Old Lewesians Organisation Origins

Notes from Maurice Hobden - the original O L Webmaster

Maurice retired as Webmaster in 2010 but continued to oversee the website until his death in 2018. The OLO will be forever indebted to him.

I have tried to maintain the site in the same spirit although a few changes have been forced upon us when 'Compila' (our original host) updated their servers to use later versions of software. More recently, after several changes of ownership the latest host migrated site to yet another server with a swingeing increase in charges so we have moved to 'Namecheap'. That alas has meant some more software changes which I hope will not lead to too many problems - but Please contact me by email if you notice any.

Perhaps slightly more worrying is the fact that I'm fast approaching the age at which Maurice died and my deputy isn't far behind me. If you're a younger Old Lewesian or even a descendant of any Old Lewesian with an interest in website maintenance (familiarity with html & php preferred but not essential) please get in touch.

Original notes from Maurice Hobden

EEPING in contact with a widely scattered and mobile group such as the members of an old boys or old girls association was very difficult before the world wide web arrived. The task of keeping mailing lists up to date and the expense of postal mailing has now been largely overcome by using the Internet. Some OLs may find the new technology rather daunting but many are now turning to it with the help of children, grandchildren and friends. This OLO website is now the established centre of the Old Lewesian network.

Many Old Lewesians will have, probably in an old cardboard shoe-box on top of the wardrobe, a few old photos, school magazines and other items that would be of interest to a wider audience. Some of you may have the gift for telling a good yarn about old school days that would amuse, instruct and stir the memories of other OLs. Anything to help recall those early years and recollect old friends and happy days of yesteryear will be gratefully borrowed for display on the website.

www.old-lewesians.org.uk

This website is now a mature collection of memorabilia, gathered since 2000 from our members. This collection ranges from the serious to the comic, from the historical to the modern, in both textual and pictorial format. Your Webmaster, set out to gather the material from you and present it on your behalf, attributed or anonymous, on the Web site in an attractive form. Members did not have to be involved with the editing and publishing or have any other special expertise. We do the tricky technical stuff.

But I do need your help! My memories cover a mere seven years and I have little personal knowledge of the periods before and after that. My own stock of photos and documents is very small, but I do have memories that can easily be written up. What I would like YOU to do is to decide what contribution YOU can make with the resources and memories YOU have. Share those old photos, souvenirs and memories with other Old Lewesians from all periods.

Photos are a prime asset which can be made even more interesting with some pertinent text. If you can trot out an amusing tale (not libellous or scurrilous please) then put pen to paper or finger to keyboard. Aim for 500 words - exceptionally 1000 words.

The organisation and presentational style of the material depends on its nature. The OLO website is rather like a scrap book or school magazine. The current form has evolved as material has come to hand. It may be rather a jumble of items but it has been decided to keep the scrap book style. Serious historical records of the school, personal profiles, amusing poems, tall tales, panoramic photos, etc all presented in a light but informative tone.

The Old Lewesians Association had been dormant for many years and the work required to keep in touch with members devolved upon the Trustees of the Chapel Fund. The Chairman of the Trustees was Ivor Wycherley and their postal mailing list was the original basis for the OLO membership list on our database.

This website will keep you informed of their ongoing activities concerning the upkeep of the School Chapel which, it will be remembered, was dedicated to the memory of the OLs who fought and died in World War II.

How to contact your Webmaster

Please contact me by email so that we may discuss your proposed contribution. Then you will be sent the postal address for sending paper based material, eg photos, prints, magazines, newspaper cuttings, type or manuscript, etc. Turn-around time for getting your material back to you will NOT exceed four weeks and should be a lot less. I know how you value those old souvenirs! Remember to enclose your address for the return of your material. Please also indicate what personal details to give as attribution.

Before sending material for the website as attachments to emails please :-
1. Tell me in advance what you have and its file size.
2. Text should be plain text files.
3. Photos should be good quality JPG, GIF or PNG files.
4. Keep email attachments to less than 1000 Kbytes total.

Unidentified attachments will be deleted unopened and unread!

So, send me an advance email telling me what the attachment is and what size it is. You will then be asked to send it if I think it suitable. Please do not send irrelevant or banal trivia unconnected with the Old Lewesians. Please do not telephone me - email and post are my normal channels of communication.

To fulfil our obligations under the Data Protection Act our database containing personal details of OL members is open to the members themselves but not to non-members and casual visitors. Members can (and should) update their own details, such as email or postal address using "Update DB" or the Logon procedure. If this is not possible please send your new details by email to us.
The database is used to construct the Member List which you can use when sending emails or letters to other members. Just click on the email address above.