The son of a Wiltshire tenant farmer, Street was born at Ditchampton Farm,
Wilton, near
Salisbury, where he eventually took over the tenancy. He was educated at
Dauntsey's School, where agriculture was part of the curriculum, and left school in 1907 at the age of sixteen. He then spent some years learning farming from his father. He later wrote that: Next, Street spent some years working on a farm in Canada, arriving in
Winnipeg in 1910. There he learnt a more expansive form of agriculture than he knew at home. First of all a working farmer, Street began to try his hand at writing as a way to supplement his farm income when it was severely reduced by prices falling during the great agricultural
depression of the 1920s and 1930s. His books were mainly light fiction, often based on the Wiltshire farming community and to some degree autobiographical. His book
Strawberry Roan was turned into
a film. A critical work of 2006 brackets him with
George Sturt,
Adrian Bell,
Henry Williamson,
W. H. Hudson,
H. J. Massingham,
H. V. Morton,
Constance Holme and
Mary Webb. A number of his books were illustrated by the artist
Lionel Edwards. He wrote a weekly column for
Farmers Weekly for thirty years. He was also a prolific radio broadcaster, appearing on
The Brains Trust and many other
BBC radio programmes, and a member of the
Empire Poetry League. During the
Second World War he was a member of the
Home Guard, on one occasion joining the chase for a missing German parachutist. Street is himself the subject of a radio programme by the poet
Sean Street. ==Family==