This is the cover of a book my daughter found for me at Christmas.
Paul Barker's picture is of the pavilion of the Oxford University Cricket Club in The Parks at Oxford, one of over 80 similar illustrations of a great variety of cricket pavilions great and small throughout the U.K. with wonderful descriptions by the author Jonathan Rice.
The book, published in 1991, bears an original inscription:
"Ron,
To someone who likes good architecture & particularly associated with cricket
Fred"
Added in 2015 was another message of some thought:
"Dad - sounds as if you would've got on with Ron, Happy Christmas, Alison"
Had my father been alive in 1991 he would have also shared Fred's message. This picture of him, second from right middle row, in front of printers Hazell, Watson and Viney's cricket ground pavilion in Aylesbury needs no words to explain why.
When I was four I was in love with Lesley Hollings who I knew until we were in our teens and beyond. Her Dad is on the left end of the middle row. That I have a picture of her dad but not of her says something for cricket I suppose.
One of my first joys on coming to Dorset a year ago was the discovery of this cricket pavilion in Broadstone Recreation Ground; a truly English setting, like many others undiscovered by Jonathan Rice, but well worthy of inclusion in such a book as his.
I remember your love of cricket. If you have never seen this book you may still discover copies available through Amazon and other sources.With every page a source of delight to look at and read. I can recommend it to you. How can it be otherwise with such an introductory sentence as this:
"CRICKET PAVILIONS, like jockstraps, can be large, medium or small and, like jockstraps, their size is no real guage of the pleasures that lurk within".
I shall not be surprised of course to learn you already have a copy in your library of cricket memorabilia!
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