Bamboo Jack's wake at Lansdown Hall

Jack Everett’s funeral service was held in St Laurence church this afternoon followed by a wake close by in Lansdown Hall. I didn’t go to the service but did venture in to the very crowded hall which was packed full of friends and family, some of whom overflowed into Bank Gardens which joins the hall to the church.

Bamboo Jack as he was commonly known built his home out of wood around a living tree in an abandoned quarry close to Sheepscombe, a local village. This was where I first met him in 1990 when he hosted some meetings of the just formed permaculture group with its founder Bill Mollison, who was visiting Stroud for several days. That visit was to help establish a local sustainable village project in the Stroud area. Jack’s partner at the time Emma I., and her great friend Annie W., (my former girlfriend) had arranged for Bill to come from Australia to give guidance to the group.

I think Jack’s monicker, Bamboo, resulted from his love of wood and building with bamboo. I didn’t know him well, and only saw him a few times over the years, but in the last week Camilla (who lead Helena on her recent tour of Rajasthan) asked me to produce some cards. She wanted to give them with personalised messages to people close to Jack who were coming to the funeral. After they met working at Glastonbury Festival in the early 1980s Camilla shared a house which she and Jack bought together which was when they first came to Stroud.

I left the rather hot and noisy wake after about an hour. As I walked through Bank Gardens I looked back at the people spilling out of the hall, and then took another picture in the opposite direction of the church, which I then walked up to, and beyond. Bamboo Jack RIP