Sittingbourne ME Postcode Group
Now surely there can't be many people who live in Sittingbourne and use Facebook who have not stumbled across the fantastic ME Sittingbourne Post Code Group website.For those who have yet to sample this incredible resource, it is a Facebook group who's sole purpose is to share memory's of Sittingbourne and perhaps reacquaint former friends. Aimed at anyone who lives or has lived in the Swale area there is an abundance of photos, memories and discussions in which to delve.
Mark Foster
Ever keen as we are to find out more we approached creator Mark Foster who very generously agreed to answer some questions as follows:-
Q. Where did the idea come from?
A. The idea came from the ME Medway postcode group. I lived in Gillingham prior to moving to Sittingbourne in 1993 and kept in touch because I grew up there, but their site tends to be a broader spectrum of requests, adverts and gossip as well as history. So one evening on a whim set up the ME Sittingbourne post code group, concentrating only on memories, photos and the history of Sittingbourne and surrounding areas including Sheppey, Faversham etc.
Q. Have you done anything like this before, or was it in at the deep end?
A. I had recently taken over Swale topics from someone who moved out of the area but its only a small topics group of about 200, So I suppose it was in at the deep end although at the time I didn't realise how popular it was going to be, we were getting 200 request to join every week at one point!
Q. What do you do for a day job?
A. I am a metalworker for a local chandelier company Wilkinson PLC, by royal appointment since 1947 I believe. They moved to Bredgar about 5 years ago from London and my boss David Willkinson has strong connection with the local Rotary Club.
Q. Do you have any help running this?
A. Help...oh yes ! With so many members help is a must and I couldn't do it without Darryl Sharp, Les
Cadwallider, and Paul Cadwallider.
Q. Are there any plans for the future in terms of either expanding what you have or branching out with
other projects?
A. To be honest I probably spend to much time on it now, so at the moment we will just see where
this takes us.
Q. What has been the reaction from the local history groups, if any?
A. I don't know what local history groups think, I hope we have some on as members, as they and all the locals make the site. You could say its their site not mine, without them its nothing, so a big thank you from me.
Q. It has become such a fantastic resource for local historians as well as the more casual users, it strikes me that it would be fantastic if you were able to group, collate or index the photos in some way, but I guess that isn’t possible is it?
A. Trying to put things into order I think would be one massive project. I think Les our admin organiser has tried to allocate some photos into groups based on when they were posted but its good to rummage through the photos, and we are not that organised I'm afraid.