RESIDENTS, friends and family members came to pay their respects and pay tribute to Arthur Johnson, known as ‘Mr Liphook’, who passed away on October 9, aged 95.

Arthur was born on December 30, 1922 in the family bungalow in Longmoor Road.

He was the second child to Maud and Sonny, his sister Eppie was nine years older.

He went to Bramshott Boys School and since sports featured heavily in his early life, it led him to the village cricket team as well as becoming a regular player at Liphook Football Club.

After joining Churcher’s College in Petersfield, he also played for its cricket team.

After school, he attended Guildford Technical College and started studying building construction, while working for the family firm, Johnsons Builders.

Arthur began work as a driver’s mate, delivering brick and other materials to the companies site.

At the outbreak of war he was only 16, too young to join up, but with the family firm he did his bit for the war effort, helping to build Nissan huts, air-raid shelters and searchlight stations.

In 1941, aged 19, Arthur and some of his friends, after a pint of beer in The Green Dragon, went to Haslemere to enlist and he joined the RAF.

He was assigned to 217 Squadron and worked as a rigger, based at Morecambe, then St Athens near Glamorgan, St Eval in Cornwall, followed by a detachment to Thorney Island in Hampshire.

That was followed by a move to RAF Lechuars in Scotland before heading to the Far East, where he served in Ceylon, the Maldives and Cocos Islands.

During the war the family building firm had set up Three Counties Supplies and Transport (TCS&T) and when Arthur returned from India in 1946, he became a director and took control of the business.

The firm’s lorries were emblazoned with the name of their major customer, Midhurst Whites.

Just like his father’s building firm, TCS&T employed a lot of men from Liphook and the surrounding area, who were all invited to The Deer’s Hut every Maundy Thursday for a company celebration lunch.

He married Edna in 1948 and set up home in Farnham on the new Byworth Estate, moving back to Liphook in 1950, after their first child, Peter, was born, followed by their second son, Paul, in 1953.

Arthur was well-known for socialising and always wanting to have fun, which played a great part throughout his life and many antics took place after a good drinking session at The Green Dragon, his favourite haunt.

When Liphook Carnival came around, not only did Arthur and his family take part every year – a long tradition established in 1901 by their ancestor John Redhouse, one of the original Bonfire Boys.

But anyone who wanted a lorry for a float would only have to ask and often half a dozen of his vehicles would be in the procession.

He had a quiet generosity and was always willing to help those in need.

Arthur would supply materials, vehicles, donate money and there were many people in the village, starting out in business, whose projects would not have got off the ground without his support.

He was always keen to do a deal and his favourite saying was, “I’ll pay you all of the cash in my pocket”, which could be just a few pounds or a couple of hundred.

As a well-known figure and businessman in the village, he was captain at Bohunt Manor Golf Club, an avid gardener, president of the Bramshott, Liphook and District Horticultural Society and captain of Liphook FC, which earned him his nickname of ‘Mr Liphook’.

Building was in his blood and in 1965 he built a chalet-style house in Avenue Close, adjacent to his father’s garden, which became the family home.

His constant companion was Patch, a Jack Russell terrier, and the two became inseparable.

Arthur loved animals and would always carry treats in his pockets for any dogs and cats he came across.

When the transport firm wound down in 1977, Arthur carried on in business welding up his collection of vintage cars and lorries, before finally retiring in 1980.

He and his wife Edna devoted more time to their five grandchildren, as well as moving next door into his newly-built bungalow nicknamed ‘Rose Cottage,’ due to his ability for obtaining secondhand building materials for the construction.

He was a founder member of Classic Car Day, which was launched in 1986, taking his favourite 1928 Lagonda along to what became a popular annual event at The Deer’s Hut.

After his wife died in 1993, he became a regular member of the newly opened swimming pool at Old Thorns hotel, as well as good customer at The Deer’s Hut,

In 2011, on his way to the the Griggs Green pub, he had a near fatal accident in his old Peugeot 205.

He blacked out and turned the car over on the bank, suffering extensive injuries with broken ribs, torn tendons as well as head injuries which required 83 staples.

Arthur was treated at the Royal Surrey in Guildford, before being moved to St George’s, in Tooting, for a six-hour operation, with plastic surgeons working on his face, while another team put a pin in his thigh.

After months of hydrotherapy at Haslemere’s Holy Cross hospital, he finally got back to walking unaided, but could no longer drive a car, which was replaced by a mobility scooter with a top speed of 8mph.

Arthur could be seen negotiating all of the roundabouts in the village square on his mobility scooter during rush hour, wearing his signature beanie hat.