'I was born', he said, 'on 15 October, 1867. That makes me on
the way to eighty-eight. A contented mind is the secret of long life and
happiness. I've always had a contented mind.
I started work when I was eight years old at one shilling and sixpence a week
bird-minding and leading a horse. In 1881 I was hired at four shillings and
sixpence a week.' 'I won't tell 'ee a lie if I can help it,' he said.
'I remember going down to Bablock Hythe at four o'clock every morning for the
milking. Then my dad and me went haymaking as far away as Northolt and
Warwickshire where we met Joe Arch, the M.P. and founder of the Farm Workers
Union. I wasn't much use at fagging. Then we came back to start a small holding
and on 19 February, 1890 I founded the Cumnor Lodge of Oddfellows.'
'I was on the Parish Council for fifteen years and I worked up at the Chawley
brick works for fifty-two years. And now? Well, I got no pension for my work
there, and now I does a bit of gardening, and when I can get over them dratted
tall stiles I cross the fields to the "Bear and Ragged Staff" for a pint or
two.'
Here he chuckled and became deliciously Rabelaisian. 'You can't put that down on
paper,'he said. 'But you can say that I've done a tidy bit of well-digging in my
time.'
Everybody I met had told me that Charlie Costar was a great character, but I was
surprised to find how great a character he is. Men of his stamp, burly,
aggressive, outspoken, humorous and tremendously vital, are becoming very rare
indeed.
('Dad Charlie' Costar was visited by P.B.S.Mais while he was working on his
book 'Our Village Today' (Werner Laurie) in 1956. Costar was then living at 'The
Closes' in Leys Lane)