Folkestone Herald 2-12-1972
Local News
The children of Parkfield special school, Folkestone, are very near to
the hearts of the members of the darts club at Castle Inn, Foord Road.
The club raises money to buy presents for the children who are mentally
or physically handicapped. It has been doing so for two or three years and so far it has collected
about £100. Members have distributed Christmas
presents, fruit and Easter eggs among the 200 children. And it spent £50 on fireworks for the children’s Guy
Fawkes’ celebrations. The money is raised by
donations, competitions and friendly dart matches.
The idea to give presents to the children came from Mrs. Vi Jessop, wife of Mr.
Tony Jessop, the landlord. A main-spring of the darts club is Mr. Andy Hall, chairman and
secretary. Three members who also take a major part in bringing the children
pleasure are Mr. Ray Waddell, Mr. Colin Drake and Mr. William “Cokie” Fullinton.
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| Photo from Folkestone Herald |
Folkestone Herald
28-1-1978
Stroller
Cheers to the new pint-pullers at the Castle Inn, at the corner of St.
John’s Church Road and Foord Road, Folkestone. The new hosts, who moved in this week, are Arthur
and Founzou Barrington. Arthur comes from London, where he ran a bar before moving to the
coast. His wife
comes from Hythe, and her brother runs the Phoenix restaurant in Folkestone’s
Old High Street. “We
were looking for a pub in the area - we like it here”, said Arthur, as he
prepared to pull his first pint. “We think we will be very happy at the Castle”.
South Kent Gazette
25-6-1980
Local News
Bill Glass and Jim Middleton aim to spend ten days in a
pub without touching a drop of alcohol. On Saturday the two men set out to
pocket a world record at The Castle in Folkestone. They hope to beat the
non-stop pool playing record – which stands at 201 hours – to claim a place in
the Guinness Book of Records. Their efforts are being sponsored by firms,
clubs, pubs and individuals in the area to raise money for Eversley House, the
home for mentally handicapped children, in Horn Street, Seabrook.
Bill, aged 34, and Jim, 19, hope to get £5,000 towards
the cost of building a therapeutic pool at the home. On Saturday two of the
youngsters were at the pub with their parents for the start of the marathon.
Mrs. Beryl Harrison, chairman of the home`s parents and friends` association,
took a cue to play the first shot at 9.30 a.m. If all goes well the two players
will finish playing at 9.30 a.m. on July 1.
Pub landlord, Mr. John Barrington, and his wife, Fonzu,
who live above the bar, will be with them all the way. Bill and Jim will be
eating normal meals and have stocks of sweets to nibble at. They plan to save
up a five minute break, allowed every hour, to take a 3½ hour sleep at
intervals, and still welcome sponsors.
The idea to raise money for Eversley House came from
Folkestone Lions Club, which has already taken on the therapeutic pool project.
Ten members will take it turns to adjudicate the marathon and keep score. A
pool of this sort is desperately needed at the home, Mrs. Harrison told the
Herald and Gazette.
There are 25 children at Eversley, all handicapped. Ages
range from three to 15 years, but none of the children can feed themselves and
most need support to be able to sit up. Care and attention is given to physical
exercise and massage by the nursing staff, but the best form of exercise for
them is hydro-therapy, Mrs. Harrison said. Some of the children are now in the
care of Kent County Council. “The children are lying so still their joints
become stiff and set”, she said. At present the home has more than £5,000 of
the £12,000 it needs for the pool. On Saturday, July 12, it will be holding an
open day and fete to raise a further £1,500; comedian Jim Davidson will open
the fete. With £5,000 from the marathon pool the project can get off the
ground.
Folkestone Herald
29-6-1980
Local News
A bid to break the world non-stop pool playing record
ended in drama and disappointment early on Wednesday. After completing a
gruelling 95 hours at the table in the public bar of The Castle, in Foord Road,
Folkestone, 19-year-old Jim Middleton collapsed. The heart-breaking end to the
attempt came about an hour after Jim and his partner, Bill Glass, 34, had
snatched two hours` sleep they had collected by giving up their five minutes`
rest each hour. By attempting to break the record they had hoped to raise
£5,000 towards building a therapeutic pool for Seabrook`s Eversley House, a
home for handicapped children.
