Growing up in Hope

Boyhood memories of village life

The best years of my childhood life was when I could go out and play in the fields with my mates. We had catapults, bows and arrows, with real feathers and metal tips. It was the 1950's. None of our parents knew where we were, except ‘Out Playing.’ Life was much less restricted for children back then. We got up to all sorts of mischief, lighting small riverside campfires was our favourite pastime. I wasn't a boy scout, but followed their motto of ‘Be Prepared.’ which meant taking a box of matches with us, not spending ages rubbing two sticks together. These childhood memories of growing up in the small village of Hope, in the heart of the Peak District of Derbyshire, bring back to life the smell of shire horses being shod by the local blacksmith, to trips into nearby Sheffield, past the brewery filling the air with the aroma of hops.