Jeff and Margaret Paulin

Jeff Paulin with his decorated bike at the King George V celebrations.

Jeff and Margaret PaulinJeff Paulin (06.04.1927 – 02.06.2015).

 

Born on 06.04.1927 in the front bedroom of 3 Flowery Hill (now known as Flowery Bank), Jeff is the eldest son of the Wilfred (known as Wilf) and Frances Paulin.

His grandparents John and Eliza Paulin lived next door at 4 Flowery Bank which was to become the family home for 3 generations.

Jeff was 14 when he left school and started as an apprentice motor mechanic serving with Parkers Garage in Castlegate, Malton. He worked on farm machinery as well as other vehicles.

He was called up for National Service, serving with REME after training at the Fenham Barracks, Newcastle.  His first posting was with the 13 Command Workshops at Aldershot.  He drove a mobile workshop touring camps on Salisbury Plain, principally repairing radios. His next posting was Egypt to serve in the workshops in the garrison at Tel-el-Kebir.  When de-mobbed he returned to his parents at 4 Flowery Bank. Initially he returned to Parkers Garage before joining his father Wilf in his livestock haulage business in about 1950.

Wilf handed over the running of the business towards the end of that decade but continued to take a keen interest. Jeff kept his hand as a motor mechanic doing repairs for friends. In 1970 Jeff gave up the haulage business to concentrate full time on establishing a business as a motor engineer. He set up in the garage originally built to house the truck. Although he retired when 66 he continued tinkering for the benefit of friends for another 4 years. He was still repairing his own car when well into his 80s.

Marriage to Margaret

Jeff  and Margaret married on the 16th August 1952 at Settrington Church.  Margaret was the daughter of Settrington village postmaster George and Edith Clarkson.  Jeff’s best man was school chum and best friend John Crosby, while Margaret’s bridesmaid was her best friend Marjorie Metcalfe of Barton-le-Willows.

In the summer of 1953 they moved into 8 Beech Crescent where they lived for 33 years until moving into Jeff’s parental home.

Margaret was a teacher, first at Yedingham and then at Langton where she was working when they were married. She went on to teach at Amotherby School (the “old school” which was then on the south side of the B1257).  She became a supply teacher while bringing up her daughter Ann, born on the 22nd April 1954 at Bridlington Hospital by Caesarean. Margaret ended her teaching career at Malton Infants School.

Ann married Slingsby farmer Chris Wilson and they gave Jeff and Margaret three grandchildren, Andrew who is in partnership with his father; Bruce who lives in Appleton-le-Street and who helps with the family business; and Louise who emigrated to New Zealand.  Jeff has two great-grand-daughters in Slingsby, Mollie and Poppy and 6 great-grandchildren in New Zealand: they are Laura, Daniel, Jessica, Sam, Charlie and Ben.

Jeff and Margaret became chair and clerk respectively of Broughton Parish Meeting in 1977.  They were persuaded to take the roles by Charles Lund who resigned as secretary and treasurer following the death of the chairman Tom King.  Jeff says it was not something he really wanted to do, but both worked hard at their posts until Margaret’s terminal illness which led to her death on the 12th October 2001.  Jeff stood down as chair at the 1998 AGM.

Jeff was also appointed a Trustee of the Broughton, Swinton and Amotherby Sports Hall.

Jeff and Margaret had lived at Settrington for a year before becoming council tenants in 1953 of the newly built 8 Beech Crescent where they stayed for 33 years.  After his father Wilf died, Jeff’s mum moved temporarily into Beech Crescent.  This allowedalterations  to 4 Flowery Bank to enable all of them to move into the old family home.

Recollections

The old lean-to was demolished with a new building created to form a bathroom as well as kitchen and pantry. The original staircase was replaced and re-sited. The original kitchen became a cosy back room with an open coal fire heating a back boiler to run radiators.

Jeff recalls childhood Friday nights when baths were taken in the oval galvanised bath tub in front of the old York range.  Light was provided by a paraffin lamp. Water for washing was drawn from a cistern in the yard filled with rainwater collected from the roofs of all 4 cottages. This water was shared by all the residents.

Drinking water came from a well with pump on Breedycroft Lane near Oak Farm.  Wilf used a yoke over his shoulders to carry a pail on either side. When this well dried up he had to walk further down the village to another well near “the stack yard” in Main Street. It was around 1933 before there was running water with one tap outside the front of Flowery Bank for all 4 houses.

Jeff remembers the National Grid pylons being built as well as the posts going up to bring the new power to the village. The family’ first electrical appliance was a copper kettle bought by Wilf from his brother Claude. Each of the 4 rooms was given one electric light and there was one two-pin socket – near a bedroom door.

Their pigs were salted and hung in the lean-to with hams hanging from a beam in the kitchen. They were slaughtered and scalded by the village pig killer, Mr Coleman, a livestock food merchant of Broughton House.

Jeff recalls Jubilee celebrations for King George V in 1935 and for the Coronation of George VI in 1937.  These were held on the cricket field.

He also remembers the single-track railway line below Manor Farm which took trains, mainly goods but sometimes passenger specials, from Rillington to join the main London-Edinburgh line at Pilmoor Junction near Thirsk. The manned crossing gate, serving mainly farm traffic, was run by John and Sheila Watson who lived in the gatehouse, until Beeching’s axe made their job obsolete.

Other memories are of Sudaby’s bus caught in flood water down “blackboards” in Norton in 1931 and the typhoid epidemic in Malton in 1932 which claimed many lives.

Read about John and Eliza Paulin

Read about Wilf and Frances Paulin

See more Paulin photos

AGW 2011