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Miss Chew (centre) outside Buckingham Palace with Miss Moore (left) and Mrs Ford. This image is a scan of the Burnley Express photograph as a negative is not available.

The woman whose vision and tenacity of purpose went a long way to getting the Mid-Pennine Association for the Arts off the ground received royal recognition for her services when she was presented with the MBE by the Queen at Buckingham Palace this week. She is Miss Doris Chew of Ormerod Road, former Burnley Girls' High School teacher and voluntary organiser for the arts, who was accompanied by a friend, Miss A. Moore, a former local magistrate, and a cousin from London, Mrs Edith Ford.

Miss Chew, who attended a Buckingham Palace garden party some years ago, wore a tweed heather suit and pink hat for the occasion. She said: "I enjoyed it all very much, but I felt relieved after it was all over. The Queen wore an apricot shot silk dress with long sleeves and was absolutely charming." Miss Chew was a little nonplussed when asked what her work was, as she is now retired. She told the Queen however, that she was a voluntary organiser for the arts. "Her Majesty was calm and gracious and, quite frankly, considering she had to stand there for well over an hour receiving hundreds of people, I do not know how she did it"