Welcome to my Blog

The recent death of my Grandfather's sister has prompted me to start a permanent record of my families diverse and interesting history. The general aim is to collate, annotate and permantly record the vast numbers of photographs and other media accumilated over the years by the family.

Being that this will be a central reference point primarily for family, friends and anyone interested in the history of the areas concerned, there will not be much in the way of chronological ordering. It is not intended as a 'diary of events'; for one it is far too complicated to arrange all of the media we have. There are also the problems of new material being turned up all the time & the fact that the dates applied to some of the media are unknown or very approximate. Last but not least, it makes it far more interesting!

Lets start with me. I am Paul Mitchell, currently 29 years of age born 29th March 1979. I am descended from Carol & Bryan Mitchell and have 1 sister, Claire, who is 27 and currently living in Bahrain. I am descended from a long line of farmers and land owners on my mothers side, and engineers on my fathers side.

My grandfather, Edward George Gale (referred to herein as EG, grandad or 'Ted') born 19th January 1924 (currently 84) has relayed a wealth of stories, jokes, pictures, cine film and a whole host of other stuff to us about his working life. He was raised at Westend Park Farm in Warfield Berkshire and worked the land and yard continously until he 'retired' in 1991.

Here is a picture of him as a boy behind the Farm's House (Park Farm House). We reckon he is about 5, so this picture would have been taken circa 1929. This house used to be named 'Halseys'

The house still stands today and is currently where I reside.