Not Pretty But Pleasant

by Enid Bailey

So vivid was my mother's story-telling that, in my imagination, I became the child who ran daily from the dairy to the farmhouse. I was the one lifted onto the enormous Shirehorse. When, during my childhood the high farm gates were locked and the farmyard hidden from view the scenes my mother described continued inside my head. Surely, in the dusty cowshed the cows still stood patiently and Grandad was milking. If I could tiptoe in, no matter how quietly, a jet of milk would catch me in the eye and I would hear him chuckle. Even today, far from Deep Pits, I still follow in her footsteps, smelling the shoe leather in the workshop, hearing the pigs crunching coal or helping with the haymaking. In my mind's eye a little girl still runs to school, clattering her battledore against the railings. But it is not only my mother's story. It is the story of the Sheffield people, of their courage and humour as they endured two World Wars. And yes! The dairy still stands. Sadly the shining churns and the home made ice cream have vanished. Deep Pits Dairy is a shop now.

200 pages, Paperback

Published July 17, 2010