I was raised in a large, detached house on the main A325 road in the centre of the village, wrote John Shrubb. The Post Office was next door, and a grocer's shop was opposite, so earliest memories are of being taken by Mum to these shops on a daily basis.

Fresh food was brought each day, due to us not having any mod cons, e.g. freezer or fridge, (it was 1953). In fact Mum would not have any modern household appliances in the house !

She used two flat irons, heated on the gas stove, as we did not have a bathroom. The tin bath (that hung on a nail on the wall between the outside loo & the coal house) was carried in to the scullery on Friday evenings.

As the coal-fired copper boiled, the contents were then jugged into the bath with a large enamel jug, & cold water added until the water's temperature was bearable for Dad to get in.

He would firstly add more cold water to the copper, so there was some 'hot top-up water' for when Mum, & then finally myself, got our baths in the water Dad had used.

When Dad had had his bath, he got dressed in clean underwear, (only one change per week on bath night for the whole family !) a clean shirt & stiff collar, & best suit, & promptly left the house for one of the three pubs in the village until closing time.

As Mum got out of the bath, l got in. She would wash me all over with 'Fairy household soap'. In years to come we used the new (to us) toilet soap, sometimes Knight's Castille, or Palmolive. Before Mum started buying shampoo, she washed my hair with 'Lux flakes'!

l can just recall being bathed in the 'pot sink', l had to sit on the wooden draining board. Must have saved Mum from a lot of backache?

My granddad lived with us, as a widower, & he owned a haulage business. When l was 4, he was in semi retirement, & just operated one Dodge dropside lorry himself, on general haulage / carrier.

1935 LETTERHEAD OF GRANDAD'S, l rode in his lorry @4 years old.

During the summer months he took me out in the lorry all day, l loved it on the road, and one day he passed our house and Mum saw me riding in the back, stood behind the cab !

When Granddad & l got home she complained very strongly about this, saying how dangerous it was, but he dismissed the fears, saying 'The boy's alright, he always rides there, with the dog '

Taken by myself with 2/6d. camera!My dog, Nell posing on our Standard Flying 14 horsepower car (holiday @ Hayling Island circa 1960 )

l recall going into Spencer's shop in Farnham, they were drapers. l was spellbound by the cash 'monorail' on the shop ceiling, which took Mum's money from the assistant to the cashier, & returned with Mum's change & receipt. It made a loud 'bang' as the carriage hit the stop at each end of the rail.

We went for flags on long tapes, (it was 1953, Coronation year. Mum tied them up, & hung a framed portrait of the new Queen Elizabeth in the front room window.

As an only child l found starting infants' school rather scary, with all these noisy kids around, fighting & pushing each other. l had always been on my own, for as we lived on a main road, l could not go out on my own to play, so never mixed with other children.

Miss Davis, my first teacher, taught us to read & write with the aid of a freeze across the top of her blackboard, it started with an 'a' & a picture of an apple, & 'b' for bat etc.

Miss Evans was the head teacher & arrived each morning in her Singer Bantam car, with two-tone paint, black & deep green on the lower half of the doors. She parked it next to the coke heap in the playground.

By the time l had progressed up to the primary school l had discovered that l was better at English than l was at arithmetic, so used to dread number-work lessons, for as l failed to understand most things I ended up counting on my fingers !

Upon arrival at Weydon Secondary School l was put in the lowest of the 3 first year grades, (1B), but after a term, was moved to the middle ability grade (1X), & remained in the X grade until l left to start work at 15.

On leaving school l did a 5-year apprenticeship as a motor mechanic at E.D. Abbott's Ltd. a main dealership garage between our house & Weydon School, a 5-minute walk from home, so ideal.

l had always 'helped' Dad mend his various cars, and loved every minute, so a mechanic was all l wanted to be !

On the Saturday before l started work, Mum took me to Wilcox, the gents outfitter's in Farnham & bought me 2 blue boiler suits & a donkey jacket with plastic-covered shoulders, was l proud !

On reporting for work that Monday morning in my new work wear, the foreman, Mr. 'Tich' Hockey showed me how to 'clock on', & introduced me to Fred Covey, the skilled mechanic l was to work with.

We started work on a series 1 Land Rover, replacing the exhaust tail-pipe. l worked on many makes of cars, including Daimlers, Fords, Hillmans, Humbers, Singers, Sunbeams & Commer vans, etc.

After 2 years l was put with Dave Binfield, the Rolls Royce expert, we worked on mainly Rolls Royce & Bentleys, did l enjoy the road tests ! l worked on cars from the 1930's up to the newest models.

When l was 17 l started taking driving lessons, & was eventually allowed to drive the service van ( a Commer Imp, new in 1966), going out with the labourer, Tom Hutchings , to various other garages to collect spare parts our stores needed.

This enabled me to get some driving practice in. On passing my driving test, Tich advised me 'No heroics' & allowed me to drive company vehicles & customers' cars.

The village was a wonderful community to live & work in, where everyone knew our family, some knew 3 generations of us.

l sung in the church choir, like Dad did as a boy. He took me to the village pubs at 17, and introduced me to halves of beer in moderation, so when l was 18 l did not go mad on it & make a fool of myself.

When l was about 10 I joined The Church Lads Brigade, & went to meetings on Tuesday nights.

l can recall getting a no.3 Meccano set for Xmas & getting 100's of hours pleasure from it. l saved up my 1/6d. pocket money to buy extras to be able to build bigger models, & the following Xmas l got a 3A set, which made it a no.4 set.

The next year l got a Triang electric train set, and then saved up & got extra long lengths of track & points. l only got toys at birthdays & Xmas, there was not the money for the rest of the year.

Summer holidays were always spent in a caravan at Hayling lsland in Hampshire: all day on the beach with my bucket & spade; evenings in the pub garden, on the swing & slide, a bottle of Cherryade & a bag of Smith's crisps with the twist of salt in blue paper.

At a Christmas Eve dance in the Bourne's village hall l met my first 'real' girlfriend, Lesley Frost, from the next village in the Wey valley, Bentley. She phoned her dad &told him not to pick her up, as l was driving her home.

We had a great relationship for several years. At 22 l got married, & we bought our first house. Later we had our first son, John jnr., & later we bought our present house where our second son Matthew was born (in the dining room) with me 'aiding' the midwife.

Circa 1982 -- Matthew rides the same Austin car's that l rode in 1952 @Hayling lsland fun fair , history repeat's itself !

Sadly, my first wife Kathleen passed on with cancer @ 40, but l was befriended by Sharon, who became my new wife, & we are very, very happy together. Ten years on & life's just great.

My sons have grown up & long left home & are enjoying their lives. So now l am 53 & a lot wiser due to the passage of life!

John Shrubb, Halifax, West Yorkshire, 2002