Linos` Club member, David Pritchard, who was invigilating
at the time, said “He looked very tired and I thought once he`d had a couple of
hours` sleep he would be better. There was no way he could have continued – he
was just beaten by lack of sleep”. And, speaking of the emotional moment of
Jim`s collapse, he added “He just went like that. He couldn`t get up and
practically cried in the chair”.
The pair of pool players had hoped to complete 240 hours
and smash the world record, which stands at 201 hours.
Despite coaxing by the organisers, Jim, a welder, was
beaten and had to be taken home. At midday, a fresh-looking Bill Glass stood at
the bar drinking brandy and talking of his ordeal. “I`m not tired, but I feel as if there is
something I have to get out of my system because I`m sure I could have done
it”, he said. “I feel sick I can`t continue, but it`s out of my hands. I do not
blame the lad – he couldn`t keep his eyes open. But he did his best and
shouldn`t feel at all guilty because he put on a good show of 95 hours”.
John Barrington, landlord of the Castle, had stayed up
all night following the men`s progress. “The bottom fell out of pur world when
he had to give up.. I feel sick for his mum and dad and for everyone else who
backed him up”, he said.
But in spite of the setback, Bill, a transport and
warehouse manager, says he will make a bid for the 208 hour one-man marathon
next year.
The pair`s remarkable stamina in completing a total of
771 games will not go unrewarded. If all their sponsors pay up they stand to
claim about £2,000.
Fully recovered on Thursday, Jim told the Herald and
Gazette of the frightening side-effects of the marathon game. On two occasions
he went into a trance and felt he was playing in his sleep. His mind began to
play tricks and he started hallucinating. “The balls didn`t look round any more
and once it seemed as if they were linked together. I felt as if I picked one
up they would all follow; also the cues looked banana-shaped. After having
early nights the week before the attempt, he said he made the silly mistake of
having a night out before the challenge. This meant he only had about four
hours` sleep. He also thought he would have been better having “cat-naps”
because he couldn`t wake up after the longer rest periods. To add to his
troubles an old eye wound opened up. His mother, Margaret, brought her
exhausted son home and watched anxiously as he fell into a deep sleep for 13½
hours.
South Kent Gazette
10-9-1980
Local News
Tempers frayed at a meeting of pub landlords. Two
members stormed out at the end of the Licensed Victuallers-
Association meeting at the Swan Inn, Sellindge, on Wednesday afternoon amid
scenes described as “chaotic” and “farcical”.
Host Mr. Bill Corne, landlord of the Swan, told the Herald
and Gazette “I had to shout at one member to shut him up. He was drunk when he
arrived at the meeting. I threatened to cancel the meeting and sling them all
out”.
And Mr. Chas Croft, landlord of the Gate Inn, Hythe, said “As the most
junior person present, I was rather embarrassed to see my elders and betters
behave in the way they did”. He said the two men wanted the LVA to
do things which are impossibilities. “They were unfortunately very inebriated
and shouting at the same time. The members didn’t discuss anything relevant and
made a load of fools of themselves. It was a typical farce”.
After the meeting Mr Brian Adams, landlord of the White Lion in
Cheriton, resigned from the L.V.A. committee for what he later described as
“purely personal reasons which I don’t really want to discuss”.
However, L.V.A. chairman Mr John Mees, of Botolph’s Bridge, Hythe,
denied there had been a row
Several other landlords declined to comment and Mr John Barrington,
landlord of the Castle Inn, Folkestone, who also is believed to have resigned
from the L.V.A. after the meeting, was unavailable for comment.
Folkestone Herald
27-9-1980
Local News
An angry landlord hit out this week at people who
complained about trouble in the streets near his pub after a charity evening.
