In Conversation With........
John Hammersley
John Hammersley was born in 1941 and although, over the years, he has lived in a number of places he has spent the greater part of his life in various houses in Little Eaton. He now lives in Coxbench with his wife Val. He moved in 1986 to Coxbench and to his present home in 2006, a house which he built himself. This last move illustrated John's skill in his main occupation which was building houses. However going back over John's life it is apparent that he was a practical man who could “turn his hand” to a number of pursuits.
The family moved to Devon in 1943 where his father managed a dairy farm providing much needed food for the war effort. but he returned with his parents and his elder brother to Derbyshire in 1945. John's brother who is 6 years older than John now lives in Canada. I think that it is fair to say that he was never particularly close to his brother possibly because of the age gap. Having come back the family set up home in a house in the Chase where John's father had built a number of houses. In 1948 John's mother died at the early age of 33.This tragedy was to have a profound effect on John as a 7 year old.
At this time John's father was building council homes in Littleover and John was a pupil at Little Eaton School. Initially this meant 2 walks a day to and from the Chase to the School. This eventually became four times a day as John was not a lover of school meals and preferred to have lunch at home. John was not a gifted student at primary school and failed the 11 plus exam. This meant that having left Little Eaton school he went to the Secondary Modern School at Denby where he was bullied. I think that it is apparent that the absence of a mother figure in his early years was a handicap for John.
However growing up in Little Eaton was not all doom and gloom. John had friends in the village, and he enjoyed playing with them in the local fields and woods as well playing football on the park. He was also a member of the Church Choir for a couple of years, and he recalls fishing trips with his father at weekends.
On leaving school he went to work for his father and by this time he was more in tune with studying for a qualification and he attended college on a day release basis and achieved a City and Guilds Qualification coming second in the final exams
By the late 1950s John's father had remarried and bought a farm at Horsley Woodhouse and his brother farmed at Ambergate. John helped at both locations but was also using his building skills and was involved in building projects at Holbrook.
By this time John's social life was typical of a young man of the time and visits to the Locarno Dance Hall in Derby were a regular occurrence on Saturday nights. On one such occasion John met a young lady called Val who was to become his wife in 1964. Over the years they had three children, Paul, Elaine and John. Val was a ladies hairdresser.
John built a house for the family in Ford Lane and while this was going on they lived in a caravan. Eventually they moved into the Ford Lane property. John continued with his building projects and Val carried on her hairdressing from a relative's property. However, part of Little Eaton Co-op became available when the butchers unit was closed and Val acquired the unit and John converted it to a hairdressing salon from where she ran her business for a number of years.
John and Val moved to a property in Highfield Road in 1972. However they were on the move again in 1986 when they moved to a property in Coxbench. In 2006 They moved to their present home in Coxbench. The large property known as Century House was built by John.
Despite his ability to tackle work around the various farms that his father owned, John was essentially a builder. When John became involved in a building project he was “hands on” every aspect of the job from drawing up the plans through to the ultimate completion. He was literally involved in all of the work from the ground up.
Some years ago John's family produced a canvas showing the numerous houses that John has built around Derbyshire. This now hangs on the wall in his present home.
Bill Hutchison in conversation with John Hammersley 2021.