Micheldever Lunch Club Announcement

that it was perhaps time to settle down, a bit. He met Angela who was living in Compton and working in Winchester and they married in 1954.

Farming in the mid-forties was a time of change. Horses were slowly being replaced with basic tractors but mechanisation as we know it today was very rudimentary. The first combine harvester arrived on the farm in a box and had to be assembled and towed by a tractor. Clive was always looking to find ways to improve techniques and remove some of the laborious drudgery of farming. He would become quite inventive as a consequence.

Outside of farming his passions included travelling, skiing, shooting, model railways, photography and videography. He never let having only one hand stop him indulging fully in all his hobbies.

In 1990 a new challenge suddenly appeared over the horizon. The owner of all the farmland around Micheldever Station and other local villages came up with the proposal for a 5000 house new town. As a tenant farmer of the landlord promoting this development, it might have been understandable to adopt a low-profile opposition to the plan. Clive’s view was that there was a principle at stake, with the future of the whole area at risk and it should be fought as much as possible. He would not be taking a low profile! The Dever Society was formed through the efforts of Clive, Nevil Wilson and Fergus Hughes-Onslow who was the first chairman. The success of the society in seeing off the early threat cannot be over emphasised and the battle is still ongoing 30 years later.

A Micheldever resident for 93 years, he served on the Parish Council, was a church warden, he was President of both the Hampshire Farmers Club and the Basingstoke and District Agricultural Society.

He was so proud of his grandchildren, loved giving them driving lessons around the farm, playing on his beloved train set with them or just simply sitting with them watching one of the many videos he had made.

We are given a chance to make a contribution to the world we are born into and it’s fair to say that Clive made a considerable contribution, in many different ways. He loved his life in farming, and always considered himself very fortunate to live in such lovely surroundings and to be a part of the wider agricultural community. He made many friends throughout his career in farming and valued those friendships.

The committee has recently met to discuss when the lunch club might be able to restart in light of the Covid pandemic. We hope to be able to recommence in the autumn. However, this is dependent on what happens over the next couple of months and the final phase of lifting of lockdown restrictions look out for further announcements.