John James of Cromer was the first ever employee of the UK’s largest woodland conservation charity which celebrates its 50th birthday this month.

He went on to become chief executive of the Woodland Trust, which now employs more than 500 people, and has just written a book celebrating its half century of creating, protecting and restoring woodland.

John’s life-long love of trees has its roots before he was even born.

“I was born in a house that my parents had built and named Rowanlea, after the rowan trees that guarded the doorway of their honeymoon cottage in Scotland,” he said.

“They planted rowan trees in the garden of their new home. I grew up in Spalding, South Lincolnshire, one of the less tree-ed parts of Britain, so perhaps that is why I have always loved trees. My parents would take my sister and me to the Sandringham estate to play among the great pines.”

The Woodland Trust has 12 woods in Norfolk ranging from newly-created groves to ancient woodland and from Aldeby, near Beccles to Reffley Wood near King’s Lynn, and Tyrrels Wood, near Pulham Wood in the south to Weybourne Wood on the north Norfolk coast.

John’s favourite of all is Sheringham Old Wood, one of the highest points in Norfolk with beautiful views down to the town and out to sea. Together with woodland owned by North Norfolk District Council and Anglian Water it forms Pretty Corner Woods. “The different habitats encourage a variety of wildlife. If you’re very lucky you might spot the invertebrate inhabitants, such as adders and slow worms,” he said. “The three ponds are home to freshwater fish, frogs, toads, dragonflies and damselflies. John is fascinated by woods for their wildlife and history, as well as their environmental value.

“With a bit of experience it is possible to see signs of a wood’s history tens, hundreds and sometimes thousands of years ago,” he said. “For example, Dicks Buck’s Burrows, a small wood near Cromer. Does its name suggest that it might have been part of a rabbit warren (rabbits were kept as a food source since Roman times)?”

John’s book From Little Acorns, Unearthing the roots of Britain’s woodland conservation movement, tracks the history and achievements of the trust. “The book became something of a labour of love,” he said.

Across the country the Woodland Trust has planted more than 50 million trees since 1972, owns more than a thousand woodland sites and has created hundreds of new woods to mark national celebrations and commemorations including the Millennium, the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and the centenary of the First World War.

It also runs an inventory of the country’s oldest and most important trees and a citizen science project recording the first dates, each year, of seasonal wildlife appearances.

John joined the trust, as its first employee, in the late 1970s.

Ancient woods were being cleared for farming or forestry, or underplanted with fast-growing conifers.

“My greatest love was for nature and although my career started in marketing, I was determined to find a job that would make a difference in conservation,” he said.

“Half of our ancient woods had been cleared or damaged in the 30 years since World War II. Many more woods were neglected and threatened with disease and decay. I had to move quickly to promote the Trust’s objectives and to raise money to buy woods and land for tree planting,”

By the time John stepped down, 20 years later, as chief executive, he had been appointed OBE for services to nature conservation and the trust had become one of the largest fundraising charities in the country.

“When I joined, the Trust had acquired 18 woods, mainly in the West Country, when I stepped down 20 years later, it owned over 800 woods throughout the UK with many more in progress," said John. "A new wood was being acquired every week.

"When I stepped down in 1997 the trust was one of Britain’s largest fundraising charities and active in every part of the UK.”

It is still based in Grantham, where John was living when he became its first employee. He and his wife, Margaret, later moved to Cromer where they ran the contemporary crafts Church Street Gallery until retiring in 2012.

One of the trust’s most recent purchases was Green Farm, near Watton where it will plant 142,000 native trees to create a mosaic of native broadleaf woodland, natural grassland, wood pasture and hedges, working with the Norfolk Wildlife Trust which already looks after neighbouring Thompson Water, Carr and Common, renowned for its post-glacial pingo ponds.

From Little Acorns, Unearthing the roots of Britain’s woodland conservation movement, by John D James, is published by Stalham-based Mascot Media.

Norfolk’s Woodland Trust sites are all free to visit – find full details at woodlandtrust.org.uk