Ben Ainslie postbox: Royal Mail U-turn in Lymington

[TrueBlueTerrier]

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A postbox in Lymington will be repainted gold in honour of Olympic gold medallist Ben Ainslie, the Royal Mail has said.

It had originally only painted a postbox in Cornwall, where Ainslie grew up.

A campaign started after Rob Smith, 51, was arrested after painting the postbox in the Hampshire town where the gold medallist lives.

Ainslie had described him as a "legend of Lymington".

Mr Smith, a father of three, was arrested on Lymington's high street early on Saturday on suspicion of criminal damage and later released on bail.

Royal Mail has been honouring British gold medallists by painting postboxes gold in their home towns and initially described Mr Smith's actions as "vandalism", saying it would be repainted red.

The company has now said it will strip Mr Smith's gold paint from the postbox in the next few days and then repaint it gold themselves.

Spokesman Nick Martens said: "We initially picked Restronguet in Cornwall as the place Ben Ainslie grew up and where he first learned to sail.

"However, after speaking with Ben, we have agreed to repaint the postbox on Lymington High Street at his request, and are delighted to do so.

"Ben is a local hero in Lymington and now he will be one of the few lucky Team GB gold medallists to have two gold postboxes celebrating his achievement.

"However, we still highly recommend people leave the painting of postboxes to Royal Mail."

'Caved in'

The gold postbox in Lymington proved popular, with people having their photo taken beside it and a Facebook campaign attracted more than 2,000 supporters.

Campaigner Ian Watkins said Royal Mail had "caved in to the demands of the people".

"Lymington is a small town with not many heroes - we are very proud of what Ben has achieved," he said.

The four-time Olympic gold medallist has lived in the Hampshire costal town for 12 years and is an honorary life member of the Royal Lymington Yacht Club.

When asked about the postbox at a homecoming event at the club on Tuesday, Ainslie said: "Obviously the police didn't really like it but it's really nice the Olympics generated that kind of excitement in the nation.

"To hear the stories of support around the nation made such a huge difference to us as competitors, it was really very, very special."

[Wessex]

A lovely little town .

Dennis Wheatley the author lived on the hill overlooking the town and harbour. Adamski of ' Killer' fame is another local boy made good.I once got asked to leave the Yacht Club mentioned in the article

because I was wearing a hat in the bar and apparently only Princess Anne as Commodore of the club could wear a hat there .

Also home to legendary punk/country band The Cropdusters. A town last in the news iirc for rejecting the opening of an Argos store because of its association with poorer people lol