishes to all.

Ron

Terry Brenchley · Buddies

Since despatching the specimen front sheet of the newsletter together
with a Christmas Card to my 3 buddies, I have only heard from one of
them. However, what I propose to do is to enclose a longer letter with
the first full copy of the newsletter, to see if that evinces any interest!
The fact that some of these guys might have moved address is a bit of
a problem, although one would hope that they would have notified the Langeleben Reunion administration had that been the case!
Anyway, gonna wait and see until after the first full copy!

Ernie Callaghan · Replies from buddies

Since the "buddie" allocation we have been contacted by about 20 members who have found out that they are on the internet after all and would not be needing the buddying service and could they receive the Newsletter electronically.
40 of the e-mails we sent were returned as not able to deliver for various reasons, after a lot of man/woman hours and many phone calls Marlene and I have managed to amend our records and are satisfied that the newsletter will now reach over 90% of the membership one way or the other.
I would suggest to "Buddies" that if there is no acknowledgement after the first issue of the newsletter the apathetic recipients should be dropped
from the schedule, it will be their loss.

BrianK

Seems a good idea Ernie, will probably do as you suggest.

paul croxson

being an idle bugger and a bit mean, before writing I looked my lot up on the on-line telephone directory. THis gave confirmation of two addresses and one had moved but not that far. The fourth was already active but had failed to keep Ernie informed of a change of address. He is an Occifer so tyhat's quite understandable!
I had some good conversations - certainly not a waste of time and one is coming to the 2009 reunion as a result.
For those who do not know 'BT' on the web has a good directory service and it is free.
Another thing was that Brian Cox's photos - particularly of young Kerby brought back memories. My Wife asks why there are none of me on the site. Not quite true but if you look at those which are there you will readily understand why there are so few.

marleneandgypo

Sorry to be a bit slow in responding to this topic. I am just finishing a special magazine which is currently being proofread and required a lot of research in that it is for our church's 50th anniversary. I wanted to do it in 1959 style and also reprint the newspaper of the week with the reports in of the opening on 25th January. I also found adverts (a van cost £500 in those days...) and other memorabilia, it was great, loved it.

Now the buddy issue. We too have not received any response yet and one of ours is Bob Kay and we know Bob and we are 100% sure that we have the address right and that he attends the reunions so I think maybe some aren't responding until there is something more to respond to. Fir those that have responded we have had photos and reunions and it has been wonderful to witness the silent members 'waking up.'

As Ernie said we spent weeks going through all e-mail addresses, catching bouncing e-mails, double checking, amending and now have 222 members and are sure their e-mail addresses for now are correct. Up until now we have had a few messages saying they have not received a response, but that means though that probably over 150 or more non internet buddies probably DID get theirs. As someone said, possibly a phone call may give an answer, or let me know and I'll ring them. We are on talk anytime so my calls are free so happy to do it - so long as I don't have any jealous wives chasing this old Naafi girl for bothering their husband Wink

Ernie and I will be talking at the weekend to discuss the way forward so I can begin to bring the March newsletter to life but more on that in the Newsletter section after the weekend and your input will be welcomed.

Main thing will be to remember we only have 4 pages and we want to include photos, so any articles must be fairly short at first to fit as much into it as possible. We would like to bring a taster to those who have never seen this site but also news to one and all.

Marlene

Tom Neal

Just an update from my buddies.
I have received an email from my fourth buddie so I now have a 75% result.
Tom

vic swain · toppling the tower!

hello to the two people that know me,and hello to them that don't. my name is vic swain,i was at Langeleben 63-64. do you remember the day it was decided to dismantle an obsolete radio mast ?it's a classic! complete farce. let me know. regards,vic.

paul croxson

Welcome Vic.
Now that you have proved that you can write, is there ANY other reason why you should not write the story up for inclusion in the Living History.
There was another story of Langeleben masts in the 50's. There was no secure storage at Langeleben in the early days and so the ammunition was carefully stowed under one of the masts whcich was fine until the mast was removed

marleneandgypo · Re: toppling the tower!

Sounds like a story for the newsletter Vic!!!

kerby

Paul, Does that mean that the area under my bed in the stores was a safe one. That is where the amo box was stored whilst I was Storeman. A box with just over 100 rounds in, sealed with brown sticky tape signed by Capt Jim Prescott. Along with the cigarette rations. Keith Rolling Eyes

ken vipond

I remember the mast incident very well,i was the one operating the winch truck and as Vic say,s what a farce,i don,t want to give to much detail if its going to be a story in our paper,best regards from Ken

paul croxson

I can never remember Keith whether you came before or after Stu Brisley but yes, I think it was the same box with or without the five rounds down the DF hut.
And!!!!!!
If our HON Ed is going to pinch all the BEST stories before I get them for the History I will remove all my support, belt braces - the lot!

ken vipond

Hi Paul,may i suggest that you wait until such stories have been published in the news letter and then purloin the stories into the history book,and by the way those braces you mention would,nt be service ones by any chance would they,best regards from ken.

