Although there was a damp and misty start to the day it did not deter about 5,000 people from joining in the fun at last autumn's annual Hartlepool harbour fete, which is organised by the local branch and its many friends. The highlight of the day was the sponsored raft race which this year attracted 13 teams, and a member of the crack Rothmans' Acrobatic team put on a solo display in a Pitts Special. Later in the day there was an exercise by a Sea King helicopter from RAF Boulmer and Hartlepool lifeboat The Scout with Captain Alex Kirk, station honorary secretary, being plucked from the deck of the lifeboat. Hartlepool Atlantic 21, Guide Friendship III, and Crimdon Dene ILB also joined in the displays and at the end of the day almost £4,000 had been raised.Fleetwood lifeboat week, organised last August jointly by the ladies' guild, the crew and the station branch committee, proved to be both a financial and a social success. A house-to-house collection, a flag day, fresh fish stall, (what else from fishy Fleetwood?), balloon race, a dance and a giant raffle, helped to raise the grand total of £3,500 for the RNLI. One man, Jim Beattie, 73-year-old retired publican, collected on his own the fantastic sum of £300 two days.

Mrs Edith Rose Taylor, although 87 and only partially sighted, has been making small Welsh lady and other lavender dolls for sale at Abersoch ILB house. In just over a year these dolls have raised over £150.

Having made a new year resolution to lose weight, Police Constable Paul Fisher of the Isle of Man decided to support his favourite charity and, sponsored to the tune of £300, he had until Easter Monday to lose two-anda- half stone. On August 26 Paul was able to hand over to John Hudson, honorary secretary of Port St Mary lifeboat station, a cheque for £300, or as it was pointed out, 'one filling of fuel which could be used on one rescue'.

In July Glenkens ladies' guild, Scotland, held a coffee evening and flower arranging competition. Guild members and friends made floral arrangements which 'the public' judged by putting coins in front of the arrangements they thought the best. The competition raised £14.60 and, with the sale of souvenirs, the evening raised £209.

Uttoxeter ladies' guild has received splendid donation of £330 from Abbotsholme School, Derbyshire, as result of a Chapel collection and sponsored swim by a member of staff.

This has come about because the chairman of the guild, Mrs Knight, is librarian at the school, and her husband teaches there.A few yards from the City of London district office is The Underwriter, run by John Francis, who in the four years since he moved to this public house has collected from his customers £1,000.56 for the lifeboat service. In addition to his efforts in London, Mr Francis is actively involved in the RNLI at Margate and many of his city customers are regular visitors to the station.

A Son et Lumiere on the lifeboat service raised £40 for Longton ladies' guild. A coffee morning raised £125 but an unfortunately wet fete day raised only £30. A lone collector in nearby Walmer Bridge, Mr Rostron, last year collected £89.39.

Mr and Mrs G. Trafford, landlords of The Prince of Wales, Steeple Claydon, kept a collecting bottle in their bar which raised £128.36'/2 last year for Buckingham and District branch; a further £16.50 was added as the result of a competition to guess the amount in the bottle. Also from Buckingham came over £288 from a sponsored sail by members of Great Moor Sailing Club, and £203 from a wine and cheese lunch, run by Mrs C. Bolton.

An auction in the Town Hall of the ancient Cinque Port of Hythe last June raised over £400 due to the generosity of many lifeboat supporters. It was followed by flag week in July which raised a record sum of £914.00 of which £102.00 was collected by the persona! efforts of Major J. B. Worts.

Bury St Edmunds must have been bright and cheerful last summer, when 355 primary school children took part in a sponsored tallest sunflower competition which raised over £2,600 for the RNLI branch. The winner was Catherine Smith whose sunflower grew to the height of 350cm (about lift).

Catherine's prizes included a trip in Harwich lifeboat. In the five years since it was re-formed five years ago Bury St Edmunds branch has raised just over £12,000.

Gift vouchers from Marks and Spencers were the prizes in a draw organised by New Milton/Barton-On- Sea branch. Tickets for the draw were sold all through the summer at local hotels, pubs and holiday sites. The vouchers, ranging in value from £50 to £5, made the draw attractive to holidaymakers, who knew that they could be used anywhere throughout the country. In all, the draw raised £700 for the branch.