Mr. John Barrington, landlord of The Castle Inn, in Foord
Road, Folkestone, said that the police were called following the incidents at
the weekend. Complaints were made after a special concert at his pub to raise
money for Eversley House, the Folkestone home for handicapped children. He said
that the police had been called by a group of anonymous people living nearby.
It was claimed that late-night customers had been slamming car doors and one
man had urinated against a wall and used abusive language in the street. But on
Tuesday Mr. Barrington said that he and his wife, Founzou, felt the
complainants were being “bloody-minded”. Efforts were being made, he said, to
raise £1,000 for Eversley House by Christmas. The pub has already made over £800 this year by staging special
events, and, until now, no complaints had been made about the behaviour of
customers. He pointed out that the police officer who visited the Castle had no
complaints about the way the pub was run, and added that there were other pubs
and clubs in the area besides his. The specific incidents complained about
happened outside the pub after the customers had left and were not something of
which he had control or was aware. “What am I supposed to do? Walk everyone
home?” he asked.
Late a
police spokesman said they had been called to disturbances outside the pub on
previous occasions. But he said “Really there was nothing to it. If we receive
a call about people making a row in a residential area we are bound to act on
it. We just go and make sure that things are O.K. or have a word with people.
If we find people committing an offence then they are reported”.
South Kent Gazette
31-12-1980
Local News
Regulars at a Folkestone pub have handed over £1,000 they raised for
handicapped children. With
sponsored pool matches, barbeques and jumble sales, customers and staff at the
Castle, in Foord Road, collected the money for children at Eversley House in
Horn Street. The
hospital for handicapped children in Seabrook will use the money to pay for a
£30,000 hydro-therapeutic pool. It should be finished by 1982. The charity started
with a world record pool playing attempt at the pub in April. Since then the
pub has virtually adopted the house as its charity and plans to continue until
it has collected £5,000. Mr. Bill Glass, who played in the record attempt, said
“We are not going to stop until we have built them that pool”.
They are already on their way to collecting another £1,000 and plan
another record attempt at the same time next year. So far, £13,000 has been
collected for the swimming pool, which will also help children from outside the
hospital, and this is the largest single donation. Chairman of the hospital`s
parents and friends association, Mr. Steve Atmore, accepted the money from the
pub`s landlord, Mr. John Barrington, and thanked all those who helped raise it.
South Kent Gazette
9-2-1983
Local News
Landlord John Barrington has reported the theft of
ten tins of food from the kitchen of his pub, the Castle in Foord Road,
Folkestone, on Tuesday night. Police are investigating.
Folkestone Herald
3-6-1983
Advertising Feature
Len Fairclough can usually be found propping up the bar
of the Rovers Return in Coronation Street. But on Saturday Len, alias actor
Peter Adamson, will be well away from his home ground. In fact he will be
visiting the revamped Castle Inn in Foord Road, Folkestone, to mark the
official opening of the Dungeon Bar. The new-look pub has, as regulars will
tell you, changed drastically over the past few months. The exterior has been
completely altered with special stone cladding to give it an authentic
castle-like look and the interior has been expanded to provide extra space and
a unique style of decor.
The Dungeon Bar in fact is decked out in the style of
exactly that – a medieval jail. Only there are one or two subtle differences.
Firstly, it is considerably more comfortable, and there can`t have been many
prison cells among the castles of the Middle Ages to feature two pool tables.
The walls of the bar are designed to continue the theme of the outside of the
building. And amid the wooden beams and stone effect walls there are one or two
nice touches. A mural by artist and customer Judith Avril gives the customer an
idea of what a view from a window from the same spot would have been like in
the early 19th century. Copied from an 1833 print, it shows what is
now Foord Road as a tranquil country area, with rolling hills and a windmill.
Another slightly gruesome touch is a caricature model head of landlord John Barrington
incarcerated behind bars.
