Family Ties With Ealand

A Memory of Ealand.

My parents, grandparents and I visited the village of Ealand every year from about 1954 until the 1960s. Our connection with the village arose from the fact that my paternal grandmother had two sisters, Mary and Lizzie, who both married farmers who hailed from Ealand. Mary married Jim Foster and they originally lived at Field House Farm, before Uncle Jim retired and they moved into a house on Ealand Main Road called 'Wyngarth'. Lizzie married Wilfred Oades (later Easton), who farmed at White House and on retiring moved into a house called 'Glenhurst' on Wharfe Road.
Auntie Lizzie and Uncle Wilf had a son called James, who became a farmer like his father and took over White House and when he retired he had a bungalow called 'Greenacres' built on part of the land. Jim and his wife Mary (nee Robinson) who hailed from Scunthorpe had 2 children, Sandra and David, but they have moved to different areas. Mary and Jim Foster had a daughter, Mary and she had a daughter, Jean. Mary married Marshall Oades, who had worked on her father's farm up to the Second World War and eventually they vacated 'Wyngarth' and took up residence in a bungalow built on adjoining land to their first home, which they named 'Rooksdown'.

I have fond memories of spending summer holidays in the village during harvesting time and I would visit the fields every day with my father and grandfather and the farmworkers. As I was too young to do much of the actual work, it was my job to make sure that the workers had plenty to eat and drink during the day. I would deliver bottles of drinks to the men at regular intervals and also take them plate pies, both savoury and sweet, that Auntie Lizzie had made for them.

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