recollections of a magical childhood
Old Times
So thought of some more..............
Pop lighting his pipe in the kitchen - plenty of sucking and blowing until it was roaring and the flame on the match became about 5 inches high!! Plastic/oil skin type tobacco pouch that he could put his pipe bulb into and push tobacco into with his finger. What tobacco did he smoke?
Probably Old Holborn but maybe something more exotic.... (See Page 19)
Knitted tea cosy on the teapot. Small metal teapot....
Yellow bone-handles knives and forks (square profile). The same kind of bread knife plus a carving knife that had been sharpened to within an inch of its life so was now a stiletto dagger shape! Carving fork to go with it had some sort of hinged flick back bar that acted as a protector for the carver's fingers.
Budgie cage had an elasticated plastic material stretched around the bottom of the cage to prevent the birdseed (Twill?) from getting sprayed everywhere. Later found a photo (below)
What was the budgie's name?
Dirty Dick?
budgies.mp4Bottles of Stout (Mackeson?) or Guinness to the right of the dresser in the kitchen before the bedroom door (plus lemonade?).
Spare kitchen chair kept in the bedroom to be carried through for meals.
Chiming of the clock all night...Pop polishing shoes at 5 o'clock in the morning (even suede ones). Probably a drop of pipe spittle got the shine right up!
Lemon meringue pies, gooseberry pies, apple pies, rhubarb pies - all with Walls ice cream in Summer (carved from a large paper-wrapped block before the common use of plastic tubs?). Wooden spoons that we used to eat the round tubs of ice cream with and also choc ices in silver foil paper.
What about that chocolate flaky stuff that came in a cardboard tin which we spread on bread.. which eventually became obsolete?
Two products; the first was called "Chocolade" (pronounced Choc-o-larder) that Mum & Dad got from their friend in Holland - a sort of chocolate vermicelli and the second was called Chocolate Spread - a thick, rich dark spreadable chocolate (far superior to today’s Nutella crap). But, as mentioned earlier, Nanna used her Cadbury's drinking chocolate powder! I remember a shallower and broader tub than the Fry's one shown above right - but similar colours!
Horace Bachelor.mp4
From a forum I found - "......Chocolate spread which was sold in the 50s in waxed cardboard tubs. It was made by Fry’s in Bristol, but the takeover of Fry’s meant that production was switched to Keynsham .....
which reminds me, "Keynsham, spelt K-E-Y-N-S-H-A-M, that's Keynsham, Bristol". Whatever happened to Horace Batchelor, and Radio Luxemburg (208 on the tuner) for that matter?
Regarding Radio Luxembourg I just remember a persistent advertisement stating ' and the time on my Everite Watch is...'! Strangely, I don't think I've ever actually seen an Everite Watch though.
...and the spread carried on there. As a child, I was addicted to it on bread and butter. I can still recall the taste which was nothing like any of the chocolate spreads on sale today. I wish someone would resurrect the recipe just so that I could sample it again. When this disappeared, Cadbury’s produced a similar recipe sold in plastic tubs but the original one was more plain choc than Dairy milk."
When we talked about chocolate in sandwiches some (a long) time ago, I was trying to recall the little fragmented chocolate bits that Nanna had originally put in our sandwiches which were the ones in the tin as per attached pic.
I seem to have forgotten those.
I recall that after a short while this form of drinking chocolate became obsolete, much to our disappointment, and we had to make do with the now-familiar powder form.
Tony sleeping and his paws moving when dreaming of chasing rabbits... silky "feathers" of fur coming from his forelegs... kinked tail where caught in a door or summat before Pop got him from the Gypsies! Choke chain and lead.
Throwing the stick...
Christmas
Christmases at either our house, Nanna & Pop's or your house. If the latter we'd arrive late morning to much activity in the kitchen. The "Girls" (Helen & Flo') being useless, full of good cheer and yet strangely managing to get on everyone's nerves. Over to the Berrylands (?) to join your Dad for a pint - he would be having a game of darts.
Back home for the Christmas feast preceded by a schooner of sherry! Much merriment. Rooms decorated with paper chain streamers that everyone used to hand-make, crêpe paper streamers that had a piece of cotton thread down the middle so that the paper puckered up as it was twisted before securing to the wall with drawing pins. Larger centrepieces of concertinaed crêpe paper bells that would appear when you opened up the decoration and turned each end through 180 degrees to become circular. Fairy on the top of the tree. Decorations made of blown glass which, when they broke were chrome inside (like a vacuum flask tube - there's another memory - Thermos Vacuum flasks - printed metal exteriors and pale plastic mug as a cap plus stopper that screwed in but had a cork centre - horrible smell when opened!). Alternative decorations that were just rolls of crêpe paper that changed colours along its length so, when rolled up, the ends looked like bands of colours. Crêpe paper sheets folded up that were used to wrap presents. Crackers wrapped in, you guessed it, crêpe paper with a golden motif on the body - e.g. a smiling Father Christmas face.
