Thankyou and history part 1

Before we start posting in earnest, a big shout out to Transpontine and Casino Avenue whose South East London blogging has lifted my spirits and encouraged me to establish The Ragged School Blog here. I read your blogs on and off and its been a great morale boost to see SE London, especially Deptford represented with lively interest. Also thankyou to everyone who spoke to me informally across Deptford about the local scene and got me up to speed about community issues, history and so on. In a future post I will review my findings and relate the story how my friend Nick and Myself became interested in Deptford after finding out about Hacklab and wanted to see if we could create a 'mobile hacklab' in Deptford. We approached James Stevens of Deckspace with our first thoughts and he directed us to the now defunct Use your Loaf and has been a great source of help. Little is represented online about The Ragged School which was once called The Princess Louise Institute. Here is an old page which I did find using the old name for the building. The day I discovered the building, door wide open, I walked in off the street and spoke to the then resident Mark Pavey of the Open Arts Platform (who have since relocated to The Seager Distillery). We spoke about the buildings uncertain future, and thats when I made my mind up to start the Hacklab idea by briefing the users of the Ragged School about a possible intervention using communications technology. We had already seen how Borthwick wharf was threatened with demolition and how the community was slow to mobilize (as details about planning applications and knowledge of whats at stake for the community cannot be campained on by just the small handfulls of dedicated and knowledgable individuals that do exist - they need our help, your help !) We need to support those active in the community to create grass roots awareness about the remaining tangible fragments of Deptford astonishing Social History (like this Ragged School), and empower ourselves to prevent opportunities being missed, history destroyed. I personally would like to establish and early warning system to alert the community to any heritage/ecology or social inclusion 'events' which need to be looked at not just by the council, but all the community. My positive experience with Boundless spurred me on, especially seeing the Internet connection at the Ragged School, a true example of how the wireless community infastructure can open up opportunities. Users of The Ragged School in situ will use the Boundless link to update this blog.