Page 81 - Phonebox Magazine September 2012

Book Review
By Oxfam Bookshop, Olney
Born into a comfortable middle-class family, Brendaʼs love of children showed itself early in her life with the birth of her younger brother, David. She adored him from the first moment she saw him, and delighted in helping her mother to care for him. It is not surprising that, upon leaving school, Brenda should apply to the Norland Institute to train as a nanny. Her description of her training and of the formidable women in charge is both enlightening and amusing. However all that was to change in September 1939, when Brenda was recalled from Great Ormond Street Hospital, where she was being given the nursing training all Norland nannies received, to learn that Britain was at war with Germany, and she was to be sent home.
A Spoonful of Sugar by Brenda Ashford
children and those with children of their own. Each child became special to her, and her various stories of events during World War Two, including one where she incautiously came out of the air raid shelter to see what was happening above, are amusing and self- deprecating.
Her final year of training took place at Hothfield Hall in Kent, where the Norland Institute was evacuated and where, for the first time, she encountered evacuees from the East End of London, nicknamed the ʻBethnal Greeniesʼ by the student nannies. Her compassion for those children abruptly removed from all that was familiar to them is evident in her account of this final part of her training, as is her patience and gentleness.
Brenda never married,
never had children of her
own, but, as she herself says, after sixty-two years of being a nanny, despite never having actually given birth, she has had a hundred children. How many women, she comments, can say that?
Fully trained, Brenda moved to Redbourn, where she worked in a day nursery, established to enable mothers to undertake valuable war work, before moving on to work for families, those with adopted
This is a most enjoyable, heart-warming account of living through the Second World War, caring for children evacuated from London and also those in a day nursery. It is told without self-pity, despite some life events, which must have been painful and difficult. It is well worth reading, and, for local readers, has an added piquancy, since the author is local, living here in Olney. It is headed for suc- cess, the hard-back version published in July this year, and the paperback due out in September. It is also shortly to be launched in the United States. Not bad for a 91 year old local author!
Memory in a House by Lucy Boston
“ramshackle madness from top to bottom”. But for Lucy Boston none of this could outweigh the superb setting of the building, the existence of Norman architectural features “a window into the 12th century”, an atmosphere which was tangible and a need to restore to the house to at least some of its ancient dignity.
The house in question is the old Manor at Hemingford Grey. Lucy Boston first saw it from the river in the early years of the 20th century – a
semi-derelict Georgian farmhouse in a peaceful
country backwater. In the 1930s she was pursuing a
should live there: “It was like falling in love. Faults were brushed away
career as an artist and was living in Cambridge
Restoration took, initially, two years and began when “we jettisoned doubt and bought pickaxes.” Ripping out studwork and generations of wallpaper (in some areas a foot thick) and eventually demolishing floors and a lean-to, what was revealed was essentially a Norman hall with a Georgian north front.
as having no valid reality, common sense or waiting-till-you-are-sure were not to be considered. I was going where it took me.”
Faults there were a-plenty – water from a well and inadequate drains; room layouts so constantly altered over the generations that it was
when the old Manor came up for sale. Viewing the
house two things became clear to her: the
first was that the house was far older, behind its Georgian façade, than it
The Manor was Lucy Boston’s home for the rest of her long life and in this book written in the 1970s, she writes in her eccentric and engaging style of the restoration process, of the war years, when the house provided sanctuary for a wide cross-section of people, of the creation of her garden - famous for its roses and topiary - and of the inspiration the house provided for her sequence of children’s books in which the Manor became Green Knowe and was peopled by children based both on those she has known in the present and on others imagined in the past – the very long past which is ever-present in her remarkable house.
appeared and the second was a complete
conviction that she
Reviews brought to you by Oxfam Books & Music Stanley Court, Olney
Tel: 01234 714592
OPENING HOURS
Mon – Sat: 10am – 4.30pm Sun: 11am – 2pm
Dear Phonebox
My name is Justin Crook, I live in Lavendon and Iʼm looking for support in a 5 day Survival Challenge which I am taking part in 22nd – 26th September 2012.
Iʼm doing the challenge for a charity called Diverse Abilities Plus, they work with and for children and adults with physical and learning difficulties, offering lifelong partnerships to empower and offer the best support and education opportunities possible. If I raise over the Target of £550, I will donate the remaining money to St John Ambulance. I am currently a County Staff Officer for St John Ambulance in Buckinghamshire and I am actively involved with the unit in Olney, attending many local events to offer first aid cover.
The challenge starts with myself and other participants being dropped off by boat to a secret location somewhere off the Dorset coast. After that I have no idea what to expect, other than to expect the unexpected! I have a kit list including items such as a bivvy bag, warm clothes and I am also allowed “Luxury” items such as a fishing rod! Iʼm expecting to be building my own shelter and catching my own food aside from this I am in the dark!
If any of your readers feel they would like to support me in my challenge I would very much appreciate it. You will find my Justgiving page at: justgiving.com/JustinCrook- CastawaySurvivalChallenge Alternatively a copy of my sponsor form can be found at C.T. Wilson and Son Ltd on the High Street in Olney, you are more than welcome to pop in to sponsor me there.
Thank you very much for taking the time to read about me and my challenge.
Justin Crook
The books reviewed above are from Oxfam Books and Music, Olney, which sells donated books, records, CDs, tapes and music to raise money for Oxfam’s work in combating poverty around the world.
Phonebox Magazine 81
Review by Thelma Shacklady
Review by Sandra Metcalf