Brazil nuts, Turkish Delight or something we hated and rectangular boxes with curved ends containing dates with a label with camels on the top. Main Christmas meal of turkey and all the trimmings accompanied by bottles of Double Diamond (no wine in those days)............
but, from these later photos (above), it seems we did have wine after all
.....crackers pulled, hats put on, jokes read out all followed by Christmas pudding and custard - the pudding had sixpences stuck in for us to find. Once everyone had had enough and cigarettes or cigars consumed and the plates "cleared away" we would finally be called to the lounge for the present-giving part of the day that we had been waiting for. Present located from under the tree, the label read, present handed to the recipient who would unwrap and either pretend to be or was truly delighted (easy to spot the difference) accompanied by Helen (usually) shouting "What have you got?". Then having to go and kiss or shake hands with the giver.
Present giving took about 4 hours! Kissing Helen and Flo's hairy chins....
Once all that was over we would manage to take our presents upstairs (or at Bournemouth, into a bedroom) and enjoy them properly. Eventually, we were called for tea and then the adults would get into their boozed-up sing-song.
Watching snow fall illuminated by the street lights.
Here are a couple of period "Christmas" photos from British Railways................ Click open to see the level of detail!
Are those mobiles the ones shown on Blue Peter made out of coat hangers (in about 1960)? ....and somebody in the Sleeping Berth Reservation booth is typing really really fast! Yes, incredible detail! You can almost smell the Brylcream and the damp, body-warmed worsted coats wafting about.
I remember going up to London (very rarely) at Christmas time and gaping in the windows of Hamleys and Gamages. They usually had enormous train sets running continuously creating much envy! See right a photo of Regent Street in 1959.
Talking of snow, remember the Winters in Parley Cross when there at Whitsun or Easter? Dying to go out and play in the snow, putting on woollen bobble hats, scarves and gloves plus wellies (Pop used to call them "Gumboots" didn't he? Yeah, they were Gumboots for sure!) and our cotton-based coats. When all the noise was deadened by the snow everywhere so it was strangely muffled. Snow-laden bushes looking like marsh-mallows. Throwing snowballs and gloves becoming frozen with blocks of ice where the fingers should be. Snow getting over the tops of our boots. Wet socks and feet making welly removal, when we got home, almost impossible!
Finally, fog and smog in the suburbs so thick visibility dropped to a few feet!
I remember my Dad driving back from Chingford in the smog and running over the top of a round-about and down the other side. Also, my Mum leading the car on foot with a torch. When we got down our cul-de-sac we had three other cars behind us who'd been following and had no idea where they were!
Lounge/Music
First Stereogram?
I now realise the above memory was wrong. This may have been the model John Gibbs' parents had. My Dad's was the one below!
These images take me right back to the sixties and all the vinyl records I played (and still have!)
Don't recall ours having the badge/sticker/decal on the turntable though (which, incidentally, is a BSR Type UA16!)
The decals proudly announce "Ferguson" and "Stereophonic"! It was known as a Stereogram rather than a radiogram after all!
Whilst on the topic of lounge furniture at 74 Dale View Avenue, my parents bought this in the sixties and I saw one on the television programme "Flog It!" and immediately recognised it!
Television
A link to some of the TV we used to watch here and a list of the ones I can remember something about - Andy Pandy, Billy Bunter, The Bumblies
(I've never met anyone else who remembers those),
Crackerjack, Four Feather Falls, Lenny the Lion, Muffin the Mule, Noddy, Mr Pastry, Pugwash, Popeye...
Thursday's childrens' TV programmes always included Popeye - "I am what I am and I is what I is. I'm Popeye the Sailor Man, Poop, Poop!"
Robin Hood, Sooty, Torchy the Battery Boy, Twizzle, Watch with Mother, Whirlybirds, Highway Patrol, Casey Jones, Champion the Wonder Horse, Davy Crockett, Gunsmoke, Hopalong Cassidy, Lassie, The Lone Ranger, Rawhide, Rin Tin Tin, Roy Rodgers, Wagon Train, The Flowerpot Men, Rag, Tag and Bobtail.
Supercar! Fireball XL5. Other programmes in the background; I Love Lucy, Tonight with Cliff Michelmore (with somebody and Jimmy McGregor), The Larkins, Hancock's Half Hour and probably, even, The Sky at Night!!!
(Left) This is why we know how to speak the Queen's English!
