2024: A Year in Review – part 1

Posted on January 4, 2025 by johnshortlandwriter

As we enter the new year it’s always a good time to reflect on the past twelve months as well as to look forward to what 2025 may bring. For me, 2024 has been a busy year. I remember many years ago an ‘old boy’ telling me that when you reach the age of sixty, life is downhill all the way. I was in my thirties at the time and so believed him. I’m now in my early seventies and I can’t say that I agree with his pessimism. Funnily enough, he lived well into his nineties and, for most of that time, enjoyed rude health so he proved himself wrong too! The only way to tackle ageing, I’ve decided, is to embrace its positive aspects – no mortgage, wisdom (ha-ha!) and more time to do the things that matter to you. Of course, good health is important and maintaining balance and staying active helps no end. One of the reasons why I’ve not retired completely.

Tewkesbury, a town in Gloucestershire on the River Severn – the UK’s longest river – is just a few miles from the edge of the Cotswolds. It’s an ancient town that I have driven through dozens of times but early in the year I made the effort to actually stop and explore its narrow streets and abbey church. I hadn’t realised that when entering the church I would be staring at a suspended globe which, when standing 211 metres away from it, is the exact size and view of Planet Earth you would see if standing on the moon. When I first saw it ‘suitable’ music was being played but it was only after that had stopped that I found the exhibit strangely moving as it rotated slowly in total silence. That’s another thing I’ve noticed as I’ve grown older – how much I enjoy silence! The church is well worth visiting for it is now almost one thousand years since it was built and is one of the finest examples of early Norman architecture in Britain. Unable to visit? Then click on the link here to see lots of photos.

*The abbey church looms over the ancient houses and narrow streets of Tewkesbury*

In March, we travelled north to the county of Yorkshire to watch a friend take part in the oldest horse race in the country. The Kiplingcotes Derby has been run annually since 1519. Tradition sys that if it ever stops taking place it will never happen again so all through the Covid restrictions only one horse took part! For this race, the 505th, dozens of riders took part for it is a horse race like no other: no finely maintained racecourse but a series of roads, lanes, field margins and tracks, a real test of endurance for both horse and rider. Our friend, who had never raced before was taking part to raise money in support of the local hospice. She reached the finishing post in good time and raised over ten thousand pounds in memory of a close friend. The race has one other completely bizarre quirk which makes it unique in the world of horse racing – to find out what that is you’ll need to click on this link here!

*The oldest, continuously-run horse race in the UK*

Later, in early summer we returned to Yorkshire for a week’s holiday spent in the pretty village of Austwick. We had planned to spend our time walking for it is excellent hiking country. However, my partner was nursing a broken foot and, later, during a hill walk on my own there, I hurt my knee badly so we were both hobbling about instead (what was I saying about staying active?!) There is always a positive outcome to everything, I find, and so we explored by car instead where we discovered the Courtyard Dairy. To misquote Paul Whitehouse, “if you like cheese, you’ll like these” for we’d stumbled across one of the top, award-winning artisan cheese makers in the country. With a restaurant, small museum, ice-cream and wine shops as well as a huge selection of cheeses, we were in our element. For lots of photos of the trip – and not just of blocks of cheese, click here.

*The Courtyard Dairy – one of England’s finest artisan cheese shops*

*There are beautiful walks around the Yorkshire village of Austwick*

I have been very fortunate in not just living in a beautiful part of the country but also being able to make my living from being in the midst of it. However, that hasn’t always been the case for before I embarked on my horticultural career I spent twenty years in the world of retail fashions. When I left school I spent some months on a sheep farm on Exmoor – the remote, hill country, now a National Park, in the West Country. That short time farming changed my life for I met some wonderful and inspirational people there who left me with a yearning for the outdoor life, However, I was dragged away by my parents to work in the small department store which had been central to my family for the best part of a hundred years. Fortunately, I had a happy time there but the desire to be spending my days outdoors never left me. This spring it was thirty years since I sold the business to follow my dream and so it seemed a good time to reflect on those retailing years.

*The family store in 1994 when it was sold*

A few months later the blog post (link here) had developed into a full-blown illustrated talk to over seventy people followed by press interviews and a printed history of the store which had been started by my great-grandfather. I am delighted that the story of the family’s endeavour has now been recorded for posterity. By complete coincidence, I was also contacted by Exmoor Magazine and my memories of farming at Brendon Barton have been included in an article on Dick and Lorna French who were the couple who welcomed me into their lives – and changing mine by doing so.

