From Facebook: (here)
Rodney Cook Memorial Charity Detecting Weekender4 października 2018
Before we move onto the finale of this years event, namely the presentation of the cheque, there is one outstanding issue that I would like to put to bed.....
There are some fantastic people in this hobby, and sadly, there are a few nasty individuals that can often ruin it for the rest....
Since the announcement of this charity rally, we have been constantly harassed by comments from a guy called Steve Taylor, some of you would have read his comments and indeed, I know that some of you didn’t attend because of them, so I’d just like to clarify a few of his comments with the facts....
In brief....
Steve Taylor initially claimed that he was pissed of because Gary had used their friendship to find permissions in his area....he initially stated that he had permission near Sisters Farm, which he later changed to having the permission next door, which ultimately became it was his farm and Gary stole it from him. - he also claimed that him and his friends had detected it a number of times but had found nothing but a few buttons...clearly designed to put people off.
Claims were also made that Gary used his sob story to get permissions and that most of the charity money would be pocketed by us. There were also a whole load of nasty and malicious comments made, some of the screenshots are below for those that want to read them.... but the bottom line is this.
Our club had the permission before Gary even met Steve Taylor. And none of the four landowners had ever heard of him, nor did they recognise his photo.
Interestingly, there were many, many hundreds of finds made across the whole site...hundreds of Roman coins and brooches...numerous Roman artefacts...3 x silver staters, 2 x bronze staters...Saxon button brooch, Viking stirrup mount...and a whole collection of medieval coins and artefacts....but very few buttons! So, make of that what you will...
Gary has personal permissions amounting to many thousands of acres, he doesn’t need to use Steve Taylor, nor ‘sob stories’ to gain any more....
Gary was subjected to a tirade of abuse and insults from Steve Taylor and his cronies, which were totally uncalled for, especially given that he had recently lost his dad.
Gary and his lovely wife Lisa worked tirelessly to organise this event, supported by our club, the Trowbridge & District MDC of whom I am proud to be Chairman.
We WILL be making this an annual event, and we look forward to seeing you all again next year.
Oh, and the cheque for the Cancer Care Unit will be for £27,000!! All accounts are available for anyone that wants to see them.
And from us all, our huge and sincere thanks to all of you for your amazing support and for making it such a huge and successful event.
See you next year.....
The Full Facts
1. A few years ago, the Trowbridge & District MDC was introduced to the landowner of Sisters Farm via a mutual friend of one of our members. The farmers wife was raising money for charity, so with their permission, we held a club day on three of the fields which raised £800 for their charity. As a result, we were invited to go back any time we liked.
2. Shortly after, Gary Cook was at Detectival and met Steve Taylor for the first time. As a result, they did some detecting on each other’s permissions.
3. The TDMC held two more club days for charity in Wiltshire, Gary invited Steve Taylor along and he attended both.
4. Sadly, around that time Gary’s dad developed cancer and he tragically passed away sometime after.
5. Gary wanted to raise funds for the Bath Royal United Hospital Cancer Care Unit, who took care of his dad throughout.
6. We decided to hold the memorial rally, we explored a few options but because of the facilities, we decided to make sisters farm our plan A. Fortunately, the landowner was happy to support us.
7. Not only did he support us, he also approached his neighbours and in all, we had over 30 fields to detect on, owned by four separate landowners.
8. When Steve Taylor complained, we checked with all four landowners and three stated that no one had permission to detect on their land, the fourth had an ‘old chap’ that had done a bit of detecting in the past, but it wasn’t Steve Taylor. None of them recognised his photo either.
9. Steve Taylor’s claims were initially that he had permissions in the area, and that he didn’t want 350 ‘knuckle dragging morons’ descending onto his area...mainly because 50% of detectorists are night hawks that would use the rally as a cover to visit the surrounding area at night....yep, he really said that....
10. That swiftly changed to it being his farm and as proof he posted a handwritten agreement, with sister farm mention, but the agreement wasn’t signed nor dated! Seriously!
Unfortunately, this nasty and vindictive individual tried to ruin what was a noble cause. He failed. He has stated that he will be taking us and the landowner to court. I hope he has very deep pockets.
Our huge and sincere thanks to you all for your amazing support and for making it such a huge and successful event.
See you next year....
