Olive Joan May Enock (1918-2017)

The following comments were recorded during my visit to Joan on Friday 24th June 2016.

"I was born 1918, I think it was just before the First World War ended, and we were living quite near Birmingham, which is quite a target, we almost got used to dealing with that noise."

"I used to live in Warwick, for years I was in Warwick. I went to the high school in Warwick."

"I went to school a little bit later than most kids did, but caught up alright. I passed the usual exams when I was 16, 17, 18, but by then it was getting more and more unsettled. I wanted to go to college and go on teaching afterwards, but by now it was becoming too dangerous to stay in the London area. When I did go to college we had moved the college out of London, and we took the whole jolly lot down to Wales. It was awfully good of them because the schools were fairly crowded and suddenly lumped with a trainload of London kids, imagine. We did make it a good opportunity for taking these kids, they were London kids, and what with bombing and so on, some of them had scarcely ever seen a wild flower growing. They were thrilled to bits when I took them out. I think it did the kids more good than any London school would have done. They learned a lot about the country, learned a lot about the creatures, and there was a kind of freedom that they would never have had particularly with the terrible war that was going on. We left them there the whole time, but we ourselves, young teachers, every now and again we would go back to London or wherever near London. Of course, I was worried because my mom and dad were still up there. You'd be interested to know that it was rather early to have a telephone, you'd go and ask the neighbour."

"Sometimes I'm amazed to think how I go back in time. I started teaching when I was about 18 I suppose. I taught a very weird mixture because there were wars, or rumours of wars. It wasn't a specialist so much, it was a sort of general teaching with one thing that you were particularly interested in. I was particularly okay on the art side, but you also taught the various other things, arithmetic, literature, so on and so on."

"I've had all sorts of weird things happen; wars, bombing, air-raid shelters, all that sort of thing. Walking to work and 'wait a minute, it's coming' and rushing with a friend and crouching down behind a hedge. It wouldn't have helped much. Some of the German bombers, that all thrumming, and the moment that you dreaded was when it stopped, and that was when the bomb was released. "Where's it going to fall?", and then woooom, ah!, that's okay, then we'd go up and go on. I supposed quite a lot has happened in a long life."

"I'm very lucky to be here, they are dear folk, and look at the view; it really is an amazing place. The view is all part of it. You can walk out there, before I had a stroke I could've walked all over, and then blow me I had a stroke, and I can only walk a very short way. It's a nuisance."

"It's an extraordinary feeling having a stroke, to be mentally reasonably okay and just helpless. Lying in my bed watching people, and perhaps murmuring something fairly incomprehensible, and then, thank heavens, a lot of it came back, but you notice I walk with this frame. I'm just so lucky to be here, with the delightful folk in this super place. It was a thorough nuisance having a stroke."

"I was terribly lucky to come back from the stroke, but I'm being very careful, and as I say, this side is much weaker than this side, not much grip, but I've got a heck of a grip with this one."

Father Jack

[On what Jack did for a living] "That's fascinating too, a weird mixture. He was a very talented person was my dad, but interrupted very much by two world wars, and at one time he was sort of a commercial traveller and drove many miles. He had invented a kind of improved microscope, and he was very much on the microscope/telescope visual side of it all. He would drive many miles and show this to people and perhaps get an order with a bit of luck."

[on being assistant to Lord Rayleigh] "They lived in a village, Terling in Essex, and Lord Rayleigh was the sort of typical inherited aristocrat, plenty of cash, and luckily, very kind hearted because there were some areas where the owner of an area was very difficult to have as a boss. When my dad went to visit mom, I don't think they were engaged, but obviously by then getting friendly, Lord Rayleigh realised that my dad was very much on the science side and got dad to go and see him and tell him quite a lot of things that he knew about microscopes and telescopes and all that sort of thing. I think Lord Rayleigh bought a telescope from dad."

"I don't know where dad got it from, but he simply was on the science side, because his father was an artist."

Mother Olive

"Mom was a great letter writer, and very much in a way she kept the family together. "Oh, there's a letter from Muriel", and whatever she was doing she'd stop and tear it open and read the letter from Muriel, and write back. I was always posting mother's letters."