*Recorded for posterity – the history of my family’s department store*

At the age of 42 I took myself off to study landscape and estate management for two years at agricultural college. It was a huge gamble and one that fortunately came off for I found employment as Head Gardener to the European Youth Parliament, an educational charity that brought teenagers from all over Europe to debate world affairs. With some Polish blood in me I liked the idea of being part of the organisation. Next, and still in England, I spent some happy years working for a delightful Swedish family – even after my role as Head Gardener had ended I maintained contact with them as Consultant overseeing projects such as the creation of a lake and an arboretum. My next move was to the Cotswolds to manage an historic garden, Kiddington Hall, designed by the architect who had created the Houses of Parliament. It was after that, that I decided to go freelance which culminated in the career in designing and creating gardens as well as the commission to write the gardening book.

*The historic gardens at Kiddington Hall*

Little did I think, when I began college that my career would include a stint at the Chelsea Flower Show, Channel 4 Television, creating a new literary festival and a study tour of Hungary. My latest – and final – garden project has been the most exciting to date. How fortunate have I been?! As before, the press picked up on the thirty year career change and a double-page spread in the Bucks Free Press newspaper followed. To read more about the gardens I’ve created, or just to enjoy the photos, click on the link here.

Talk: A Short History of Shortlands

Posted on July 6, 2024 by johnshortlandwriter

Further to my post Thirty Years On – Sadness & Celebration (part one) (link here), I am delighted to be giving an illustrated talk to the newly-formed Bourne End (Bucks) One-Place Study Group on Thursday 15th August, 8.00pm at the Bourne End Community Centre.

The talk will look at both the early days of the store, why it came to Bourne End, as well as its more recent history. There should be plenty of opportunity afterwards for reminiscing and to share memories.

Bourne End (Bucks) One-Place Study (link here)

30 Years On – Sadness & Celebration (part two)

Posted on May 6, 2024 by johnshortlandwriter

Earlier I wrote about the sadness felt within my family, as well as the wider community, at the closure of our small department store that bore the family name, Shortlands. It had spanned the generations for almost one hundred years, firstly as Langstons – my great-grandfather’s surname, and then, after one of his sales assistants married the boss’s daughter, renamed Arthur Shortland. Clever chap, my grandad! Later still, during my tenure, the ‘Arthur’ was dropped. I locked the doors for the final time thirty years ago this spring. Last month seemed an appropriate time to celebrate its history and tell the story, not just of our family connection, but also of the incredible people that worked there over the decades. It can be read in Part One by c lick ing on the link here. I found the response to that blog incredible with so many people contacting me through my website or social media. It was lovely, as well as humbling, to hear their memories and to know that Shortlands had not been forgotten after such a length of time. Although I gave a hint in the blog, I was also asked what have I been doing since 1994. In this post, Part Two, I bring the story up to the present date.

A reaction to my choice of careers that I receive quite regularly is one of surprise. Surprise that I once worked in the world of fashion, and wearing a suit and tie each day, or surprise that I am now working outdoors and wearing jeans and a t-shirt – although, I do have to look smarter on occasion [laughs]. When my retail career of twenty-five years ended, I was in my early forties and my future looked uncertain. I toyed with various career plans, none of which appealed very much. Unsure of what to do next, I decided to take a night class at our local agricultural college, Hall Place at Burchett’s Green. Little did I realise, on the evening of my enrolment, that I would soon be working at the Chelsea Flower Show, working on a gardening series for Channel 4 television or travelling to Hungary, only recently free from Russian occupation, on a horticultural study tour.

My visit to Hall Place had ended not with a night class but a two-year, full-time crammer course in Horticulture where I studied Landscape & Estate Management. Gardening had been the major hobby across the Shortland family for generations; I was the first in modern times to try and make a career of it. Knowing I still had a mortgage to pay, and therefore failure wasn’t an option, I studied hard in a way that I had never managed in my school days and came away with a good qualification. By then, I knew that I wanted to run gardens for large country estates. I had the good fortune to be offered, during my training, a work placement with the Getty family, then the wealthiest in the world. Their Head Gardener, Andrew Banbury, gave me various tasks and projects to carry out, frequently pushing me beyond my comfort zone. I have a lot to be grateful to Andrew for. When it was time for me to leave, I stepped straight into the role of managing gardens for a Swedish family who, again, were keen for me to develop further skills as well as their garden. Over the next few years, I had the opportunity to develop an arboretum, create a lake and, best of all, to manage and develop a one-acre walled kitchen garden.

