Where Retired Work Hard - At Gardening
Although Preston Capes is essentially a 'dormitory' village, an industrious community lives in this tiny village of no more than 110 inhabitants, nestling in South-West Northamptonshire.
About half the inhabitants now use preston Capes as a dormitory, but the traditional 'compact' quality of the village has been kept intact by the retired population who work hard at the village 'industry'.
The youngsters go to school outside the village, the working generation travel to Daventry or Northampton for employment, and the retired people, almost without exception, work eight hours a day in the garden - making sure that Preston Capes remains what many claim is the prettiest and the tidiest village in Northamptonshire.
United Aim
Nobody driving through Preston Capes could fail to notice that this is more than just a typical English village. It is much more than that. It is the work of a community of people whose united aim has been to make their village the prettiest in the county, if not in the land.
True, the thatched roofs and stone walls that do so much to make this village 'every American's dream' are not the work of present generations living there.
But the herbaceous borders, the exquisitely bordered lawns and the immaculate roads are the work of a community determined to show that Britain can be kept tidy.
Proof of the village's horticultural pre-occupations lies in two silver cups that are to be found in homes in Church Way, the lane leading to the village's medieval church.
On the mantelpiece of Mrs. Hart's home in Danecot, Church Way, is a cup presented to the village last year for the tidiest village in Northamptonshire; on the mantelpiece in the adjoining cottage, Evenlode, is a cup presented to Mrs. Peter Gray by the WI for the best-kept garden.
Both women would be the first to admit that the cups belong to the community in general; Mrs. Hart, who retired recently after 25 years' service as village postmistress, was asked by the villagers to look after the cup.
Mrs. Gray most probably has the best-kept garden, but the others in the village are only a step behind her.
But here village activity ends. Apart from one or two farms, there is no 'internal' paid work for villagers. And on top of this, there is no shop, no school, no pub and no real community centre of any kind.
Few Problems
The village is too small for a parish council and so any problems that may unfold themselves in Preston Capes lie on the shoulders of the parish meeting chairman, Mr. C. Haynes or the Daventry Rural District Councilor, Mrs. V. Bevan.
And the problems are few and far between. The only one on the agenda at the moment, and it has been there for many years, is that of sewerage. "Otherwise", said Mrs. Bevan, "we are a contented village, quite prepared to put up with the lack of public amenities."