THE whole of Witney has been buzzing with the news that the World Pooh Sticks Championships will be held there for the first time this year.

But for 81-year-old Margaret Grayston of Woodlands Road, the occasion will be extra special.

The last time the grandmother- of-three played Pooh Sticks, she was 10 years old and it was on the original Pooh Bridge in the “100 Acre Wood”.

Mrs Grayston, who grew up in Kent, was evacuated to Ashdown Forest, East Sussex, where AA Milne lived and set his Winnie the Pooh stories, in the Second World War. Children from the school she attended, Wren’s Warren, even went to visit the author at his house for Sunday afternoon tea.

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She and her friends would regularly go to “Pooh Bridge” to play the game, dropping sticks off one side of the bridge and “racing” them to the other side.

It was on that same bridge the author first played the game with his son Christopher Robin.

She left the school when she was 11 and returned home to Kent, but she always treasured the Winnie the Pooh stories.

This summer, she will play Pooh Sticks for the first time since she was a girl when the world championships is held at Langel Common on Sunday, June 7.

Oxford Mail:

Margaret Grayston used to play Pooh Sticks on the original Pooh Bridge.

The mother-of-two said: “When I read the news in the Oxford Mail I thought ‘that’s lovely’. I’ve always been a fan of Winnie the Pooh and AA Milne, and my children were fans as well.

“I’ve got a lovely big book of his poems, because part of my childhood was in Winnie the Pooh country and it was a wonderful place.

“I shall certainly be there this year.”

The World Pooh Sticks Championships found its new home in Witney after a little help from the Oxford Mail.

The contest has been held at Day’s Lock on the Thames at Little Wittenham, near Didcot, for 31 years.

But in January the Rotary Club of Oxford Spires, which now organises it, announced it would not be able to hold the event there this year.

The contest had grown so popular, attracting 700 competitors each year and more spectators, that the club said there was no longer enough space.

Organisers put out an appeal with the Mail and within weeks Cogges Manor Farm offered the use of a bridge over the River Windrush on Langel Common, meaning the competition can be held in the summer for the first time.