If you lived in Bean.
Daily Herald 12th July 1949
By Arthur Eperon
Transcribed by Neil Pearson-Coffey
You who live in the towns, taking the great
things in life for granted...
read how, thanks to the assistance of its
'big brother' in local government,
a forgotten hamlet is just getting a water
supply, sound drainage --
and street lighting.
About three miles past Dartford along Watling Street is a sign-post pointing
down a lane: "Green Street Green 1½ miles." Underneath
this sign, a man has just nailed another. It reads : "Bean ¾
mile."
To the motorist hurrying to Canterbury and
Dover, it was not a significant
operation.
I doubt if many have noticed
the sign. But
to the 282 folk of Bean it is
a symbol of
victory.
Bean is not an important place. Officially,
it does not even rank as a village.
It is
a hamlet under the parish council
of the
larger village of Stone. But
Bean had staged
its own revolution in the past
three years.
In 1946, Bean was truly a forgotten hamlet.
Its school was primitive. Its
cottages were
lit by paraffin though the grid
passed over
its fields Bean smelt of earth
closets and
overflowing cesspools. It had
no street lamps,
no playing field for children.
It had no
hall for meetings, and the clinic
was held
in a tumbledown hut. It had had
a housing
shortage since long before the
war. All this
mind you, in a hamlet only 17
miles from
London.
SELF-HELP
Only in its water supply was Bean better
off than some neighbouring villages.
Some
of Bean's cottages had running
water, and
only two rural homes out of three
can claim
that. No one cared much about
Bean. It was
called Paraffin Island. But as
the old chronicles
said, the people were impatient
of wrongs
and desirous of progress. The
people of Bean
set out to help themselves.
In June, 1946, Herbert Knox, now secretary
of the local Labour Party, called
a village
meeting in a field opposite the
pub. George
Wallace, the local M.P. was invited,
and
he went. It was the first time
in the memory
of Bean that an M.P. had visited
them. He
promised to help the villagers
to make their
village more habitable.
Then Bean went into action. The villagers
worried the Parish Council and
worried the
Dartford Rural Council. They
worried the
electricity company for light.
Of course
they were told they were crying
for the moon.
It would cost a fortune to modernise
Bean.
But the men of Bean are stubborn.
They remembered
that Wat Tyler, the revolutionary
leader
of the oppressed peasants came
from their
area.
Bean won its battles one by one. The school
was improved. The last earth
closet was replaced.
A new hall was built with financial
help
from the Rural Council - built
by the villagers
themselves in a co-operative
effort in which
each man worked in his spare
time. The greatest
battle was fought over electricity.
The company
said it could not get wooden
poles to carry
the power. But the Ministry of
Supply told
the villagers about the new metal
poles and
the current came. Then after
a great fight
the Rural Council agreed to put
in mains
drainage. The drains have been
laid now.
The work of connecting the houses
to the
new sewers is just beginning.
Before the
autumn, Bean will have its first
street lighting.
The children's playing field
is on the way.
And soon 16 Council houses will
have been
finished. [See comment below]
REVOLUTION
I saw for myself this week the difference
Bean's revolution has made to
its homes.
In beautiful Bean Cottage, built
in Queen
Elizabeth's day, I found Jim
Hibben whose
family have lived there for 400
years. Jim
is 67, and for many years he
lugged water
from the well, and his wife cooked
on an
open stove by the light of paraffin
lamps.
Today she uses an electric cooker,
and turns
on taps for water.
Frank Hayes, tenant farmer, of Shell Bank
Farm, is the happiest man in
Bean this week.
Hayes has farmed since 1914.
The only water
supply he has had for his family
and his
stock has been collected from
the roof. When
he kept 3000 chickens and cattle,
he had
a four mile journey each day
to the River
Dart to get water for them. Now
with the
help of local councillors, he
has just got
water laid on. You can tell what
a difference
that makes to a man who works
from 4 or 5
a.m. until after sundown. Frank
is so proud
of his water supply that he has
already fitted
a cistern and one of his rooms
has a notice
"Bathroom" on the door
to show
that he intends to fit a bathroom
in the
autumn.
DIEHARDS
As in most villages, some of the older people
are doubtful of these changes. One veteran
told me he had used paraffin lamps all his
life and intended to go on using them. Harry
Smith who has lived 64 years out of 78 in Bean, pointed out that
all these changes cost a power
of money.
And of course they do cost money.
If Bean
had been left to pay for all
these things
or if the Rural Council had had
to pay for
the sewerage unaided, I doubt
if Bean could
have had them. But surely the
people who
live in the villages and grow
our food deserve
them as much as town folk?
The sewerage will cost £10,000. A penny rate
in Bean brings only £10. If Bean stood on its own, instead of being part of Stone parish,
the cost of installing street
lighting would
have been 10d. rate. As it is
the cost to
the parish is a 1d. rate.
|
~Bean Brickfield
