Peter Willson, BWT Deputy Chairman and Life President (interviewed in 2006)
Richard Ashness (L) and Peter Willson (R) by the President's Tree, October 2009.
The Honorary Deputy Chairmanship of the BWT is a demanding role in terms of time, and Peter Willson, who has held the post since the formation of the Trust in 2004, has been devoting at least 20 hours a week to it.
Peter was born in Hoo in 1937, one of six children, in the house his father had built two years earlier. At 13 he went to Rochester Technical School where he studied printing and bookbinding, and in 1953 was apprenticed to Mackays of Chatham when the firm numbered only 40 staff. Apart from his National Service (spent on active service in Cyprus 1956-58) he stayed in the firm, seeing it grow hugely, and finished as Manager of the Diary Division. It was a hefty and stressful job, and Peter, responsible for administration, editing and sales, was forced to retire at 59 on health grounds. Once recovered, however, he was soon looking for voluntary work, and decided to help people suffering from Alzheimer's Disease, at Darland House in Gillingham. The Matron was amazed at his offer, but the work, assisting residents in all sorts of practical ways, never depressed him, because he is a true optimist.
In 2001 Peter and Val moved to Bearsted where he had already been a member of the Bowls Club for 17 years. One day in 2003 Peter spotted someone he didn't know putting a notice up in the Church Landway, went to talk to him, and met Richard Ashness for the first time. Richard's ideas for a gift of land in Trust for the village caught Peter's imagination, and he immediately offered to help in any way he could. The die was cast. Since that day Peter has worked on the site himself, arranged dozens of meetings, delivered hundreds of leaflets (in his 1968 tartan red MGB roadster) organised countless volunteers and made innumerable contacts by phone and email. Richard says "without Peter the project just wouldn't have happened."
Peter says that the high point for him so far has been the completion and opening of the paths for wheelchairs (a task very dear to his heart) for which he personally delivered invitations to more than 40 organisations. 250 people (including children from five schools) saw the paths opened in September 2005. Since then the Deputy Chairman's diary has continued to be dominated by his work for the Trust. Recently a site meeting at eight am by Major´s Lake took place in pouring rain because Peter refused to have it postponed!
So as you walk around the new paths, think of the man who, on the first planting session in 2004 lined up the donors of 50 trees with 50 plaques and 50 planting holes, arranged experts to help, and made sure that there was absolutely no muddle. In 2005 a similar operation involved 90 trees over a much larger area! Planned like military operations, both days went smoothly. The Deputy Chairman's organisational flair, and that buoyancy which overrides endless opposition from all directions, have been invaluable assets to the Bearsted Woodland Trust.