In fact 37-year-old John and his wife Founzou have been
largely responsible for the pub`s recent transformation. They took over the
Castle as tenants some four-and-a-half years ago. At that time it was Londoner
John`s first taste of life in the licensed trade. A former electrical
contractor, he says “It was something I always wanted to do. I spent most of my
time in a pub anyway but on the other side of the bar as a customer. It was a
logical step to take and just a matter of selling the idea to my wife. The
Barringtons soon found that running a pub was no holiday. “I honestly didn`t
appreciate just how much hard work went into it”, said John. But he soon became
determined to capitalise on his efforts and last year he bought The Castle from
the brewers, Ind Coope, and set his transformation plans into action. He
knocked the old public bar through into the house next door to create the new
expanded Dungeon Bar and set the work in progress. Customers, he says, have
been delighted with the results. And he is convinced that once word gets around
even more people are going to want to visit the pub, which is now a free house
selling beers that include Scottish and Newcastle. Charrington`s and Ind Coope.
South Kent Gazette
15-6-1983
Local News
Coronation
Street star Peter Adamson swapped his bar stool at the Rovers Return for one at
the Castle Inn, Folkestone, on Saturday morning. Peter, who plays Len
Fairclough in the long-running soap opera, spent half an hour signing
autographs for fans. His visit to the Castle coincides with a promotion
campaign by Reface Ltd., the company responsible for re-cladding the outside of
the pub.
Owners Mr.
John Barrington and his wife Founzou have spent nearly £25,000 renovating the
hostelry since they bought it from the brewery in August. As well as the stone
cladding they have converted the public bar into a dungeon bar incorporating a
mural Hilda Ogden would be proud of.
Although
Len Fairclough is frequently seen with a pint in his hand on the Coronation
Street set, Peter Adamson has actually been teetotal for 14 years.
Photo from South Kent Gazette
Folkestone Herald
13-7-1984
Advertising Feature
The times they are a-changing at the Castle pub in Folkestone’s Foord
Road. Genial host John Barrington and his wife Fonz have turned the clock back
several hundred years to recreate the age of Elizabeth I, Walter Raleigh and
Francis Drake in their new look Tudor Bar. Wooden beams now dominate the bar in Tudor
style and the couple plan a host of other touches to make it a relaxing place
to drink with a distinctly historic feel.
The couple have been in the licensed trade for seven years at the
Castle. It was run by Ind Coope but two years ago John and Fonz took the plunge
and joined the growing number of publicans who prefer not to be tied to any one
brewer. During that time they have spent thousands of pounds transforming their
pub. They started at the bottom, with the now hugely popular cellar bar, and
have moved up to the top bar, with its new Tudor style. Outside the couple added stone cladding to give the pub a homely look.
Former Coronation Street star Peter Adamson, who played Len Fairclough
in the long-running series, swopped his bar stool in the Rovers
Return for a seat in the Castle to celebrate one major phase of the pub’s
expansion.
There’s further good news for drinkers at the pub with the couple now
offering two real ales as well as a selection of keg bitters. Draught Bass and
IPA, two beers with distinctive flavours, are available on handpump. For lager
drinkers there is the strong Swiss lager Hurlimann and that pride of Scotland,
Tennents. In hot weather there's nothing like a drop of either to quench the
most powerful thirsts.
Don’t think the couple are going to stop there for they have ambitious
plans to add further facilities to the pub, hopefully in the autumn. Next time
you’re in Foord Road pop into the Castle - the drawbridge is always down and
there’s no danger of being locked in the dungeons!
Folkestone Herald
16-11-1984
Local News
Plans to change a house into a pub with bed and breakfast facilities
were turned down by planning councillors last Wednesday. Members of
Shepway’s Plans Sub-committee refused a scheme to extend the Castle pub in
Foord Road, Folkestone. The plan included extending the bar
into the house next door and using three of the rooms on the first floor of 73,
Foord Road for bed and breakfast. The end result would have been two
bars, a kitchen, dining room, two offices, two bathrooms and seven bedrooms. Councillors felt the development would worsen current traffic and parking
problems.
