Norden celebrates St George’s Day

Dozens of people turned out to Norden Jubilee Park to celebrate St George’s Day

Dozens of people turned out to Norden Jubilee Park to celebrate St George’s Day.

Attractions on offer for villagers included a brass band, a chocolate hunt for children and also face-painting.

St George also made an appearance and slew the dragon.

The event was open by the Mayor of Rochdale, Councillor James Gartside.

The Friends of Norden Jubilee Park set up after the success of the Party on the Park to mark the Queen’s Jubilee in 2012.

All members of the group are residents from Norden and passionate about making the park a key feature of the village. They hope to encourage the whole community to make use of it.

The group plan to hold a series of events at the park so that it is a hub of the community and have already successfully put on a Christmas Carol event which saw dozens of people turn out to sing traditional yuletide hymns.

The group have a very strong link with businesses in the area especially with the Bridge Inn pub and the landlord of the pub sits on the committeeand are working with the Council and the Norden Area Forum to site a memory tree on the park as another one of its key goals is to make sure the park is tidy, clean and has nice features for residents to look at.

Councillor Anne Metcalfe was instrumental in the founding of the group. We were very saddened by her death. We will be holding a fundraiser in her memory in the near future. 

A spokesperson said: “We think we have achieved a lot in the short space of time we have been going and we are really looking forward to organising more events for the benefit of the community.

“Things are tough for all families at the moment so we hope by providing free events for the communities on a park that has previously been underused, we can spread a little joy around.

“The park is in a great location and can really be a fantastic community asset. We really want it to be one of the jewels in Norden’s crown.

“We are going to work with other community groups in the village including the Norden Carnival to help make our village a fantastic place to live.

“We are all passionate about our village.”