WINIFRED Hulbert has spent most of her 100 years around Sawtell.

Win Kidd was born in Coffs Harbour in 1922, and moved with her parents from Dorrigo to Sawtell when she was two.

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In those days, record keeping was not always meticulous, and Win celebrated her birthday on 21 October until she was fifty.

She then found out she was actually born on 21 July!

Her father, David, paid Ossie Sawtell £10 each for two blocks of land, approximately where Lime restaurant is today.

Mr Sawtell built a house and bakery for the Kidds, which Win said were the first buildings north of Chinaman’s (Middle) Creek.

Win said people used to come to the bakery if they were ill, because her mother, Fanny, had been a nurse.

She remembered being in the dining room, behind the bakery when a man with a blood-soaked shirt burst in.

He had been clawed by a crab and was patched up by Mrs Kidd.

After about twelve years, the Kidds sold the bakery and then ran a drapery shop next door.

Win recalled that Sawtell was known as “Bonnie Bonville” and the “reserve” (now the caravan park, was where people came from all over the area to camp.

She said that, back in the 1920’s, there were very few cars, and people travelled in sulkies, by horse or walked.

Win attended Sawtell Public School and met her future husband Ted Hulbert, who was 18 months older.

She went to high school in Coffs Harbour for two years, and then worked in a grocery shop.

During WWII, she went to Sydney to work, stamping metal parts, which she said was very boring, but had to be done.

Ted was in the Army and they would meet during holidays back in Sawtell.

The Hulberts had a small store near the hall in the caravan park.

(David Kidd used to take a tray of bread across a footbridge over the creek to the store.)

However, her future father-in-law was gassed in WWI and he sold the shop and bought 400 acres for £2000 near the railway line and what is now Hulberts Rd.

Ted and Win married in Sydney in 1953, and moved to the farm, which supported four Hulbert families.

The Hulberts grew peas, beans and tomatoes on the farm and ran some Herefords.

Win and Ted moved, with their children, Ross, David and Helen, across the railway line to Sawtell in 1970 and Ted became a builder, with Win helping in the business.

They originally lived at 100 Boronia St and then at 125 Boronia St.

Ted and Win built 28 houses in the area, but, in 1987, Ted passed away from a brain tumour, and Win moved to Circular Ave.

After that, Win travelled, living in the US for a while and visiting relatives in the UK.

Win used to walk every day, and, at various times, played tennis, golf and bowls and she eats plenty of vegetables.

However, when asked what she attributes her long life to, Win said: “My father insisted on us having rolled oats every day and I still like them.”

By Andrew VIVIAN