History

The Wanderer Returns To Staple

Page 2

Some sources say the old-fashioned shop at the right end of the Black Pig Inn, Barnsole closed in 1948, but the village history panel puts closure in the sixties.  Both shops had the only call boxes nearby in the fifties, being Button A and Button B affairs.

For many years the main business in the village was Chas. Petley, Auctioneers, Valuers, Estate Agents and Insurance Agents, in a house in School Lane, inscribed  C.P. 1905.

Housing in the village is varied.  Eastry RDC provided four blocks of council houses in lower road, called Jubilee Cottages, which implies the date 1935.  In contrast, a few thatched cottages remain.  In the Street, I remember Tudor Cottage being thatched, but elsewhere look out for Reed Cottage (1528) with its corn dolly on the roof, called Auntie Maud; Thatched Cottage in Durlock Road, a cottage next to Summerfield Farm, Gander Court and Yew Tree Cottage at Barnsole, and Rose Cottage in Fleming Road.  School House in School Lane is early sixteenth century and has exposed beams and inglenook fireplaces.

Staple has escaped excessive ribbon development, Rowan Close and Bates Close, fitting in seven and five dwellings respectively, fairly inconspicuously.  There has been some neo-Georgian infill near the school and beyond the church, whilst a hollow known as The Dell had to be levelled to expand housing on the south side of the Street up to the Old Forge.  This evicted some rabbits whom I remember were the previous tenants!

Some former agricultural property has been converted into homes.  Petley's Oast and outbuildings , including a stable block, became Oak Paddock, when Garden Of England Homes revamped the site in 1988, banishing those farmyard odours.

The parish once had five pubs, but I co not recall the Plough being in business in School Lane.  Rowan Close marks the general location today.  Shatterling had the Endeavour until Charringtons closed it in April 1967.  This seventeenth century highwaymen's haunt had been run by Eleanor Burton and her late husband for fifty-three years.  Now it is a private dwelling.

Only a quarter of a mile away the Green Man remains, the name respected in bus timetables, but the pub has been renamed The Frog and Orange.  The inn appeared on a map dated 1769.  In Staple the Three Tuns was described as modern in 1925, but I have seen a photo of an earlier and smaller building.  It is of solid brick construction with a central porch, and is still the first building in from Wingham.  A greater emphasis on food and motel status shows it has kept up with the times.

The Black Pig in Barnsole is much older (1588) and is mentioned by Pevsner.  It lost its brewing operation in 1912, but produced ginger beer for Gardner's Ash Ales until 1926.  The inn name may be unique, recalling a Kentish breed of pig.  A black pig occupied a sty nearby (for luck perhaps) until ca. 1970 when Whitbread Fremlins nearly closed the pub.  More recently the Grade II building was worth �275,000, and its 50-seat restaurant is widely known.

Continued on Next Page .............

BUS TIMES  �  POST-CODES  �  MAPS  �  BLACK PIG  �  THREE TUNS  �  FROG & ORANGE  �  LOCAL BUSINESSES � LAYHAM'S GARDEN CENTRE �  SUMMERFIELD NURSERIES �  STAPLE HISTORY �  VILLAGE CHURCH �  BARNSOLE VINEYARD �  STAPLE VINEYARD  � OLD PHOTO'S  � PICTURE TOUR  � GUESTBOOK  �   STAPLE-FORUM  � NEWS & UPDATES  �  LINKS  �  LOCAL COMMUNITY