David Thomas · Vic Swain

Halla..bloody..lula Vic can write, well done, great to hear from you. As I said on the phone when we spoke back last year, the main memory of masts and you, is the snowy night you thought it would be a great idea to climb the mast. Dan Bailey was duty officer, he didn’t think it was a good idea, but then these officer types never did have much of a sense of humour. Was it your shoes you threw at him or your underpants? It’s been a while and the old grey cells are not what they were. All the Best. Dave T

Camembert · "Buddy" Letters

Greetings, all!
Treat me gently, this is my "debut"! I'll try not to put noses out of joint - but might fail!
Some of you may have had the dubious pleasure of my acquaintance - in a bygone era - if you were really unlucky!
Although a Langeleben Reunion member I have, for my sins, failed to attend any of the reunions! However, I did recently receive a "buddy" letter right out of the blue from a guy I'd never heard of. I was completely bemused even although the sender was totally polite etc etc.
To be fair, I guess I was somewhat blase about the whole thing and was slightly irked at first that I'd been sent what seemed like a kind of patronising letter, as if to say "let's see if the old bugger's still breathing - the poor old sod might need a helping hand", or whatever.
I must admit that I haven't replied, simply because there was no actual insistence that I should, plus the fact as I've outlined above.
Personally I now realise that it was sent with the best intentions, but now that I've discovered this medium / website etc, I can state quite categorically that I'm still alive and kicking (just!) and will be using this as my way of "keeping in touch".
Cheers,
Fred McLoughlin (Langeleben 78-81)

M1j6horn · Buddies

Having been nominated as a 'Buddy' I did what Paul Croxon did and checked the addresses of my buddies, one, my old mate Jock Morrison fom 9 Sigs days was one and we had a reunion up in Wakefield in January, and very fluid it was too, 2 of the others were listed as still at the addresses I was supplied with, so I sent out a covering letter with the dummy front page, asking if they could contact me to confirm their interest in receiving the newsletter.... A big blank zero I am afraid. I sent them all their copy of the newsletter today so lets hope there is some sort of response now. I did notice that one of my 'Buddies' names is on the list as attending the Konigslutter reunion so I will be able to check out at least one of my buddies then!

Good luck to you one and all.

See you in June

Tom Allum

paul croxson

At least you/we tried, Tom
I had a mixed but overall a good reception from my buddy contacts and I think that it has been a thoroughly worthwhile exercise. Ernie is to be congratulated on his efforts on the mailing list. If we do not tell him when we move or change email addresses it is hardly his fault but a conscious effort to keep him informed has to be made. Sadly I added this task to the list 'Things to do when I die' that my Wife asked me to prepare.
Better to do these things when the threat to fall off this World is still distant and hazy and I still have most of my marbles (I have haven't I?)

marleneandgypo · Re: "Buddy" Letters

Hi Fred and welcome

Thanks for being brave enough to voice what maybe one or two recipients of our newsletter may be thinking.

The idea of a newsletter was birthed last year when we we talking on the forum about trying to include all of our members more. With half of us on the internet and half of us not, it seemed like the ones without internet were missing out on the comradeship that we all enjoy so we looked for a way to bring us all together more. I am the editor of two other magazines, one at work and one award winning parish magazine of which I have been editor for 9 years. So with the need there and the means to fill the need we thought why not? Cash was a problem as having it all printed officially and sent out from any kind of central point would have emptied the coffers somewhat so Ernie and I set up a buddy system whereby 60 fantastic volunteers offered to print up 4 copies each and send them to their 4 allocated buddies.

Many have had good responses, some have had no response (Clive and I haven't had any response to our 4), but we have had responses from relatives to say a member had died and we hadn't heard about it.

Ernie and I have spoken about this and I am quite happy to take the name of anyone concerned about a non-responsive 'buddy' and give them a call and see what happens as UK calls cost us nothing at all.

One thing that the dummy run and test revealed was incorrect e-mail addresses and we managed to put right between us 231 e-mail addresses and received no returns when the newsletter went out. Maybe with the next newsletter in August we could ask people to write to confirm receipt so we can keep our address list up to date? What does everyone think?

Thanks again Fred. You won't be receiving a hard copy anymore now we know you have e-mail, Ernie will let your 'buddy' know.

Best regards
Marlene
Editor
The Listening Post

David Thomas

Hi Guys, I’ve had a bit of a mixed bag in response to my buddies. Vic Swain came up on the net, so we can count that as one success. I’ve phoned and spoken to John Bate and sent his copy on. Peter Cuckow the RSA administrator has agreed to forward a copy to Bill Garner, the only person I haven’t been able to contact is Bob Crookes in Northern Ireland, I’ve tried phoning him, but the delightful canned lady from BT tells me the lines are busy, and have been continuously for three days so I think Ian Paisley must be having a quiet fireside chat. Reaching three out of four doesn’t seem too bad.
Probably the best outcome for everyone is if the mailshot results in someone else joining us on the forum. All the best. Dave.

marleneandgypo

or at a Reunion Dave!!

But thanks for all your efforts, you are a star!

Replies, or lack of from 'buddies'

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toppling the tower!

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