News from Silver Rainbow

Silver Rainbow in World Pride parade 2012

Ross Burgess with the Silver Rainbow banner Silver Rainbow was one of the groups taking part in the "Older LGBT Community" section (one of the "red" sections, as you can see from the photo) in the Pride Parade on 7th July 2012.

Silver Rainbow featured online and at Croydon Library

Today (Saturday 28th January 2011) Silver Rainbow was featured, alongside other local LGBT groups, in the LGBT History Month display at Croydon Central Library. The display will be in place throughout February.

And a video about Silver Rainbow went online at this link. It was filmed by Leon Ancliffe of Pflix Films, on behalf of the LGBT Consortium, and will be used on the LGBT London site.

Documentary wins Gold Award

Bernard An Interior Life has won the gold award for Best Documentary in the Third Coast competition, held in Chicago USA in October 2010.

Laurence Grissell "Bernard charts his life story and inner struggle to accept his homosexuality during a time when sex between men was illegal. He speaks movingly of the lost loves of his life, but just as Bernard’s loneliness starts to overwhelm him, a ring on the doorbell signals the start of a new chapter in this octogenarian’s life."

The radio programme, produced for BBC Radio 4 by Laurence Grissell (pictured right), tells the story of Bernard, one of our oldest Silver Rainbow members, and was broadcast in August last year. See below for more about the programme.

Bernard in the media again!

Bernard, one of our oldest members, features in an article in the January 2010 edition of Pride Life magazine, The article "Life stories" by Steve Bustin, starts on Page 25 and includes reminiscences by Bernard and other older LGBT people, with a nice mention of Silver Rainbow.

Shortlisted again by Pink Paper readers

In 2010, for the second year running, Silver Rainbow was shortlisted in the nationwide Pink Paper Readers' Awards. This year we came fourth. Apparently the number of people voting nationwide was considerably greater this year, even though the Pink Paper is now an Internet-only publication.

The finalists in the "Best older LGBT group" this year were as follows:

Out in the City, Manchester
Age Concern, Opening Doors Central London
Metro 50+, Greenwich (a couple of us visited the Metro Centre on the 30^th of March)
Silver Rainbow Lunch Club, Croydon
Armistead Centre, Liverpool.

LGBT History Month celebration – special filmshow and some good news

Silver Rainbow celebrated LGBT History Month on 12 February 2010, with a special showing, after our regular lunch at the Waterside Centre, of the new short film Latecomers, directed by Olivia Humphreys. Many thanks to UNACC for facilitating the use of their main room and their projection equipment for the showing. On the same day, we heard that we had once again been shortlisted in the "Older LGBT Groups" category in the Pink Paper Readers Awards. For more about this, see our press release.

Full of Life Week

Full of Life (logo) Silver Rainbow took part in Croydon's Full of Life week in October 2009. We had a display in the Croydon Clocktower foyer from Monday to Thursday, our regular lunch was featured in the Full of Life Brochure, and we were on show at the Full of Life finale on Friday in the Fairfield Halls.

Silver Rainbow in Soho

We had a stall at Age Concern's "LGBT 50+ Information Fair" (4 September 2009). Roger and Ross manned the stall, and several other Silver Rainbow members were in the audience for the presentations. The photo shows Roger and Ross in their Silver Rainbow polo shirts, with Nick from Age Concern Camden's Opening Doors project.

Radio programme

One of our members was the subject of a programme (An Interior Life) on BBC Radio 4 (5pm, 23 August 2009). We heard Bernard speaking about his life as a gay man, his situation after the death of his partner, and the difference that Silver Rainbow had made to his life. The programme was reviewed in the Daily Telegraph on 25 August.

Museum visit

On 6 July 2009 we had a very successful visit to Croydon Museum, where we were allowed to see and handle some of the Museum's collection of artefacts, followed by lunch at the Clocktower Café.

Recognition by Pink Paper readers

In 2009, Silver Rainbow came third in its category, in the nationwide Pink Paper Readers' Awards. For more about this, see our December 2008 and February 2009 Press Releases and our certificate.

The finalists in the "Best older LGBT group" were as follows:

Out in the City, Manchester
Age Concern Camden Older Gay Men’s Group, London
Silver Rainbow, Croydon
50+ Group, The Metro Centre, Greenwich
Older Lesbian Network, London.

Helping to promote Croydon

On 17 November 2008, Silver Rainbow was represented at an event to promote Croydon as a "Beacon authority" for its work for older people, and on Wednesday 29^th April we had a stall at Croydon's Festival of Positive Ageing (part of the Cultural Olympiad) at the Parchmore Community Centre, Thornton Heath.

Healthy Eating

Fit as a Fiddle (logo) Julia from Age Concern Croydon came to our lunch in July 2008, and introduced us to the concepts of healthy eating as part of the "Fit as a Fiddle" programme, and this was followed by Age Concern-sponsored lunches as at a variety of local venues. As part of the same programme, one of our members attended classes in nutrition skills in September and October 2008, and on the 21st of October several of us took part in a workshop at the Glenthorne Avenue Allotment Hall, Croydon.

The Fit as a Fiddle programme has now come to an end, but we're continuing to have a second lunchtime venue every month, still with an emphasis on healthy eating, at various venues around Croydon.

Working with Age Concern

On 27 June 2008, Ross from Silver Rainbow assisted with a training session on LGBT matters (presented by Age Concern England) for Age Concern Croydon staff.

Lunches at the Waterside Centre

We've been having lunch at the Waterside Centre (courtesy of UNACC) every month from February 2008. We adopted the name "Silver Rainbow" in May 2008.