David Garrod had a 29-year career at the Post Office, four years of which were spent as a community relations officer. This role involved working with local charities around the country offering help and resources to raise funds for worthy causes.
Here he discusses working with the Goodwin Sands Potholing Club, a local charitable organisation which raises funds to support recreational activities for young people. In this case, with the help of volunteers, David set up a Post Office counter and postbox on the Sands and had the service officially allocate them a full UK address and postcode. Visitors to the temporary Post Office were able to purchase commemorative covers from the counter and send postcards and mail from the sandbank in the North Sea.
This is an interview conducted as part of the Goodwin Sands Oral History Project, a podcast series which speaks with those who have grown up within sight of the Sands, who make their living upon or around them, or who have been creatively inspired by the air of uncanny mystery they invoke. The Goodwin Sands are a pair of large sandbanks of the south-east Kent coast which offer both shelter and a dangerous hazard to unwary shipping or those caught in storms, and are the site of great historical importance and maritime archaeology.
This podcast project was undertaken as a response to an application to dredge the Goodwin Sands for aggregates and building materials to expand Dover Harbour, a proposition vehemently opposed by local residents and the Goodwin Sands Conservation Trust, who have created this podcast series. It is hoped that through hearing the voices of the people connected with the Sands their cultural status might be raised and further industrial interference might be avoided in the future.
Credits:
Presented and interview conducted by Joanna Thomson, co-founder of the Goodwin Sands Conservation Trust.
Production, editing, sound design by Ben Horner.
The music is "Free Floating" by Jon Shoemaker, used under Creative Commons licence.
For more about the Goodwin Sands Conservation Trust please see https://goodwinsands.org.uk/, and please see https://theaudiosphere.com for more on our producer.
