A clutch of high achievers from all walks of life in South Lakeland and Furness have been recognised in the New Year's honours list.

Many of those to receive accolades have freely given up their time to serve their local communities, or have worked to benefit society as a whole.

Gerald Cole, of Burneside, said he was "overwhelmed" to be awarded his MBE for services to heritage and to the community in Kendal.

"I have only lived in Kendal for the last 15 to 16 years and I don't know who put my name forward for the award. An MBE is not something that you can buy or something that you can study for - you have to be recommended for it and that is what makes it so special," he said.

Mr Cole, 76, is a former inspector of schools and teacher but has also spent much of his life pursuing his love of carpentry and English church woodwork.

"I was born into a cabinet-making family in Durham and that is where it all began," he explained.

But over the years Mr Cole's hobby developed into a passion and on moving to South Lakeland he became the first secretary of the South Lakeland Decorative and Fine Arts Society - which is now one of the biggest groups of its kind in the country.

He is also a popular lecturer on the subject and has given talks to organisations both in South Lakeland and all over the country.

Mr Cole has also worked with a large number of voluntary organisations throughout the UK over a 50-year period, including the Duke of Edinburgh's Award and the Youth Hostel Association. He is still a volunteer with the Samaritans and has also heavily involved himself with the Ramblers' Association, working to protect footpaths in the Kendal area with the group.

Professor Victor Thomas Charles Middleton, whose influence in the world of tourism has been felt around the globe, said he was both surprised and pleased to have received an OBE.

Mr Middleton, who lives in Low Nibthwaite, has been chairman of the Lake District Peninsulas Tourism Partnership for the past three years.

He has spent the last decade working within the group a public and privately funded body that strives to help businesses within the tourism sector develop to their full potential and work alongside Cumbria Tourist Board to promote the sector in general.

He told the Gazette that he got involved with the partnership, which is part of the Market Towns Initiative in Ulverston, since first moving to the Lake District, an area of the world that he confesses to have loved since childhood.

The scope of the professor's career reaches far beyond Cumbria and the Lake District.

Mr Middleton was part of the Tourism Society's push to make the Government realise the potential of tourism in the UK during the 1970s and has worked extensively to bolster the educational aspect of his field.

He was among the leading figures to develop tourism as an educational subject over the past 20 years.

The subject is now taught in dozens of universities across the country and in countless more around the world.

He has also had studied and worked at Oxford Brookes University, the University of Central Lancashire and has penned several educational books on tourism.

These include a highly regarded book within the industry, Marketing in Travel and Tourism, a must-have manual for students of tourism which has gone through three editions.

His latest book, The Story of Tourism in Britain since 1945, is also soon to be released.

Commenting on his award, he said: "It feels pleasing that my modest efforts have been recognised."

Elsewhere in South Lakeland, Crook man John McAlpine Entwistle was honoured with an OBE in recognition of his services to the community in the North West. Mr Entwistle was unavailable for comment yesterday.

Richard Priss, a project engineer at BAE Systems, in Barrow, also received a MBE for services to the defence industry.