A WELLINGBOROUGH care home is celebrating the life of one of its residents — honouring her contribution to the war effort in light of International Women’s Day.
Meadow View, a branch of Wellbeing Care that provides residential, dementia and respite care, is celebrating the extraordinary life of Mabel Bright, who recently turned 100.
Born and raised in Wellingborough, Mabel originally aspired to join the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force in 1941, before joining the Women’s Land Army instead following persuasion from her father.
At the age of 18 she was stationed in Kislingbury, Northampton, where she worked on a farm and was responsible for growing vegetables, cooking, cleaning, driving tractors and loading fresh produce onto trucks ready to be transported across the country. Mabel was also in charge of two horses used for ploughing the fields, both of whom she was very fond of.
Mabel was one of more than 80,000 women who were part of the Women’s Land Army, responsible for boosting Britain’s food production during the Second World War. Before the conflict, Britain had imported much of its food but when war broke out, it was necessary to grow more food at home and increase the amount of land in cultivation.
Reflecting on her time in the Land Army, Mabel said: “I found strength in adversity, but we didn’t really have any other choice. The war was an important time to show the contribution women could make to society, and proved our role as working members of the community. It was a very hard time, but I did enjoy the work and the people I met along the way.”
After two years serving the WLA, Mabel went on to marry her first husband Rex Jones, with whom she shares two children – Trever and Peter. Rex passed away at a young age, and Mabel went on to marry Cliff Bright whom she has a daughter, Vallerie, with. Mabel now has four grandchildren.
Mabel went on to work as a postmistress in Wollaston, and then as a sunglasses maker for Thurgar Bollé. After that, Mabel got a job in Jinx’s shoe factory as a sample maker and continued this until her retirement.