After our lunch on 13 November, we were treated to a talk by one of our own, David
Debenham, entitled ‘A Foot in Two Continents’. David looked back on his long career, firstly
as a chemist with a fascination for making loud explosions, then in research with the
Scientific Civil Service, which first took him to Kenya. On his retirement from the SCS, he
took up small time farming in Kenya and running a charity ‘Sevenoak Kenya Educational
Trust’ which, among other things, assists young Kenyans from poor rural families with
payment of their school fees.
Clearly illustrated and full of anecdotes, the highlights of the talk included the story of his
arrest and being charged for causing an explosion at a firework display in North London
when he was a young man (he was cleared) and his own video of the last steam-hauled train
on the Mombasa-Nairobi railway.   Written by ‘The Probus Scrivener’.