Folkestone Herald
14-12-1984
Advertising Feature
It`s not often you find a pub that caters for all tastes and transfers
you 400 years through time. But at the
Castle Inn in Folkestone’s Foord Road you can sup a pint of English ale in the
Elizabethan style Tudor Bar or enjoy music and the bright lights of the video
games downstairs in the Dungeon Bar - complete with fruit machine and pool
tables. Landlords John and Fonz Barrington can even
offer you a candlelight dinner in the pub’s new dining room. Six tables in elegant Tudor surrounds, silver service waiters and an a
la carte menu would impress even Good Queen Bess.
The Castle is a free house which means it
selects the best beers from the entire range offered by the breweries. Bass and I.P.A.
are on hand for real ale fans and for the lager drinker there’s the strong
Swiss Hurlimann. Whether you
decide to travel back to the past or stay firmly in the present the Barringtons
can assure you of good beer, good food and good cheer. And as an
added boost landlord John has had his picture painted by artist Ivor Jones. It shows
John in a cavalier’s outfit and hangs, appropriately enough, in the Tudor Bar.
Folkestone Herald
25-1-1985
Local News
Wily rag trade boss Mike Baldwin from television’s Coronation Street has
a hard nose for business. He may moan about the cost of living
but he drives a flash car and never seems short of a bob or two. Now a
Folkestone pub has invited him to pay them a visit in the hope that a little of
his Midas touch will rub off on them. Not one to refuse the chance of a free
drink - despite what Vera Duckworth and her mates might get up to in his
absence – Mike, in the form of actor Johnny Briggs, will be arriving at the
Castle Inn in Foord Road on Wednesday, February 6. It’s a
long way from the Rovers Return and he won’t find Bet Lynch behind the bar but
landlord John Barrington and his staff will be on hand to give him a warm welcome. And the
likelihood is that a large number of devoted “Street” fans will turn up for the
occasion too. Mr. Barrington is hoping that Johnny`s
visit will help to publicise their Tudor Dining Room, which opened at The
Castle early in December. Despite offering a full A La Carte menu as well as
businessmen`s lunches and Sunday lunches business has been poor. Staff are
convinced that the lack of interest is due to the pub`s rather unfashionable
location. Johnny Briggs` visit will also help maintain a connection with
Coronation Street that was originally fostered by the pub a couple of years
ago. On that occasion actor Peter Adamson, who played the long-running
character of Len Fairclough, was their guest and opened their successful
Dungeon Bar.
Folkestone Herald
15-2-1985
Local News
Coronation Street’s Mike Baldwin sauntered
casually up to the bar, smiling that winning, slightly lop-sided grin.
Everyone in the pub was waiting for that almost immortal line “I’ve had a hard
day” and the sight of the Street’s factory boss knocking back a large scotch. Suddenly the script had been changed and Mike Baldwin, alias Johnny
Briggs, ordered draught Guinness! However,
visitors at Folkestone’s Castle Inn were not too surprised, for on Wednesday,
Johnny was making an appearance as himself (well, almost) to promote the Foord
Road pub’s restaurant. Landlord John Barrington was thrilled with the results
of Johnny’s visit and the actor has promised to return - to the Rovers and the
Castle Inn!
Folkestone Herald
13-1-1994
Local News
Drug abuse lay behind a string of burglaries committed by
a young Folkestone man, a court heard. But despite a plea on his behalf that he
was determined to rid himself of the habit, Judge David Croft told Jamie Farmer
the desire was not strong enough to persuade him to find an alternative to
prison. Farmer, 22, of Trinity Crescent, Folkestone, was jailed for a total of
30 months for burglary and other offences.
Mr. Richard Travers, prosecuting at Maidstone Crown
Court, said one burglary was committed by Farmer in a flat above the Castle
Inn, Folkestone, after he had been drinking in the pub. A second burglary took
place on October 6 at the home of Mrs. Mary Ronco in Sandgate Road, Folkestone,
while she was out walking her dog. An Empress Josephine clock worth £800 was
stolen.
The sentence included concurrent terms of 18 months and
two years for the burglaries at The Castle and Sandgate Road, and a consecutive
term totalling six months to replace a probation order that was imposed for
earlier offences dealt with at another court.
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