Bear with seed packet from Kew
I touched briefly on the subject of the internet and the pitfalls of using it unquestioningly. I am, as you know, intending to move to Peterborough at the end of the year and I wanted to check up on the Peterborough Coin Club. I’m going to need to make friends when I move, and this seems as good a way as any. There’s a lot about it on the internet and it seems like a lively club with an annual Coin Fair. So far, so good. It meets monthly at the Peterborough Zoo.
Zoo? There is no zoo in Peterborough. Not in the Cambridgeshire one, at any rate. Then I realised what had happened. It’s happened before. Peterborough cropped up once before when I searched. I’m told it’s the canoe building capital of the world, which is a surprise as I hardly saw a canoe last time I lived there.
Bear in the Garden
It’s Peterborough, Ontario that grabs all the internet attention. Peterborough, Cambridgeshire is much less interesting, and its coin club, which hasn’t posted on Facebook since lockdown, meets in a Community Centre. Things aren’t looking good for this one . . .
There are three other Peterboroughs in the world – two in Australia and one in New Hampshire. One of the Australian ones was renamed in 1917 due to anti-German feeling in 1917 (it was originally Petersburg)Â and one was named after someone named Peter. Peterborough NH was named after a man called Peter too and Peterborough, Ontario, was named after the New Hampshire town.
This is a bit of a blow to civic pride – I had always imagined that they were all called after the original Peterborough. Still, Peterborough was originally called Medeshampstede in Anglo-Saxon times, changing to Gildenburgh and then Peterborough by the 12th Century, so even the original Peterborough isn’t really Peterborough.
I note, reading the article on Wiki, that we are twinned with ll the other Peterboroughs and with Ballarat. I didn’t know that.
Bear in a tree
On the other hand, see where your Internet research led. Hope there is an active coin club. And those bears sure are cute!
My internet research (otherwise known as drifting from pixel to pixel) does provide a lot of fun. 🙂
Right, so in as much as I live in Ballarat is there anything ‘twinable’ that I should or could do.
I’m not sure. I lived in Peterborough for around twenty years and my sister still lives there – we never knew we were twinned with Ballarat. It was only when I saw it on the Wiki page that I realised we were twinned. I will give it some thought . . .
You may be just what the club needs! A new intelligent, well-read member …… 🙂
If it still exists . . . I’m beginning to worry it may have closed.
Oh no! 😟
There will still be plenty to do. 🙂
Your arrival will bring such excitement to the coin world in Peterborough, that the society will become a hotbed of interest.
It is an interesting thought, but probably an exaggeration. 🙂
Town names and how they change over time are interesting. The town we moved from back east was called Granby, but the original name was Salmon Brook.
The American west seems to have a number of towns with unique names. Here’s another.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rough_and_Ready,_California
Not just an interesting place name, but a short-lived republic too, I see.
Granby is the name of a village near here and a well known pub name is the Marquis of Granby, named after an 18th Century general.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Manners,_Marquess_of_Granby
Granby, Connecticut was named for Granby, Massachusetts which was name for John Manners, Marquess of Granby, according to this link. Names travel… 🙂
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granby,_Connecticut
Interesting link, including a coin and an old tree – my favourites!
I trust you will find the Club
I will find something. 🙂