A report by the Royal Berkshire Fire Brigade had left performance centres in Bracknell facing closure unless they tightened up on their fire prevention in 1980.

One of the buildings under threat was Bracknell College, which used its hall for lunchtime music recitals as well as evening and weekend concerts, being the town centres only concert hall.

Meanwhile a few miles away, South Hill Park had been told to remove its wall hangings along the stairs, because the materials that they had been made of were a fire risk.

A Wokingham based entrepreneur was making his mark 39 years ago, when inventor Barry Pacey came up with a quicker way to paint ‘white line’ road markings.

His new invention came about after he had witnessed a traffic jam last for three days outside his office window, whilst the painfully slow work of marking lines in the road was delayed by heavy rain.

Local councils such as Reading had already placed orders and Berkshire County Council had also endorsed the firm because the whole process was cheaper and more efficient.

Wokingham’s top sidecar driver racer, John Roberts, was celebrating winning his first race of the season at Tweseldown, near Fleet, along with his passenger George Skeates in 1980.

The pair were looking forward to the next seven rounds of the British Championship and this was also going to be a big season for them in the European races.

Although it was an expensive sport John would always take his wife and their two young children to all the UK races, he explained a little more to the Bracknell News:” The competition is exceedingly keen, this win will bring a lot of prestige and good standing abroad.”

The motoring section of the News published a feature on their newly installed Gilbarco “Highline” petrol pumps at Brookside Autopoint garage.

By the 1980’s the era of self-service was replacing the petrol attendant, who would fill up your car for you on arrival.

Company secretary Nina Archer explained:” The new pumps are clean and easy to operate, but we still have two staff here to serve our customers.”

Wokingham’s Lions Club were gearing up for their Easter event in aid of the Ken Thomas Body Scanner Appeal by displaying a 1930 Talbot vintage car- which was due to be the star of the show.

Owned by Tony Barker from Wokingham, the classic vehicle had recently been used during the filming of Agatha Christies’s “Why didn’t they ask Evans?”, due to be shown on television at the end of the month.

Another charity event in aid of the scanner appeal was held at Wellington College in Crowthorne- a special medieval banquet.

A strolling minstrel, an American singing group and a trio of recorder players entertained the guests during the evening, whilst the college students presented a wedding anniversary cake to Mr and Mrs Thomas during the finale.