Norfook boo-i again

This is a personal "historical" entry posted in January 2021, that I simply want to get on the record for my children and grandchildren.
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My Dad born at Fir House, Hellesdon on 11th July 1913,  grew up at various farms in Norfolk including The Limes, Paston (Bacton), North Walsham (seemingly now demolished) and finally at Honingham Thorpe House in the 1930s.

Although he loved the farming life and his father was quite successful, he was forced by his father to learn a different profession due to the 1920/30s financial crisis in agriculture. Events overtook him as his father died and mother decided to sell the farm. While he studied to be a Chartered Surveyor, he earned money working for a Frank Easton from Bunwell who was breaking into the milk transport business.

Family tale was that Frank Easton wanted Dad to marry his daughter, but he wasn't too keen and so when WWII broke out he volunteered straight away and after initial training in Luton and Northern Ireland, was sent to join the Royal Indian Army in  Calcutta where he served until 1946.

He loved the 'tropical' climate of India and now back in the UK with no home (mother had moved into a hotel at Caister), and armed with his passed May 1939 Chartered Surveyors exam certificate and October 1945 Professional Associate certificate, he looked for a job abroad and found one with a small UK company called "Trinidad Petroleum Development Ltd" and packed his bags 1947.

He only returned every two years for leave, staying with his eldest sister at The Grange, Ormsby St Margaret, where in 1953 he met on one such  leave, a German girl working for the family as Au pair, earning money to finance her brother's medical Dr study at Heidelberg University. The idea of her going to the UK came from a British student at the University who organised it - he went on to become a Prof in London.

Dad with only about 6 weeks holiday, managed to organise a proposal, dispensation from Catholic Church for a mixed marriage, get family in Germany over for the wedding and even a few days honeymoon at Blakeney before he had to return to work, leaving his wife to get UK citizenship, return to Germany, pack her things and via ship from Germany to Portugal and then from there to Trinidad, join him. And at some point I came along.

He had a great life in Trinidad, officially the Chartered Surveyor but spent much of his time for the company by now part of British Petroleum, managing their farm businesses and even building a golf course, his great passion in his youth in Norfolk. A Norfolk farming boy can turn his hand to anything - coffee, cocoa, oranges, lemons, bananas and even flying cattle from Florida.

However, in 1970, the tropics came to an end when BP sold up in Trinidad. Dad was the last employee to leave and was posted to BP HQ in London but told he would be spending most of the coming year in Greece spraying cotton for a replacement to DDT - no sweat for a Norfolk boy.

So very quickly, a house was found in Norfolk - Crown Farm House, Old Buckenham, Norfolk. A bit run down but at around £5,000 affordable. Parents 'moved' in, he took off in the spring to Greece, I was at boarding school in Somerset and Mum was left to deal with getting the container of furniture from Trinidad delivered, and  a local builder to get some basic work done before she joined my father in Greece in early Summer. 

The Norfolk Boy was "back home". And Frank Easton who probably played a crucial role in my "being", was still up the road at Bunwell, and I was to get to meet him - a character.

Bit mixed up Extra Photos
1) The Limes. Paston
2) Honingham Thorpe House
3) Chartered Surveyors 1939
4) Chartered Surveyors 1945
5) Release Papers 1946
6) Basic Training Luto with his best Norfolk pal
7) Royal Indian Army
8) Royal Indian Army 1945
9) His fathers 1929 Royal Agricultural Society Show Harrogate awards, as far as I know for cattle/cows despite "Orchards" word which I assume is name of sponsor.
10) Mum's visa  1952 to work in UK
11) Their wedding certificate Great Yarmouth 1953