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 JEAN GABB

Born: Murton, County Durham, 1930
Lived: Dulverton, Clayhanger
Recording made: 1999
Length of recording: 1 hr 32 mins

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Jean Gabb is the youngest of nine children. Her father was a flautist, her grandparents ran a theatrical boarding house. Since she was 16, when she came to Dulverton to be under-housemaid at Pixton, she has always worked for the Herbert family. There would be house guests most weekends, when the family was in residence, and twice a week she and her friend Ina would walk down to Hele Bridge to collect the fish off the bus. When no-one was there, Mrs Herbert let her play the grand piano.

After a few years she went to Gloucestershire to work for Laura and Evelyn Waugh. Then she married John and they moved to Devon, to Bridget Grant at Clayhanger. In 1974, when Mrs Grant came back to Dulverton, they did too and have been with her ever since. She says people in Dulverton still remembered her from when she was 17 and danced with them in the town hall.