Doris Stapleton
Doris Stapleton
Doris was born at 2 Commercial Street Coxhoe and came to live in Windsor Terrace West Cornforth when she was two years old.
Doris was six when the second world war started and eleven when it ended. Doris felt that for the most part in the years leading up to the war a woman was ‘under a man’s thumb’. The war effort required women to work outside the home. A change in the status of women began to be seen around the village during the war as women made their contribution and recognised their worth.
Doris has clear memories of her first job in the ice cream parlour owned and run by Dave Bolton and his wife from their spacious premises. Doris began her job within days of leaving school. Her main role was to serve behind the counter which she loved. When Doris began working at Bolton’s sweets were still on ration and remained so long after the war ended. When the shop wasn’t too busy Doris also helped ‘in the back’ where the ice cream was made by Betty Gilmore and Norma Winskill. It was a busy place to be. As well as the shop Mr Bolton had two ice cream delivery vans driven by Ronnie Dixon and Mr Bolton’s son Doris’s working day started at nine and ended about six. Mr and Mrs Bolton were caring employers. Doris ate with them as part of the family in their accommodation which was reached directly through the door behind the counter.
Bolton’s was a good place to work and Doris enjoyed her time there. Doris arrived home one evening after work to find her mother had arranged for her to have an interview with Syd Blenkinsop the local bus owner who was advertising for bus conductresses to work on the Scarlett Band’s daily route. Doris did as her mother said; went for the interview and shortly afterwards she became a conductress on the service that ran between Ferryhill Station and Bowburn passing through West Cornforth in the middle of each journey. The round trip took an hour and the Scarlett Band passed through the High Street in West Cornforth at quarter to and quarter past the hour in different directions.
It was a fast run with 32 stops in the hour and no time built in for lunch or comfort breaks. Each day before the regular service run there were trips to factories to cover. Work was never dull. Tommy Mitton and Jack Hodgson were the drivers. Doris was teased mercilessly by them but they all got on well. The company also had excursions often called ‘Mystery Trips’. Doris revealed a trade secret the trips were more often than not also a mystery to the rest of the team.
Doris met her husband Dick when she was persuaded by her best friend Lorna to go to the pictures in Coxhoe. Lorna’s boyfriend Jack was going. Not wanting to play gooseberry Doris said that she didn’t want to go to the cinema. Lorna was determined that Doris would go and make up a foursome with Lorna, her boyfriend Jack and Jack’s friend Dick. Doris was not quite seventeen when she and Dick met and Dick was twenty
Doris and Dick were married at Holy Trinity Church West Cornforth in 1953 when Doris was 19. Doris and Dick lived in with Doris’s parents first in Windsor Terrace and then in Linden Road for six years until they got a house in Salisbury Crescent.
Doris continued working on the Scarlett Band, When she found she was expecting her first child she though she had better tell her driver who once he knew made sure every passenger knew too. Annie was born in 1960 and three more children Lillian, Richard and Emma made up the happy family soon afterwards.
Life was good. Dick was enjoying his work as long distance lorry driver. Tragedy struck in 1970 when Dick was seriously injured in an accident while working away from home in the Midlands. Dick was in a coma for three months in Burton on Trent. Dick and Doris’s four children were aged between two and a half and nine years old. Much of Doris’s time was spent travelling to and from hospital. The children were cared for by Doris’s sister and then her parents until Dick was well enough to come home.
Life was never the same again. Dick came home from hospital dependent upon Doris’s care for him. For the next nineteen years Doris was Dick’s carer. Dick’s health improved but his mobility was limited and progress was slow. Doris devoted her time to caring for Dick and her growing family. Gradually they adjusted, made the most of their life and particularly enjoyed holidays together. They were on holiday in Great Yarmouth when Dick sadly died in 1989.
Doris was 55 and had to face life without Dick whose care had taken up all of time, all of her days. The children were grown up and making lives of their own. Doris looked for work at a time of life when women of her age were perhaps thinking of winding down Doris began a new career. Doris nervously applied for a job in a nursing home in Ferryhill; she was willing to consider any work. Her employers quickly recognised that the skills Doris had developed caring for her husband were exactly what was needed in the nursing home. Doris became a professional carer and once again found herself in a job that she loved. Doris ended her career with two years voluntary service.
Today Doris is at the centre of a loving family and is there for her grown up children, their children and their children. Mum, mum in law, nana and great grandma she is very interested in cycling and a life long fan of John Wayne.
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