1960’s

A Memory of Stanford Dingley.

I remember Stanford Dingley when the cottages existed opposite Dumbledore on Jennets hill, they used the water pump opposite. A fire destroyed the semi-detached house opposite where Casey Court now stands. There was a post office half way up Jennets Hill and one eventually at the bottom which used to be known as ‘Bradfield Farm’, you had to ring the bell to get in! 3 pubs, the Travellers Rest, The Boot and the Bull. Numerous farms and very few houses except those owned by a few Lords or Ladies, or even famous poets and their boyfriends!…Colletts farm burnt down, was rebuilt and eventually sold to Dick Body MP who ran a pig farm next door. Bill Cummings took Lord Canarvons coffin up to the top of Beacon hill with his tractor and was also the ‘Captain of the Tower’ of St Denys Church, the incumbent was Rev. Hay…much more but like many there were few children in the village in the 1960’s but one bus a week on market day, (Thursday) into Newbury…so to live here you had to drive.
I have fond memories of Lady Cathleen Hudson and Brigadier Grahame. The annual village fetes that paid for the annual outing to the seaside. The owners of many homes, like Mr Lewis who kept an owl in his barn and lived next door to mill cottage. Mr and Mrs Kent who lived in Kent’s cottage, opposite the church, and of course the annual fireworks held on the village green! Walking along the footpath to the ‘blue pool’ owned by the Emms and playing on the old cress beds strewn across the river pang that’s flowed through the village as we walked to our swimming spot at plum manger!