"My mom learned to drive a car, I think just before the First World War. I've got a photo somewhere of my mom, with dad, mom is in the driving seat, priceless car, upright thing, no roof, and she's extremely upright. Dad is in the back muttering instructions to her. But it was most unusual for a woman to be driving then. She was taller than dad; mom had a very good upright carriage."

"They came to see us when we went on holiday. We particularly liked that place in south Wales; you've got south Wales and then the Gower Peninsula sticking right out, and next a piece of land as it were, is a big sandy bay Rhossili. We got very fond of that, mom and dad, my brother and I. Mom would write to the village and make enquiries as to what accommodation there was, and if possible, if there could be a room for camping as near as possible, because she didn't really want to camp so she had some sort of room right near by. It worked very well for the several years we did that. Dad got hold of one of those army bell tents, whopping great thing, not at that time rotting. We'd already contacted the local farmer or whatever, to ask if we could camp in his field. One or two had very kindly made sure that there wasn't any cows or pigs in the field. If it really rained, the tent wasn't adequate, so that we quite sensible really, erected a small tent inside the big one."

Brother Derek

"He was 6ft 3" when he'd finished going upwards. We always got on very happily. He was very kind and he didn't bully me, because if you're that much taller and older than your sister you can really have a go."

Enocks

"The beard and moustache are very much a family thing."

"On the whole, not very tall. My brother altered it by becoming 6ft 3”, but most Enocks were not like anything as tall as that."

Uncle Charles Reginald Enock

"I went to see Uncle Charlie, one of the brothers. Now my father was the younger brother of the Enock lot. Five boys and three girls, and uncle Charlie was a dear chap and a pompous ass. He had married the Mexican lady. My mom, dad and I, used to go down and see them. My dad drove a car as soon as cars were invented, and we drove down to see them."

Charlie c1908

[Joan's reaction to the above photo of Charlie] "The rather Enock high forehead, that's there. Well when you take my fringe away I've got quite a forehead, so I let the hair come down. I've had a fringe for, let us say, well at least 90 years."

"My mom and I, rather wickedly, used to sit somewhere where we could just see through a slightly opened door, and see him brushing his beard. He was a dear, very kind, but a pompous ass."

Great Auntie Nellie Enock

"Aunt Nellie, yes, we used to go and see her. When I say we, my mom and dad, and usually my brother. We would make a full outing to go and see Aunt Nellie."

Nellie Enock

[Joan's reaction to the above photo of Nellie] "What an amazingly straight look she's got."

Cousin Amy Enock

"She emigrated to Australia. That took some courage didn't it to go there in those days. I don't think she got on all that with her family did she?"

Cousin Madge Enock

"Madge, she was a strange one. We felt that she didn't sort of open up."

Great Uncle Fred Enock

Fred Enock

[Reaction to the above photo] "Is this uncle Fred? Well I'm blown. Fred Enock. I still have some of his natural history drawings. He made these very large things to be reduced, and I've got quite a wad of these, they're about so square, and if they're going to be reproduced rather carefully he took the top off, how he did it I don't know. They're beautifully mounted on very good quality paper with linen backing so it's got some substance to it. But all that to photograph, but of course, what he was photographing, many people would never be able to manage anyhow, peering for hours, waiting for some insect to immerge from a chrysalis maybe. His wife put up with a great deal."

"Got an Enock nose hasn't he?"

"How did he eat? I mean how do you eat through all that stuff? Do you lift it up or? And that's an Enock ear, there's quite a lot of similarity in ears, but that moustache is ghastly."

"I must have seen this, but have forgotten just how appalling the moustache is, but also, amazing how much the hair has gone back."

Cousin Joseph Enock

"Joe was very musical."

"I think it was rather a surprise wedding. We went and visited them after that, as well as before, to what we called the music room. It was a weird place, but suited them. It was just as well because it was like a great big barn and well away from other neighbours so they could kick up a heck of a noise there. Joe would put on a much amplified music thing. It was a weird place for her, she seemed to cope with it, but very, very, few women would've wanted that as a home, and clambering up a weird wooden step stairs up to THE bedroom."

Uncle Guy Enock

"I didn't see Guy very often, but more than most relatives."

Auntie Dora and Christine Enock

"Obviously I was younger, and I remember them so well as being such totally different characters. Aunt Dora, rather formal, and aunt Christine, the youngest of the three sisters, not formal at all, and very much she was sort of kept at home as a girl, but I do remember them, I'm so glad I do."