Brenda Graham was born in Carlisle and lived in the small hamlet of  Rocky House which is near Boltongate, near Cockermouth until she was eight, when the family moved to Cockermouth.

Bunty Ellison was born in 1923.   Her family moved to Carlisle when she was eleven years old and her love of the countryside grew as she and her brother explored the area around Carlisle and the Solway coast on their bikes.