The Filling Station c1955, Oswaldkirk

The Gatenby Family. The Old Postoffice.

I was born in 1942 at Oswaldkirk postoffice. My mother was the youngest of three sisters. Joyce the eldest was a nurse in Leeds, Olive the 2ed helped run the shop and postoffice, and my mother Nancy who also helped in the shop. My father Harry was away serving in India, and did not return until the war was over in 1946.
I return to the village each year to go to the family graves in the church yard, so notice how the village has changed over the years. Long before the Catholic Church was built my cousin Joyce and myself played many happy hours in the old orchard, and up the bank at the back of the old shop.I went there each summer holiday for 2 weeks, and I have the most wonderful childhood memories of this place that i still think of as home.