One of the tasks set for conference delegates who come to Balmer Lawn Hotel, Brockenhurst, is to invent a game. One week in September the game was so successful that it was played around the hotel among the guests and £30 was collected for charity.

Coverdale Organisation, which runs these conferences, asked for it to be donated to the RNLI.Poppleton ladies' guild celebrated its tenth anniversary in 1979. In those ten years, together with the luncheon club which was formed in 1972, it has raised £5,130. The guild's annual strawberry and cream teas, which have raised £809, are a feature of Poppleton village life.

The generous gift of a new. fully equipped Mirror dinghy and trailer ensured the success of the grand spring draw organised by Wadhurst and Ticehurst branch. Local people donated many other prizes but the dinghy was the 'star attraction', and it was won by an elderly lady who had never been in a boat and had no intention of starting now! Fortunately the matter was resolved when a member of Bewl Valley Sailing Club, who was looking for a dinghy, bought it from the lady. A sponsored skip-in by local Brownies provided the branch with a further £70 bringing the total for the year to £ 1,300.

When Bentalls Ltd opened their new store in Chatham a limited edition of 2,000 miniature replicas of the local green buses, made by Matchbox, were sold at 25p each, with all the proceeds going to the RNLI. At the end of three days £564 had been raised, some people having jiven more than the 25p.

The counterfoil of each sale then went into a draw, first prize of which was a token for £50, plus £25 for the runner up, to be spent at Bentalls.On Saturday August 18 Mrs Joan Lake, landlady of the Ty-newydd Inn, Barry, organised and joined one of her sponsored walks, from Cardiff back to Barry Island, all proceeds to Barry Dock lifeboat. Collections in buckets and sponsorships raised over £500. Mrs Lake has averaged almost £500 for the past three years.

Last summer Molesey branch organised an evening garden party which took its mood from the Ivor Novello era with his music and songs performed on the lawn in front of enchanted guests, who feasted on champagne and strawberries. Therewas even a fashion show of period dresses, and with the help of a raffle and a treasure hunt the evening raised £260. A further £269 was raised when, on the busiest weekend on the Thames, all those river travellers using Molesey Lock and waiting for the water level to rise, were lured towards a souvenir stall. Those who did not buy something could not avoid a collecting box, and every boat load was able to continue on its watery way knowing it had supported the lifeboats.

In its first year, Walton and Frinton ladies' guild raised and presented to the branch £1,500. The ladies also presented to the crew a new standard which was dedicated on Lifeboat Sunday by the Reverend K. Williams, padre to the branch.

A midsummer supper held at Lulworth Castle organised by Wareham and District branch raised over £700.

With a coffee morning run by Mrs Duncombe Anderson, which raised £50; a showing of lifeboat films organised by Mrs Farrant, wife of the former chairman of the Institution, which raised £97.67; the sale of souvenirs, largely organised by Brigadier Sir Frederick Coates, which showed a profit of £323; subscriptions, donations and collecting boxes, the branch was able to send a cheque for £2,259.21 to head office.

When the yacht Alcyone went on a two week cruise, a collecting box, hung underneath the mainhorse, acted as a swear box at 2p per swear. Indemnity to the next port of call cost 50p and the total amount collected for the RNLI, including the winnings of some hilarious games of dominoes, was £5.17.

When customers of the Marquis of Lome public house, Lowestoft, lost pounds, they made pounds for the local lifeboat. The 18 people concerned were taking part in a sponsored slim and between them raised £450.In about one-and-a-half hours Littlehampton branch's annual coffee morning, organised by its honorary secretary, Susan Cheney, raised £1,105.90.

Her Grace Lavinia, Duchess of Norfolk, Lord Lieutenant of the county and patron of the branch, came to draw the winning raffle tickets and cake, plant, antique and bric-a-brac stalls all helped to bring in the money which was £350 up on last year.

A sponsored walk organised by Holsworthy and District branch on April 1 raised £861.05.

With the closure of Durrants, the family butchers, Petworth branch is losing valuable support for when customers asked for dog bones they were asked to subscribe to the RNLI collecting box instead of paying. The scheme, under the guidance of ex-CPO Bill Matthews, has raised nearly £100 since July, 1977.

