Joe Leggett left Liphook in 1928 and was ninety when he set down his memories of 'growing up in Griggs Green', a hamlet a mile outside the main village, with a vividness and a gift for the telling 'childhood' detail which recalls Flora Thompson. Like Flora, Joe writes of his family and their hard life, and of his beloved animals, without glamorising and without sentimentality. Unlike Flora, he writes with boyish energy and remembers his youthful adventures and misadventures with glee - and his stories of the Canadian foresters and their sawmill on the Longmoor Road add a new chapter to our 'Canadian connection'. His memoirs (of which we hope this is only a first instalment) are not only 'a thundering good read' (which children will enjoy as well as adults) but also a valuable piece of local history.

Flora Thompson in fact lived next door to Joe's family for her last two years in Liphook (see the BLPS publication of Liphook Remembers, pp. 35-39). Joe's sister Eileen knew her best but it was Joe (by then a teenager) who used to take her young son Peter on his cart up to the Leggett farm under Weavers Down, "giving her a chance to get on with her writing".

Thanks go to Sally Hughes from Lloyds Chemist for her research on No.9 pills, and to Adrian Bird for desktop publishing the whole document.

Joe and the Preservation Society are extremely grateful to Elly Foster, his enthusiastic editor, who has introduced each of her selections from Joe's closely-written "exercise books" with a few valuable comments to put the reader 'in the picture', to Joanna Elliott for typing a perfect text and to Anne Street for her delightful illustrations. A copy of Joe's map of the area forms the cover.