by BETTY JAMES

LIVERPUDLIANS throughout the world over are renowned for their great sense of humour and it is said that the best comedians hail from Liverpool.

Brenda Jones comes immediately to mind as a lady who could well have a good tale to tell. This effervescent lady, well known at Bourne Abbey for her colourful hats, happily agreed to be interviewed, and what a good laugh we had together for a couple of hours.

Brenda began: "I was born in Liverpool during the war. My father was in the Royal Navy and actually I believe that I was conceived during a 24-hour pass! As a child, I remember life being pretty tough. We didn't have a proper home until I was eight years old and even then it was a grotty little house with just gaslight, a loo down the garden and a tin bath, not to mention all the cockroaches."

Brenda paused and then added apprehensively: "I remember thinking that I want better than this when I grow up."

On leaving school, Brenda started work at Bryant and Mays' match manufacturers in Liverpool and it was there that she met Jim Jones, her husband to be. She recalled: "I think that the first thing I noticed about him was his broken thumb. Anyway, he certainly grew on me and following a relatively short engagement, we were married. Only teenagers we were too. Our children, Gary and Caroline, arrived on the scene pretty quickly and the years just seemed to roll by. I went back to work and eventually Jim and I decided that we needed a change, so moving to another part of the country was top of our agenda at that time."

Brenda, obviously very proud of Jim’s ability to turn his hand to anything mechanical, continued: "We had no qualms that Jim would easily find a job so we just stuck a pin on a map and ended up living in Spalding. Somehow though, I really liked Bourne better, so that's where we decided to put down some roots, and that's where we've stayed."

To begin with, life was not a bowl of cherries as Brenda somehow just couldn't settle. She was homesick for Lancashire and her family. In fact she told me: "To begin with, I hated Bourne. I did so miss the family, and I just choked up thinking about them."

As one would expect, Brenda took the bull by the horns and got herself a job at Dee's Cafe (now the Norwich & Peterborough Building Society) as a waitress. The pay was poor at 40p per hour but it did the trick. Brenda made lots of friends and she gradually felt that she belonged in Bourne. A change of job followed when Brenda began working at Bourne Laundry (currently Bourne Services). Life was good. Brenda was happy, Jim was happy, their children were happy.

In her younger days, Brenda was quite a sporty person. "Yes, I've always kept pretty fit," commented Brenda, adding "Over the years, I've played badminton, netball, hockey, but it wasn't until I came to Bourne that I taught myself to ride a bike and that was a sight to behold. The children in our road couldn't believe their eyes as I tottered up and down, struggling to keep on the saddle."

This Liverpool lass still has a distinct Liverpool accent and she is so very proud of it too. Brenda is a Liverpudlian through and through, cheeky in the nicest possible way, ultra friendly, with a lovely outlook on life, but stand clear if there's trouble at mill.

What keeps Brenda so very busy here in Bourne? It is difficult to know where to start. Together with Jim, she joined Bourne Civic Society in 1978 and now, 28 years on they are head cooks and bottle washers, devoting every spare minute to keeping Baldock's Mill in pristine condition.

The Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust is very dear to Brenda's heart and she very much enjoyed being on the Bourne in Bloom Committee. Music is important to Brenda too. "Actually, I would really love to have been an opera singer," she told me during one of her serious moments, adding "Oh, but I must tell you that I am teaching myself the piano. I'm getting there, slowly but surely."

There can be few people who are more concerned about Bourne than Brenda Jones. "I really do care about this planet and it really worries me a lot how things are going, especially in our town." She told me quite vehemently: "I really can't bear to see all the rubbish in our streets and I often go around with my rubber gloves collecting bags of dog poo. Why on earth dog owners don't take them home instead of hanging them on trees I'll never know. Jim calls me the bag woman!"

Brenda couldn't wait to tell me about the day before she accompanied the judges of The Best Kept Town competition. She looked at me intently and said: "Jim and I collected seven big bags of rubbish from along the new slip road, and it was just disgusting at what we had to cope with. These included dirty nappies, condoms, kids' bikes, trolleys, For Sale signs and other unmentionables. Jim and I were quite appalled and very disappointed that some people have so little pride in their town."

At heart, Brenda Jones is a dawn person, rising at 5 am and then it's on with her head band and relevant exercise gear and she's off for a four-mile walk around Bourne on a daily basis. "Oh yes", she laughed. "I get plenty of wolf whistles, the odd flasher, just the one kerb crawler, and a lorry driver who showed me his willy. Life is what you make it and it's never dull for me."

Of course, Bourne Abbey Church plays a major part in the lives of Brenda and Jim Jones and it is very rarely that they are missing from the congregation at the Sunday morning service. With regard to her many hats, Brenda commented: "Usually I am the only one to wear a hat at church, but it really doesn't bother me at all. I just do my own thing. I have always loved hats of all shapes and sizes and it is fun wearing them.”

Towards the end of the interview, I asked Brenda if she still had any long burning ambition and her reply came thick and fast: "No, I realised my dream when I was 20. I had found a good man, a house and I had given birth to a gorgeous baby boy (with a lovely daughter to follow later). My dream really had come true."

Finally, I would like to choose a few words that describe Brenda Jones and they have to include: "Forthright, energetic and funny, but more importantly honest, hard working, thoughtful and kind."

Brenda's parting words were "Don't expect to see me on a Zimmer frame for a while as there's plenty of life in the old dog yet!"

NOTE: This article has been reproduced from the September 2006 issue of the Bourne Parish
News magazine. Photograph of Brenda Jones wearing one of her famous hats by Jim Jones.