Two eight-pint collecting bottles from Bell's Whisky, which were filled by customers of the First In-Last Out pub in Bath, were broken open by Sir Alec Rose on June 22 and were found to hold over £400. Peter Shaw from Bell's and Ian Walker, of the First In-Last Out helped Sir Alec crack open the bottles. The money was collected for Falmouth lifeboat.

At last August's three-day New Forest Ideal Home Exhibition a stand was manned by Hythe and District branch members. A competition to guess the number of people travelling between Southampton and Cowes on the hydrofoil during August was won by Mr Parker from Totton whose prize was a day for two in the Isle of Wight.

Together with the sale of souvenirs, over £100 was raised.Yatton branch, Avon, topped the £1,000 mark for 1979. Flag week accounted for £580 and the year's successful efforts were brought to an end with a delightful cheese and wine party held at the home of the president, Peter Baldwin, which produced a further £250.

A marathon chip eating contest raised £297.46 for Broadstairs branch.

Of the 38 sponsored contestants, the winner devoured seventeen 4oz portions of chips in 15 minutes. The chips were kindly supplied by local fish bar owner, Ed Doody, who also organised the event.

In one year customers of Seagrave Arms, a public house at Weston Subedge, raised more than £1,200 to provide a small inflatable dinghy for an Arun class lifeboat together with various items of equipment. Their efforts included a trolley race down a very steep hill outside the village, a May dance and a pig roast. The cheque was presented by the licensee, Mrs Eileen Wixon, to Cdr Peter Sturdee, DOS(SW), last August.

Plymouth lifeboat took part in harbour displays during Plymouth Navy Days, from August 25 to 27, and, bykind permission of the Royal Navy, Plymouth branch and guild members, lifeboat crew, Sea Cadets and members of the Girls' Nautical Training Corps made collections around the dockyard, raising £1,121 for the lifeboat service.

During the summer months a photographic display, paid for by the crew, is put up in St Ives boathouse and an up-and-over platform is erected so that holidaymakers can look at the lifeboat.

This year £2,750.61 was collected. In August, as many as 1,000 visitors a day have been to the boathouse.

Leeds branch raised £230 on a perfect summer afternoon on July 29 when Mrs S. P. Spencer opened her beautiful gardens at York Gate, Adel, to nearly 600 enthusiasts and supporters. Mrs Spencer and her son, Robin, created this haven in North Leeds with 30 years sustained effort. The gardens were recently featured in a BBC TV series with Geoff Smith and are open once a year for the National Gardens Day in June. Committee members and their families ran refreshment and souvenir stalls which contributed to the proceeds.

Hornchurch branch ran a raffle during the two-day borough show on August 26 and 27. The gross amount taken on the stall and in the raffle was £148.87. The winner of the lottery, drawn by carnival queen Carolyn Brown, was a young girl, Alison Blogg, who later wrote a letter of thanks which read: 'Dear Lifeboatmen, I would like to thank you for the time you give in saving thousands of lives every year. We enjoyed the fete at Harrow Lodge and thank you for my prize.' Thirteen-year-old Andrew Simpson of Yeovil, organised a mini fete at his home on August 25. Helped by four friends Karen Baker, Maureen Smith, Jane and Claire Parsons, they sold icecream, clothing, books, cakes, ran a tombola and other competitions. At the end of a wet, but highly successful day, £67 had been raised.

Glorious weather and magnificent surroundings helped Bournemouth ladies' guild raise £200 on July 14, when the Marchioness of Salisbury, president of the guild, kindly allowed an open day to take place in the gardens of Cranborne Manor. Guild members ran raffles and cake, souvenir and bring and buy stalls, which all helped to make the day a success.

It took Ronnie Graham from Huddersfield only six days to cycle from Land's End to John O'Groats. Not put off by continuous rain and lack of sleep, Mr Graham, who is 58, raised nearly £3,500 towards the cost of an ILB.

Members of the small Buckfastleigh branch sat down one afternoon in September and had a mammoth 'stick in' of Co-op stamps. The local Co-op store has a charity box in which customers are invited to put their dividend stamps. The charity selected is invited to stick the stamps in books which the store then buys, usually adding £5 in every £50 of stamps. Mr A. Mason, branch honorary secretary, and a sturdy band of workers stuck 180,000 stamps into 159 books which were then turned into £79 by the Co-op. When the cheque was handed over at a special coffee morning, a further £65 was raised by a raffle, bring and buy and souvenir stall..