*The new lake two years after construction*

The Millennium saw a change once again for I left the Chilterns and the area I had known all my life and moved to the Cotswolds, there to manage an historic, Italianate Garden, Kiddington Hall. This had new challenges but, although I enjoyed it enormously, the call of working for myself once again beckoned. In 2005 I set up a design and landscaping business which, I am glad to say, flourished; now I have virtually retired.

One of my last projects had been designing and overseeing a garden that has many elements to it: a 50 metre ha-ha, a cottage garden, formal lawns, terraces, topiary, wildflower meadows and kitchen garden, most of which have been created from scratch. As I watched the garden come to shape, with all the hard work being carried out by the owner’s own team of builders and gardeners, how grateful I was that I could now ‘pull the age card’ and let others do the physical tasks!

When I moved to the Cotswolds in 2001, for the first time in my life I was no longer ‘a local’ and knew no-one. Hearing that Oxfordshire was one of the few counties without a Gardens Trust and that one was being formed, I volunteered and for several years organised talks and visits to gardens which introduced me to many new people. One, hearing of my attempts at writing suggested I joined the local writers group. Feeling very out-of-place I did and before long the talk of ‘doing something big’ with books came about. From those very casual thoughts I found myself part of a small team that created the Chipping Norton Literary Festival. My title of Author, Agent and Publisher Liaison brought me into contact with many people in the literary world and soon I was commissioned by one to write a book on gardening. Three years later it was me being interviewed and giving talks on stage and the radio, a surreal experience.

*Being interviewed at the Chipping Norton Literary Festival*

Looking back over the past thirty years I realise just what a chance I took with my career choice and how fortunate I was for it to have ended well. It has taken me on the most incredible of journeys and given me the opportunity to meet/work with some very special people and places. It has had both tearful and joyful moments – it has also had bizarre and funny ones too: being invited to play in a ‘friendly’ cricket match only to find myself bowled out for two by the Captain of South Africa, or sharing an ice cream with American model, and ex-wife of Mick Jagger, Jerry Hall, these being just two of them. As with the shop, it has been a mix of celebration and sadness. I am so grateful that I have had the privilege of two careers both of which I can look back on with pleasure and a certain degree of pride.

Thirty Years On – Sadness & Celebration (part one)

Posted on April 14, 2024 by johnshortlandwriter

How time flies by. I know that’s a bit of a cliché to open with but, even so, it hardly seems possible that thirty years could have passed since that early spring day in 1994 when I locked the door of Shortlands clothing and footwear store for the very last time, and wondering where my career would go to next. I was in my early forties and knew that I would have to do something to earn my keep and pay the mortgage but what? It was a time of great sadness, not just for me and my family but also for our loyal staff some of whom had been with us for many years. Thirty years on it seems time to write the shop’s story to celebrate it having been at the centre of community life for the best part of a hundred years.

The shop that was to become Shortlands began with my great-grandfather, William Bradby Langston, who had already established shops in Marlow High Street and in nearby Lane End. He was quite entrepreneurial, something he and his brothers inherited from their mother. Poor Sophia, widowed in 1863 at the age of 34 with five children under the age of 13 and a baby due at any time needed to provide for herself and her family. She set up a shop in her front living room which later expanded to become Langstons Department Store in Reading, Berkshire. As well as those already mentioned, she and her sons between them also had shops in Boscombe (Hampshire) and Ilford (Essex). Unsurprisingly, she is remembered as being rather a force to be reckoned with – you can read her life story, Rebel in the Family, by clicking here.

*The first generations of retailers*
*l to r: My great-great grandmother Sophia Langston (nee Bradby); my great-grandfather William Bradby Langston; my grandfather Arthur Shortland*

William opened his ‘Boot and Shoe Warehouse’ in Marlow in 1884 at the age of 22. Seven years later he opened another, opposite the first, specialising in boating and tennis shoes as well as other sporting footwear. When a newly built parade of shops became available in Bourne End in 1899 he established what was to become Shortlands. At first the shop was tiny but by 1904 he had expanded to sell not just shoes but also mens and boys clothing. Four years later William’s daughter, Nellie, married Arthur Shortland who had come to Marlow to work for William a few years earlier. The newly married couple came to Bourne End and by 1915 Arthur was listed as the owner in Kelly’s Directory.

