Early Memories of Home Life
Stocks and Harvestgate Farms lie under Old Winchester Hill It would seem very strange to my children, but life in the fifties and sixties was very different in a thousand ways to today and much more similar to that lived by previous generations. There is a marvellous book called 'Scenes from A Hampshire Childhood' by Gerald Ponting in which he describes growing up in a Hampshire village in the 40s and 50s, and which is similar to my own early experiences. Life then hadn't changed that much in the preceeding 100 years. It was only since the late 60s (ie when I was in my early 20s) that the huge changes that are still with us today began to be felt. Stocks , which we moved to 1950 from Danegate , lay almost two miles outside Meonstoke and had no mains water, electricity or drainage, though there was always a telephone (Droxford 135) which connected to the 'exchange' in Droxford. You could dial 'local' calls, but 'trunk' calls had to be placed th...