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One Man's Dream - the Bowl of Brooklands
Without the Bowl, Taranaki might struggle to attract big acts. It's an amazing setting and the big names like to perform there. There was a time though when the Bowl was a swamp at the bottom of a greasy hill.
The main act was the loudest frog and the audience fluttered through the trees. Then along came Eric.
Eric was an ideas man and his Bowl idea was an absolute cracker. That's what this week's story is about. It's a good read.
Rewind
The Bowl was built in the 1950s - the decade of Rock and Roll. Decide if the performers below were part of the 50s music era. Just answer true or false and check your answers at the end of this week's TreasureLink.
True or false? These people and groups were famous in the 50s:
- Elvis Presley
- The Beatles
- Cliff Richard
- Jimi Hendrix
- Bill Hailey and the Comets
Word watch
All the words and phrases below appear in this week's story. Choose the best meaning and check your choices when you read the story. The answers are at the end of this week's TreasureLink.
- din (a) dance and lights or (b) a jumble of loud noise
- demure (a) shy and modest or (b) trained ballet dancers
- good old Kiwi No. 8 wire ingenuity (a) extremely hard workers or (b) creative problem solvers
- proposal (a) a plan to be considered or (b) an offer of marriage
- infectious (a) catching or (b) deadly
- cottoned on (a) grabbed hold of (b) took a liking to
- pitched this idea (a) presented the idea or (b) worked on the idea
- discriminating (a) those that make careful choices and may have tastes difficult to please or (b) people that are extremely demanding
- waned (a) disappeared or (b) to decrease gradually in size
- amphitheatre (a) an outdoor stage or (b) a theatre surrounded by rising slopes
I have an idea Miss Jones!
All good ideas depend on a number of factors if they are to succeed. They've got to have a good person driving them- that was Eric and they need people behind them with vision.
That was Eric too. People with vision, look into the future to see the finished product.
Read the introduction to this week's story and then read A bright idea. Find out why Eric Handbury was just the man for the job.
Success factors?
To work out how much of a success an idea will be, can be done by considering the success factors.
Check out the PDF file below and put yourself in Eric's shoes. Decide if the idea had enough success factors to actually work.
Who wants to help?
Building the Puke Ariki Museum and Library was a big project and it all came together a lot differently than the Bowl of Brooklands. This job required a business-like approach.
Tenders were asked for, various companies got the jobs and the council managed the money.
To build the Bowl of Brooklands in the 1950s volunteers were asked for and they all got jobs. Money management was easy because nobody had any money. Read On a shoestring budget.
Could a project this big, still done in the same way today? Would volunteers be as easy to find? Schools are always asking for volunteers. Do some "volunteer research".
Ask your principal if it is as easy to get volunteers now as it was in the past. Perhaps the days of the volunteer are coming to an end.
Hardcore volunteers
Building the Bowl of Brooklands really was a community event. People gave their labour and their expertise free of charge and all sorts of ingenious ideas were used to cut costs and get the job done.
Read Calling all hands and The Festival of the Pines and then look at the PDF file below and record the design process with a classmate.
A tad crude but perhaps some good points
The first Bowl toilets were state of the art. They had packing case walls, no doors and were open to the stars. Some people called them crude and some complained but perhaps they looked for the bad points instead of the good.
Put on the yellow thinking hat and list their good points-their values and benefits and why these toilets did the job! Compare your yellow hat list with a classmate's.
Resource management!
There was no such thing as the Resource Management Act in the 1950s. Most towns still pumped their sewage into the sea and if landowners wanted to clear trees from their land and drain their swamps they just went ahead.
Look here to see how the Resource Management Act aims to look after the environment today. (Just read the first part and take special note of the bullet points.)
The Resource Management Act then is a set of laws that helps protect the environment. What if the Act was in place in the 1950s when Eric and his band of helpers went to work with their bulldozers, wheelbarrows and salt? Would the Bowl have opened six months after the job was started?
Get together with a classmate and list the things that might just have been held up, if the Resource Management Act had have been around.
After that, take a look at your list and decide whether today's Resource Management Act is a good idea.
A Bowl that rocks!
A staggering 45,000 people turned up to the Bowl for its first week of festivities and it's just as popular today.
More than 30,000 people partied in the sun at WOMAD New Zealand 2005 and the summer of 2006 saw world-class acts like the Doobie Brothers, Russell Watson, UB40, Michael Crawford and Jimmy Cliff.
Finish the story now by reading The Heart of Entertainment and then look at the PDF file below and plan a gig of your own.
Fast forward - Volunteers to the rescue!
The Bowl of Brooklands was built with volunteer labour. Volunteers are the people that donate their time and expertise but don't get paid. Most schools have a team of volunteers who raise funds, organise and attend working bees and activities like school camps. The wider community depends on volunteers too.
Explore here and here to find out about the range of voluntary organisations.
All these groups depend on funding for equipment and things like stationery to keep their organisations going. Fund providers include groups like the government and charitable trusts.
In Taranaki the Taranaki Electricity Trust, (TET) often provides funds to help voluntary groups.
Check out the PDF below and finish the graphic to show these funding providers just how important the volunteers are.
Rewind answers
1. True
2. False. The Beatles began in the 60s
3. True. Cliff Richard first found fame in the late 1950s
4. False. Jimi Hendrix became famous in the 1960s.
5. True. This was the band that had a hit with the song Rock around the Clock
Word watch answers
1b, 2a, 3a, 4a, 5a, 6b, 7a, 8a, b, 10b
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