*Langstons – the Bourne End branch c1910*

The shop continued to prosper and during the 1920s the adjoining shop was purchased and ladies clothing and footwear as well as carpets, haberdashery, dress fabrics and knitting wools, soft furnishings, household linens and luggage were added to create Bourne End’s own department store. The 1920s photo below shows my grandfather Arthur using the steam (clothes) press although it was a (much hated!) task given to my father Hedley as soon as he returned from school.

*Langstons, now expanded and with my grandfather’s name on the fascia 1920s*

*My grandfather, Arthur Shortland using the steam press*,*1920s*

With the outset of WW2 my father joined the army and it was left to the older generation, including my great-aunt Edith Shortland, to run the business. Both the Langstons and the Shortlands were deeply religious and scrupulous in the way they behaved towards others. My mother would tell the story of how when some silk stockings arrived (which were rationed and in short supply) she rather assumed that she would have a pair. She was told quite firmly that her name would go on the bottom of the list like anyone else – she never did get her stockings. Aunt Edie was quite diminutive but with a voice that belied her stature. One day she spotted a lady conceal some goods inside her coat. “Jesus saw you do that” came a thundering voice from nowhere; the woman screamed, dropped the goods and her shopping and was last seen running down the street fearing the wrath of God was upon her! After the war, my father returned to the business along with his brother Jack, later to be joined by their cousin Maurice Phipps.

During the 1960s the shop expanded again. The garden and old shoe repair workshops at the rear of the property were built over and a new shopfront installed. Made of aluminium, it was considerably ahead of its time and was featured in several design magazines both here and on the Continent. By the late 1970s both my father and my uncle Jack had died and soon after the shop was due for another major refit. The interior, as well as the fascia, was modernised and the displays became more open and accessible to customers. Until that time stock was kept hidden away in drawers and boxes – if you wanted to buy something it was necessary to ask and an assistant would show what was available. Personal service, nowadays a rarity, was the norm back then. How times have changed! To make space for the improved selection of clothing, all of the other departments closed and the shop concentrated on mens and womens fashions and footwear for all the family. The toiletries and gift department was retained; the soaps and potpourri helping to make the shop always smell rather nice!

*The ‘new and modern’ shopfront in 1969 featured in design magazines* *of the time* – *by the 1990s it was looking tired and old-fashioned*

*By the 1990s the displays were brighter and (to use 2020s speak) more ‘on trend’*

I suppose it was because the shop was ‘always there’ that we have no photographs of the shop interior through the decades which is rather sad. Fortunately, I did take a few in the early 1990s and these will probably trigger some memories for local people. The 1990s brought new challenges for the business with recession and changing shopping habits sounding the death knell for businesses like ours. I had joined the firm in 1971 and my business partner, John Pheby had begun even earlier, as a lad, working for the family. It was a hard but inevitable decision that we decided to close and were fortunate to find a buyer almost immediately. They converted the property to three shops and the accommodation and stockrooms above to flats. Since that time Bourne End has changed quite considerably and most of the old shop names (and several of the buildings too) have disappeared. I believe that there must be photos of the interior held by local people somewhere – it would be wonderful to see them. I seem to recall Jean Peasley taking photos during our last few days…

*a small section of the* *Ladies Fashions Department* *1990*

So, what happened to our employees? In the early days of my tenure there was Ivy Taplin (Akela to us cubs of the late 50s!), Yvonne Ludgate, June Charlton (later to become June Billinghurst), Cissy Hyde, Mrs Faulkner, Liz Hill and Diana Spokes. Later, Pauline Harvey, Marjorie Kane, Wendy Manley, David and Marian Bratter, Diane Douneen, Kath Bowdrey, Iris Halstead and Cissy Vickers. I’m afraid I can’t remember the names of them all but some of those listed will be familiar to Bourne End locals – please don’t be offended if I have left you out, you were all valued! The younger generation I purposely have not named but they aren’t forgotten either – I still keep in touch with several of them thanks to social media. It was thanks to a succession of great staff through the years that the business was so successful. It seems appropriate to thank our loyal customers too – I can still picture many of them and the frequent kind comments that I still receive on social media shows that they haven’t forgotten Shortlands either which, after all this time, is rather humbling as well as very special.

