Ged Mann, who sadly passed away on February 1st, will be missed by everyone in the Chobham Community. He fought cancer for a long time, but instead of curling up or going on a long cruise Ged founded the Chobham Museum. He gathered a committee, arranged funding, sorted the plans, got the planning permission, oversaw the construction and, together with Janet, painted, sanded, planted and begged and borrowed to get the museum up and running. It opened in September 2000 and from then on Ged and Janet - let us not forget they were a team - organised everything including the displays, the rota, cataloguing, correspondence and maintenance as well as the building of the storage extension.The highlight of the Museum year was the Chobham carnival. Ged was always dressed up in some ridiculous costume: three years ago he was Scooby-doo, and in the early days he and Janet waltzed down the High Street as Fred and Ginger. Another year he was a Beatle with the Yellow Submarine which he had built; and who could forget Ged as the cave man pushing a wheel shaped lump of concrete down the High Street wearing a leopard skin and little else. (Does anyone have a good picture of this?). Ged’s most glamorous moment was dressed as Admiral Nelson, here he is standing beside HMS Victory, another boat he built for the occasion.
We salute Ged, the admiral of our museum fleet - Chobham Museum will carry on as he intended. He was a kind gentleman and a true hero for the whole community. We will mourn his passing and be so grateful and thankful for everything he has done for Chobham over so many years.
Ged’s funeral will take place at St Lawrence Church at 12 o/c on Monday 20th February 2011. The family hope you will join them afterwards at Foxhills.
