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Maurice Hobkinson was born in 1933 and lived as a child in a house in Oakdene Yard not far from the railway line through Woodlesford. His father was a miner at Water Haigh Colliery. Maurice went on to a career as a car salesman retiring as sales director for the Pendragon Group at Holbeck in Leeds, but he lived in Woodlesford all his life, latterley in a house on Alma Street on the opposite side of the line to the one he grew up in. His mother's maiden name was Webster and she came from a long line of local people. A branch of the family were lock keepers at Woodlesford and others had a milk round. Although she didn't grow up in Woodlesford Maurice's wife, Mary, comes from a railway family. Her ancestors helped build the Settle and Carlisle railway and her great grandfather was killed on the line. Mary's grandmother lived at Cowgill near Dent station and brought up a large family on her own after the death of her husband. As a child living in Leeds, Mary went to see her for holidays and after the train emerged from Blea Moor tunnel remembers waving a white hanky at her granny on the farm below who responded with a wave of her tea towel. Maurice Hobkinson's older brother Alan is pictured third from the left in the photo below of boys at Woodlesford school dressed up as Vikings in the 1930s. Stationmaster's son Cyril Roberts is second from the left. Before he passed away in 2008 Maurice remembered growing up in the village including the annual excursion to Morecambe when practically everybody went by train for a day trip.
Maurice Hobkinson's memories 
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