Quarterly Stories Update

April 2009

FRED BECOMES ‘APPRENTICE’ WELDER AT THE AGE OF 90!

Who said life stops when you enter a care home? “Nonsense!” says 90-year-old Fred Denny, who despite having Parkinson’s Disease, left his Abbeyfield Greensted home at Wateringbury for a day’s welding at GKW, the Fairseat wrought iron and restoration specialists.

Fred last did a spot of fabrication welding about 30 years ago, but when Senior Carer at Greensted, Hilary Vanns, told him that her husband and son were partners in GKW, he expressed a wish to see how life behind the welder’s mask had changed. No problem! Geoff, Karle and Wayne Vanns readily agreed to let Fred have a go, so Hilary drove him to Fairseat for the experience he had longed for.

“The trip is all part of our policy of making it possible for our residents to do things they might have given up hope of doing,” said Hilary. “Just because you go into care doesn’t mean life comes to a grinding halt.  At Abbeyfield we believe in enhancing the latter years of our residents’ lives and that can be done in so many ways.

“Fred wanted to do some welding, so why shouldn’t he be given the chance?” she said. Fred couldn’t believe his luck and was so eager to get going that Karle Vanns had to hold him back to make sure he was kitted out with the right masked helmet and gloves.

As the zimmer frame was put to one side and the sparks flew, Karle commented: “I hope I can weld like that when I am 90!” Fred, a Londoner before coming to Kent, where his grandson runs a pub, didn’t spend all his working life as a welder.

He also worked for the local authority in London where he ran his own workshop. What did he think of his day out? “It hasn’t changed much since I was doing it, but what I produced was rubbish!” he joked. “All he needs is more practice and we will take him on as an apprentice,” said Karle.