Wokingham youngsters had a sporting chance to keep active during the long summer holidays in 1978, as St Crispin’s Sports Centre had organised a vast number of activities to keep them occupied.

Gymnastics and trampolining were the best attended, with dance gymnastics proving so popular that more classes had to be hastily arranged.

Manager David Cross told the Bracknell News:” We have more than 100 children most days and up to 300 on others, I am delighted that local people are getting the best out of this excellent amenity.”

The world-famous potter, Bernard Leach, travelled from his Cornish home to attend a Baha’i summer school at Bearwood College 41 years ago, where he joined their open-air exhibition. Mr Leach presented the Wokingham Art Group with a signed copy of his book, “Beyond East and West” but in his acceptance speech, Arthur Waller, Secretary, announced that it should be enjoyed by a greater number of people and presented it to the bibrary.

Mr. Waller told the Bracknell News:” It was the last day of our two-week exhibition and it has been a tremendous success, local artists sold approximately 4,000 pieces in that time.”

Local archers Sue Wilcox and Rachel Fenwick announced that they were disappointed to come 11th and 12th in the ladies’ individual event at the European Championships in Warwick.

The Great Britain team’s combined score of 3,524 put the hosts in 5th position at the end of the shoot-out, with Russia, Poland and Finland taking home the medals.

Sue told the Bracknell News:” We knew the Russians and Poles would be the teams to beat, but we didn’t know much about the other squads as we rarely hear about their overseas results.”

A monkey, a clown and a ‘Mighty Atom’ entertained children at the Wokingham Adventure Playground in the summer of 1978.

All were members of the South Hill Park Theatre Group, who had been spending the holidays travelling across Berkshire, recording their biggest turn out of children in Wokingham.

“The Mighty Atom” astounded the crowds of youngsters with his strong man act, especially as he eventually revealed himself as five-year-old Adam Seaney.

Pop singer Alan Carvell visited the Wokingham skateboard park 41 years ago, to promote his new album “Skateboard Rampage” and give a demonstration of his own skills.

His previous hit single “LA Run”, which had a musical style similar to the Beach Boys “surfer” songs, had charted at 31 in the UK and reached number 1 in Sweden.

The Bracknell News reviewed the new soundtrack album for the forthcoming musical comedy film “Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”, which had just been released in UK cinemas.

Despite a galaxy of stars such as the Bee Gees and Peter Frampton re-recording the Beatles iconic tracks the News reviewer called it “an unmitigated

disaster.”

The film was met by extremely negative reviews and eventually came 76th in the VH1 “100 Most Shocking Moments in Rock and Roll.”