VOYTEK LAST POST. AGAIN (HOPEFULLY)So now can we draw a line, move on and envision a future without ranting away about a statue for Voytek the fighting, farting, flirting etc etc Polish bear. While various people here (one at least) were agitating for some fitting memorial for the long dead Bruno all was in hand in Embra. Read all about it here Well done PC Daley for quietly getting on with it whilst further to the south east a lot of p### and w*** was expended in achieving nothing except some temporary self publicity.So one hopes that we can forget the idea of a memorial for this unsavoury beast in these parts where Voytek's stay was mercifully brief. Paxton House in particular has a poor record for looking after public art in its grounds so any fine Polish inspired statue is at least...
Grin and Bear it. Once more with FeelingHuttonian vowed not to blog(again) about Voytek the Drinking, Smoking, Fighting, ASBO-worthy Polish Bear but a letter in the Berwickshire strikes a chord: SIR, - May I disagree with the places to put the statues of Voytek the Bear.There was no Polish connections with Paxton House. They employed Italian prisoner of war labour.Visitors have to pay to go to Paxton House and it is closed from October to Easter. As Duns has a Polish war memorial and Duns is twinned with Zagen in Poland more people would be visiting Duns.Voytek ended his days at the zoo in Edinburgh. Many children saw him then and would remember him today. The statue would be more at home there than at the Parliament. How many politicians remember him?Hutton (not Paxton) was the centre...
Still Bearing ItThe silly season is not quite over judging from an account of the indefatigable Mrs O's plans to create memorials (Hutton, Paxton, Duns?) for the drunken,smoking,nipping, cursing, fighting Polish bear-the Berwickshire has the whole story here (Voytek surely? Blog ed)Given the important military connection between the Free Poles and the Borders during the Second World War-a permanent memorial for those Polish soldiers, who lost their lives on the Allies' side is surely more appropriate than a statue dedicated to a seriously brain damaged quadruped. And we already have one in Duns. Or am I missing somethingPublicity for a SNP parliamentary candidate...
Its That Bear AgainHuttonian had rather hoped that we had heard the last of the Polish fighting Drinking Smoking Bear-Voytek by name- who has once again put Hutton on the map as the wretched animal was briefly 'posted' there with the Polish army in the latter stages of the war. It ended its years in retirement in the Embra Zoo. If you want an unexpurgated frank account of this rather unpleasant animal you can read about it here It made an appearance on the BBC TV One Show earlier this week with the energetic Mrs O, SNP candidate for Dumfries etc at the next general election, making her pitch for a memorial for the beast in the Hutton area. Recently a local writer has written a book about the bear-see here and a mention on the One Show will do its sales no harm. Given the number of...
Duns has Jim Clarke and Duns Scotus, Paxton its connections with 'Sweet Robin Adair' but Hutton is now thrust open the world stage by its association with the Fighting, Drinking Smoking Bear: Voytek; who has his own website at: http://www.voytekbear.com/The world medja from the Washington Post, Al Jazeera,Musings from the Merse, BBC, Daily Mail to our own Berwickshire News have been full of his exploits about to be further immortalised in a book by local (Eyemouth) school teacher Garry Paulin. The Hutton connection (claims this week is being pushed by the indefatigable Mrs Aileen Orr (SNP- as the Berwickshire labels her) who has been in touch with Holywood over a possible movie and also with Prince Charles and his two lads who are apparently Voytek buffs having seen the exhibit about...
The words 'Hutton, Berwickshire' leaped up at me from the pages (well, Page 3 actually) of the Scotsman yesterday. A whole page heasded Tribute to Voytek, the smoking drinking fighting soldier bearThe Story begins :HE ENJOYED a cigarette and a bottle of cold beer and could carry more mortar rounds than any other soldier. But Voytek wasn't one of the ordinary dogs of war – he was a battling bear.Adopted by the Polish army, the European brown bear "fought" at the bloody Battle of Monte Cassino before dying, not of a bullet wound, but of old age, in Edinburgh Zoo. Now a campaign has been started to build a monument to him.Voytek was adopted as a cub in the Middle East in 1943, before growing into much more than a mascot. He eventually stood 6ft on his hind legs and weighed 35 stone, and he...