That intro' is so familiar!
I distinctly remember us going around saying
"Oh schlobabalob" and "Wee-eed".
Happy days!
(Right) I also Watched With Mother,
Rag Tag and Bobtail......goodness it was slow-moving!
Today's kids wouldn't sit still long enough to see the end!
(Left) I also watched (with mother), Andy Pandy today - Jeezaloo! A quarter of an hour of a puppet on a swing!
I was always a bit concerned about Andy Pandy
(the first human to wear a Onesie!)....and Looby Loo.....
an opportunist tart if ever I saw one...always hanging
about in flower beds.
And Teddy?....what incredible durable thread did hold his arms and legs on?
Sweets & Toys!
Making our own catapults with forked branches and thick elastic but dreaming of metal framed ones.
Fruit Salads, Black Jacks, Barrett's Sherbet Dabs, Shrimps....Jamboree Bags (with horrible sweets and a novelty inside) which contained horrible tasteless sweets, a bloody hard toffee and a rubbishy toy made in Hong Kong. Ah! Made in Hong Kong! There's a phrase you don't see anymore!
A selection of "oldies" plus....
....Frozen Jubblys...
This shape (above) but I thought they were orange (see below and right)?
This must be the later “Drink” version and not the original “Frozen Jubbly”
[Later] I found an image of the orange version and, apparently, that was sold as a drink or, if the retailer wanted, as a frozen "lolly".
Not being allowed to go back in the sea after lunch for 30 minutes - "You'll get the bends/cramp and drown!"
Also, when it rained in the summer, it was still warm enough to go in the sea...I can tell you this year it definitely ain't been warm enough for any of that sort of behaviour.....or were we so full of Nanna's dinners we were just much tougher then?
Fireworks over the sea (especially the Kite ones).
The night of the illuminations on Bournemouth Promenade - lamp posts adorned with decorations illuminated by loads of light bulbs - in numerous shapes such as flowers, butterflies, etc.
Oh, and the Track Cleaning Car....and buying Carbon tetrachloride from the Chemist without too much trouble....would have been good for a long sniff, no doubt....bet a twelve-year-old couldn't buy it now!
Sweets - Flying Saucers.....Five boys Chocolate.....Nux bar (looked like a turd)....and funnily enough I can't remember Werther's Originals at all, yet they make out they've been around for a long time! See Page 12.
Wagon Wheels? Strawberry Mivvies? Murray Mints (the ad' ran... "Too good to Hurry Mints”!)
Strand ciggies - Guards? Rothmans, St Stuyvesant (menthol)? No, it was Consulate! Passing Cloud (oval-shaped specials) - Dominoes (packs of six!) Woodbine's also did sixes I think or was it fives?
Just found a bit about West Parley Memorial Hall and how it came to be built and renewed. The link is here. Interesting that Mr Chubb's name comes up regarding the hall meetings. I've been trying to find historical pictures of West Parley, particularly Parley Cross, but not had much success. I know there's one in existence of the crossroads in the 1930s with a blue sign by the garage pointing up the road to Longham for The Horns Inn, but can't find it online.
See Page 13
I have found this photo of Chubb's Garage at Parley Cross Roads in Flickr but just a bit before our time!!!! Note telephone number – Northbourne 17!
Oh, for those carefree summer days, eh?
Thanks for this extra stuff - really interesting. I've searched and searched for photographs of Parley Cross but cannot find one from "our era". I'll keep looking! See Page 13
While we're talking about Chubb's garage, I seem to remember that over a couple of summers my Dad hired cars from there.
When he first hired it he apparently sat in it for 10mins trying to find the starter, which, you'll remember was, strangely for those days, on the floor.
and the dip-switch, to the left of the clutch!
Yes, I remember your Dad hiring the Consul and the Mini! Great photo of Chubb’s Garage by the way!
Just had a moment of reflection....get the polystyrene cement out and the pin to seal the end...heady sort of smell....ahh! See here for evocative stuff!
I also remember having these bits and pieces at some time but don't suppose we could be bothered to set them out, let alone paint them!
And I remember building this but not what happened to it... there was also an 0-6-0 diesel shunter.
Here's one from the same era, of the T-Junction at Northbourne where "our Bournemouth buses" would turn left and a comparison with 2011. You can see the same building on the extreme right and the houses dead centre – possibly the same tree (to the right of the bench on the photo - left?)
Do you remember the journey into Bournemouth where the bus would feel like it was about to fall over onto its side when it rounded the relatively sharp bends of the old road from Northbourne before the new roundabout and new road were built to bypass them?
Note: on the map above I have said: "where our Bournemouth buses turned right". I should have said "left" of course.