And what have I been doing the past thirty years? Retailing had been a passion for my family for generations but I decided to follow another of the Shortland passions and forge a new and very different career – you’ll have to wait a short while for part two to find out what but the photo below may give a clue!

Part Two of this blog focussing on the last thirty years is now published and can be found by clicking on the link here

A Rebel in the Family

Posted on January 20, 2020 by johnshortlandwriter

A photograph came winging through the ether to me via email recently of a rather severe looking lady, taken in her later years. As is often the case when meeting an older person for the first time it is all too easy to forget that they had a past; that they were young once and, perhaps, hold a huge store of memories and tales. Sometimes, the stories they tell surprise you and seem more in keeping with today rather than decades before. It was (as it turned out) the same with this lady – Sophia Bradby.

Sophia Langston nee Bradby

I had never seen a photograph of Sophia before although I knew of her existence for she was my great-great grandmother. The only tale I knew was that she came ‘from a good family’, the friend of a great poet and the giver of a ‘middle’ name for succeeding generations. Numerous boys, although for some reason, neither my father or myself (for which I’ve always felt rather cheated), sported the name Bradby immediately before the surname. Now that this unexpected image had landed in my inbox I began to dig a bit deeper.

Sophia was born on Christmas Day 1828 in Theale, Berkshire, the third daughter of William Bradby and Mary Shepherd. William had been born in Derbyshire, his parents of Yorkshire origin. Why or when he came south is unknown but in 1814 he married Mary in Reading. We also know that by then he had changed his surname from Bradley to Bradby. The reason behind the name change is unclear for he remained on friendly terms with other members of the Bradley family. In their day, the Bradleys were well-known nationally and, later, internationally. Perhaps the name change was to give his own, immediate family a degree of anonymity. Whether the family were upset and/or disappointed by his decision is unrecorded but perhaps this is the first sign of a rebellious streak that would continue to run through the family to this day.

The date on this old image is wrong for he was baptised on 3rd September 1823

In 1849 it was Sophia’s turn to rebel. On the 29^th May she eloped to London to marry Charles Samuel Langston, a union disapproved of by her family. These days, the journey would take no longer than an hour but in the mid-1800s it would have been quite an undertaking. Her travel may have been by coach and horses although the new Great Western Railway line had opened in the early 1840s so she might have travelled by train. Whichever mode of travel she chose she would have been all too aware that her path crossed both an area that had been notorious for highwaymen and footpads and, in more recent times, the scene of a landslide that had derailed a train, killing ten passengers. Whether Sophia ever met her parents again is unknown.

1849 Langston Charles Samuel L18, Bradby Sophia B14

The marriage of Charles Samuel Langston to Sophia Bradby 1849, St Anne’s, Limehouse, London

St_Anne,_Limehouse, London - copyright Amanda Slater

St Anne’s, Limehouse, London (photo Wikipedia/Amanda Slater)

It turned out that Charles, too, had rebelled, leaving his parents’ home in Cranfield, Bedfordshire because of religious differences. Quite what these might have been is unrecorded. We know from old records that Charles had been baptised into the Church of England and he also married Sophia within the Church of England so there seems to be no conflict there. Whatever the reason, in 1843 he became an Excise Officer and his application papers are held by the National Archive in Kew, London. At a later date, this side of the family must have been reconciled for Charles’ father died when visiting Sophia in 1865.

The childhood home of Charles Samuel Langston

Sadly, Charles and Sophia’s marriage turned out to be fairly short-lived for Charles died aged 40 from cancer of the throat. Their 14 years of marriage produced eight known children, my great-grandfather William Bradby Langston was just twelve months old at the time of his father’s death and poor Sophia was some months pregnant with another daughter, Agnes. The photo below shows Sophia – wearing a crinoline – with one of her children, probably Christiana and taken in 1865. By 1871 she had established a drapery business with her eldest son, Ernest in Reading. By 1891 she had been successful enough to retire to the south coast where she died in 1916; the business that she had founded also prospered and became the largest department store in Reading before it finally closed its doors 120 years later.

LANGSTON (BRADBY) Sophia B14, probably Christiana abt 1865

Sophia with (probably) Christiana, 1865

Many thanks to Jo Liddement who, like me, is a great-great grandchild of Sophia. Not only did she send me the two photographs of Sophia which set me on the journey to find out more about the life of our remarkable ancestor, she also became a newly-discovered cousin.