“If you live in the village and are prepared to do things you do it for everybody,” says Mandy Watt, referring to the way members of different organisations in Algarkirk help one another.
But there are some projects that are just too big for village people to take on, such as the £1.3million project to put a new nave roof on St Peter and St Paul’s Church.
It’s a surprisingly grand church for such a small village, with stunning stained glass windows. The Rev Gary Morgan explains this is thanks to an earlier clergyman, the Rev B Beridge, whose family were very rich and thankfully lavished some of their wealth on the church.
The church is currently shrouded in scaffolding and plastic sheeting as new internal timbers are installed and lead is replaced.
Funding has also been secured to repair the chancel, where services are currently held, and there are plans to repair windows, restore the bells and install a kitchen.
In light of the amount of original features in the church and the amount of work that is being carried out, there are proposals to introduce a heritage area to the church to help other people going through the same process.
Grand the church may be, but it takes the time and devotion of ordinary people to keep a place of worship going. That is certainly true of former churchwarden Bill Moore, whose work over more than 50 years extended to cutting the churchyard grass.
Bill was born at the farmhouse where he has lived for 78 of his 80 years.