Lion Garage

A Memory of Dulverton.

I was working at the Lion Grage then, Mr & Mrs Ros in the Tantivy. First thing in the morning I would go to Mr Ross for our fags (pay him on Friday - pay day), the garage then was open seven days a week for petrol (Esso), Sundays people were coming back off the moors and would fill with petrol. Go to the Tantivy for ice cream, it was good days, the Lion Hotel and the Lamb Hotel always full with guets, the times we had to garage the cars three abreast for the people staying in the hotel. Some nights we could not get them in so we put them around at Jack Arnold's for the night, fetch them in the morning and chamoise the cars off so the customers thought their car had been garaged all night, I believe it was 2 shillings a night (1060/1963). I worked under Eric Combes, what a great mechanic, garage owned by G C Stanbury & Son. Still going today, run by David and Rick (a great family to have worked for). I was with them for 36 years. They they pulled the old garage down (a great shame). I then went to Wreanton to work for them, it was the old nursery before it was turned into a garage, owned by Mr Laurence. Where the pumps and forecourt now is was an orchard, well as I said before it was good days (closing now).
Colin Needs