I was idly wandering around on the internet this afternoon and came across a 1957 black and white film called 'Adventures in the Hopfields; starring a child actress of the time, Mandy Miller. She of 'Nellie the Elephant' song fame. I remember her as a child, she now lives in the USA and is now 74 years old.
For those who are interested in a bit of visual UK history/nostalgia I think its worth a look, especially if you know anything of Kent. It was filmed in and around the village of Goudhurst which I knew very well in my youth and which I walked through when I hiked the High Weald Trail a couple of years ago. The village centre still looks the same today as it did then.
To view it, type '123movies.fm/watch/EdZw09vp-adventures-in-the-hopfields.html' into your browser. It only lasts 60 minutes.
It made me realise that as we walk around the country today, all sorts of ways of life have disapeared, perhaps even in our lifetime and for ever. As a child, hop picking was a big thing in my life, it was one of our yearly 'big earners', as it was for hundreds of London working class families, and for me it was the time when I first became aware of girls! Happy days but all gone now, the hop picking machine was invented in the early 60s and that was it, gone!
I bet Forum writers can identify all sorts of these types of ways of life that have disapeared from all over the country. As an adult now I still find I'm always intersted in such things.
