Mary Hignett Bequest Fund 2025-2026 Annual Round Invitation

The Mary Hignett Bequest Fund is open for new grant applications. The closing date this year is 14th November 2025.

You can download

• the Application form in Word Format here and in PDF format here.
   
• The Guidance notes in PDF format here.

Forms Revised September 2024

Mary Hignett, a much-loved local writer, teacher and naturalist left half of her substantial estate to the Rotary Club of Oswestry Her Will gave the Club wide discretion regarding how the money was to be administered and disbursed, with the only guidance being that it should be used mainly for local small projects in the fields of Sport and the Arts. Following the merger with the Rotary Club of Oswestry Cambrian, the new club manages the financial aspects of the bequest via the Rotary Club of Oswestry and Cambrian Trust (Registered Charity 1101708)

The Committee charged with administering the Fund meets regularly to consider applications received. Each year an invitation to interested groups is published in the Advertizer early in the Autumn with an end-of-November deadline and the resulting awards are then announced normally no later than early January. Ad Hoc applications can also be accepted.

Most awards are in the range of £500 to £2,500 but each application is treated on its merits: Is it local? Is it a project? Does it provide lasting legacy? Is it related to Sport or Art?

Successful applicants to the Mary Hignett Bequest Fund in the Rotary Year 2024-25 included: Oswestry Boys' and Girls' Football Club, Designs in Mind, Shropshire Youth Association (Oswestry Youth Club), Lights Out Trefonen, Whittington Music Festival, Marches Music Tour, Morton Playing Field, Oswestry Team Tennis, Stage 5 Theatre, Shropshire Special Olympics and Oswestry Scouts.

Click on Mary's image to download her obituary as published in the Shropshire Botanical Society Newsletter Spring 2005.

Please DON'T use the contact form below (this doesn't seem to be working and we can't remove it). Instead directly email any queries and your completed application to this address:

oswestrycambrian@gmail.com

Your email will be forwarded to Graham Moss very quickly.

Our president for 2024-2025, David Griffiths, with Graham Moss presenting the Mary Hignett grant to the Oswestry Music Festival organisers. When the Whittington Music Festival organisers were planning their 2025 outreach programme as part of the popular annual event, they asked the Rotary Club of Oswestry and Cambrian if the Mary Hignett Bequest Fund could help with funding. The project was to organise activities where some of the professional musicians performing at the festival would work with interested pupils from three local primary schools and with students from Oswestry’s Derwen College. This request ticked all the boxes – a small, local project, centred very much on the arts and with great legacy potential in terms of the impact on the musical lives of the youngsters involved – and we were happy to support with a grant from the Fund.