Sunday, November 11, 2012

 
How relevant is this for Memorial Sunday

Spitfire sculpture is unveiled in Darwen

More than 250 people turned out to watch the unveiling of a new war memorial in Lancashire.

The £175,000 stainless steel sculpture of a Spitfire aircraft was officially unveiled at The Green in Darwen. It was made and donated by Darwen-based WEC Group Ltd, which also supplied the replacement for the top of Darwen Tower which blew off in a storm.

A spokesman for the company said: "It was very well received and there was a really good turnout for the ceremony."Darwen was the smallest town in the UK to finance a Spitfire during World War II and the Spitfire memorial will be a lasting reminder of the town's contribution to the war effort."

The Darwen Spitfire memorial sculpture took two years to complete and was handcrafted by WEC Group's apprentices. The sculpture has a wingspan measuring 3.8 metres (12ft 5ins) and stands 6.9 metres (22ft 7ins) high. Must get a photo as it is quite incredible. Well done apprentices...there must be some good training happening within the company.

I never knew that about this town. Well I knew the sculpture was there obviously; but I didn’t know we’d financed a Spitfire during the war. What a grand company WEC is. Nice to see something given back in the spirit of philanthropy and civic pride to the town. (They also made the new glass roof dome for the Tower)

http://www.wec-group.com/index.html



This is a hanwritten version of the famous poem by John McCrae (from Wikipedia)