When I’d sent the lovely Rob Beckett Honorary Membership to The Handwritten Letter Appreciation Society for “Services to Handwritten Letters” (that is definitely a thing!) I did promise that unless he gave me the go-ahead I really wouldn’t tell anyone what I’d done (and that of course he could say “Er, no thanks, actually!”) so you can imagine my surprise and delight when he announced he was an Honorary Member live on his BBC Radio 2 evening show on Sunday 5th November! How absolutely brilliant was that!

Rob and his team at BBC Radio 2 had started a postcard feature back at the beginning of the summer to encourage people to send them in to the show from wherever they were around the world and he would read some of them out along the way. Once we’d got wind of this it was only a matter of time before, as he said himself, his pigeon-hole was fit to bursting, and it was wonderful to hear Rob’s genuine love of the handwritten word. It seemed the least I could do to give him membership, and although as a rule I don’t give famous people membership (could be seen as a bit weird and you could make anyone a member, couldn’t you) I got the impression he might be up for it. And how right was I! The challenge now will be not to spam him with gifts and letters (I will try very hard), but at least the “LOOK WHO’S A MEMBER OF THLAS!” baton has been passed from Axel Scheffler to Rob Beckett for a time. (Maybe we could have two batons)

Anyway, I’m absolutely delighted that Rob wanted to make it publicly known that he’s a part of our wonderful letter writing community here at The Handwritten Letter Appreciation Society. What a hoot/coup!

Thanks everso, Rob, for making my year!

Dinah

Click below to listen.

And see here, the wonderful collage!