Grainger Market 180th Birthday Celebrations
Date and Location: Wednesday 28th October, Grainger Market
5.30pm - Entertainment from Sawdust Jacks (local folk group), Keith Armstrong (poet), Gordon Phillips (poet), Ann Sessoms (Northumbrian Piper)
6pm - Welcome to celebrations by the Lord Mayor of Newcastle, Councillor Ian Graham
6.05pm - Welcome from John Phillips, Chairman of Grainger Market Traders Association
6.10pm - John Grundy – talks about the Grainger Market and Newcastle
6.20pm - Lord Mayor and Sheriff award Grainger Market Customer Service Award winner with certificates and hamper
6.30pm - Gifts awarded to dignitaries/special guests
6.35pm - Lord Mayor and John Phillips cut the Birthday cake and open the Buffet
6.40pm - Entertainment from Sawdust Jacks, Keith Armstrong (poet),
Gordon Phillips (poet), Ann Sessoms (Northumbrian Piper)
7.30pm - Finish
Access - Please note access to this event from 5.30pm is via Entrance 1 of the Grainger Market on Grainger Street between Skipton Building Society and the Wildtrack store.
This is life,
the gloss and the flesh,
Weigh House of passion and flame.
You can get lost in this market’s amazement
but you can never lose yourself.
Sometimes,
a sleep walk in these grazing crowds
can feel like a stroll through your brain.
Keith Armstrong
A city
within a city,
light cage.
Bazaar and blind,
these swollen alleys
flow with a teeming life’s blood.
Geordie !
Swim for your life !
Keith Armstrong
MAUD WATSON, FLORIST
bred in a market arch
a struggle
in a city's armpit
that flower
in your time-rough hands
a beautiful girl in a slum alley
all that kindness in your face
and you're right
the times are not what they were
this England's not what it was
flowers shrink in that crumbling vase
dusk creeps in on a cart
and Maud the sun is choking
Maud this island's sinking
and all that swollen sea is
the silent majority
waving
Keith Armstrong
Photos: Keith Armstrong & Peter Dixon
