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Juliet Nicolson reviews The Great Western Beach: a Memoir of a Cornish Childhood between the Wars by Emma Smith
It has been said that you only ever meet the world once: in childhood. Everything that follows is just memory. In Emma Smith’s evocative, witty and profoundly moving book, her England - of the era after the First World War - shines with an intensity quite unblurred by the eight decades or so that have elapsed since.
Born in 1923, Emma Smith (Elspeth Hallsmith when small) grew up in the Cornish seaside town of Newquay, in genteel poverty, with her twin brother and sister, Jim and Pam, the baby Harvey, her parents and their nanny/housekeeper Lucy.
The town’s Great Western Beach supplied the backdrop to Smith’s childhood, its prosaic name giving away nothing of the magical opportunities afforded by the endless stretch of sand. It became their “summer playground”: a place where, for Smith, “a timeless tranquillity that must be what is meant by heaven” bordered the “delicious embrace” of the sea itself.
Smith describes with a remarkably sharp recall that “teases the very edge of memory” how, although the seasons came and went, an all-pervading sense of summer filled those years.
The blessed good fortune of growing up in a seaside town peopled by delightfully eccentric characters meant constant entertainment - batty but inspirational teachers; the deck-chair man, “agile as a monkey”; and the Italian family who made forbidden, mouthwatering ice cream (the following day’s supply was said to be stored each night beneath their beds, right next to the chamber pots).
Busy summer days are filled with family picnics, the exquisite, unforgettable taste of the jam sandwich that follows a morning swim, and by the children’s amused monitoring of the influx of the summer tourists - “truly pitiable, these poor transients” with their “ludicrous” floundering attempts to master a surfboard.

telegraph.co.uk

31 CENT SCOOP NIGHT: 2.5 ounce scoop of ice cream for 31 cents. Baskin-Robbins is partnering with the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation and providing a donation. Certain Baskin-Robbins store locations will also help raise additional funds for local firehouses. 5-10 p.m. Baskin-Robbins, 4555 S. Nolan Road, Independence. www.baskinrobbins.com/31cent (816-350-0131)
FENCING INSTRUCTION: Six-week session. Ages 6 and older. Blue Springs Parks and Recreation. Intro to fencing 7-8 p.m.; Mastering fencing 8-9 p.m. Wednesdays through June 4. Hall-McCarter Education Center, 5000 N.W. Valley View, Blue Springs. $49. Register. www.bluespringsgov.com (816-228-0137)
LIGHTING OUR LIVES DISPLAY: Oil lamps and candle holders. 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Closes April 30. Bingham-Waggoner Estate, 313 W. Pacific, Independence. Free-$5. www.bwestate.org (816-461-3491)
SPARKLING STRINGS: Exhibit features 1960s marionettes created by Gerry and Andrea Sparks of Branson, Mo., and traditional German Kaspar theater hand puppets made by Hans Waecker and his wife, Martha Feehan, of Georgetown, Maine. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Puppetry Arts Institute, 11025 E. Winner, Independence. Museum admission $1.50-$3. www.hazelle.org (816-833-9777)
BALLROOM DANCE CLASSES: Six sessions. Singles and couples welcome. Ages 16 and older. Blue Springs Parks and Recreation. Beginning International Waltz 6:45-7:45 p.m.; Intermediate Viennese Waltz 8-9 p.m. Thursdays through June 5. Vesper Hall, 400 N.W. Vesper, Blue Springs. $39. Register. www.bluespringsgov.com (816-228-0137)
FIbrOMYALGIA AND CHRONIC FATIGUE SUPPORT GROUP: Meeting. Fibromyalgia Coalition International. 7 p.m. James Walker Elementary School, 201 S.E. Sunnyside School Road, Blue Springs. Free. www.fibrocoalition.org (816-220-7356, 816-847-7606)
FROM EVERYDAY TO COLLECTIBLE—FRANCISCAN CHINA EXHIBIT: 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Bingham-Waggoner Estate, 313 W. Pacific, Independence. Free-$5. www.bwestate.org (816-461-3491)
HARRY S. TRUMAN: SOLDIER TO SENATOR EXHIBIT: 8:30 a.m.-4 p.m. Harry S. Truman Historic Site Visitor Center, 223 N. Main, Independence. Free. (816-254-9929)
MACRAME CHAIR DESIGN: Five sessions. Design your own lawn chair out of aluminum chair frames. Blue Springs Parks and Recreation. 6:30-7:30 p.m. Thursdays through May 29. Vesper Hall, 400 N.W. Vesper, Blue Springs. Class $20; Supplies $30-$50. Register. www.bluespringsgov.com (816-228-0137)

kansascity.com

Heavy fighting continued for a second day in two of Iraq’s largest cities as Iraqi security forces clashed with militias connected to Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr. In the southern city of Basra, 40 people have been killed and 200 wounded, according to a spokesman for the Iraqi military. In response, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has issued a 72-hour ultimatum for gunmen in Basra to surrender.
“Sixteen months after voters in Michigan voted to kill affirmative action in the public sphere,” opponents of the program “are pushing five more states to ban the practice.” Led by long-time anti-affirmative action activist Ward Connerly, petitions are circulating in Colorado, Arizona, Missouri, Oklahoma and Nebraska. Connerly says he has raised “about $1.5 million for the campaigns.”
Air Force lawyer Col. Morris Davis, “who quit as chief prosecutor for the Guantanamo Bay war court five months ago because of what he called political interference has asked to leave the U.S. military.” Morris said that “he submitted retirement papers last week, because of fallout from his criticism of the Guantanamo court and because of family concerns.”
Scientists said yesterday that a chunk of ice seven times the size of Manhattan collapsed off the Wilkins Ice Shelf in western Antarctica. “The event is a result of global warming, said British Antarctic Survey scientist David Vaughan.”
A new analysis by Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. finds that “Wall Street banks, brokerages and hedge funds may report $460 billion in credit losses from the collapse of the subprime mortgage market, or almost four times the amount already disclosed.”
The USA Today writes that the different proposals among the candidates’ health plans boil down to three issues: “Who gets health insurance, how should they get it and who pays.” “McCain’s ideas could continue to leave millions of people without insurance, they say, and could increase the number of employers dropping or limiting health plans.”

thinkprogress.org