Hooptedoodle #120 – Definitely the Last Bus from Birkenhead

The final couple of 1/76 buses for my non-collection.

This Liverpool Corporation Leyland “Titan” type PD2 is another common sight from my childhood. For some reason, LCPT is one of the few bus operators for which I can’t find sensible fleet information on the internet – I guess this model is of a mid-1950s vehicle.

The Birkenhead Corporation Guy “Arab” is another personal nostalgia bomb. This is a relative oldie - the original vehicle which this depicts was supplied to the Birkenhead fleet in 1946, and the old-style municipal paint job was officially updated in 1951, but in reality a great many of the older buses were left like this – a bit like military dress regulations, I suppose. Since it remained in service until 1957, this would still have been trundling along the New Chester Road and around Rock Ferry when I was a boy. Guy Motors were based in Wolverhampton, and the wartime utility-style coachwork for this particular vehicle was by Park Royal, of London. Once again, a bus that looks like a proper bus – would anyone dream of naming a bus an Arab now, I wonder?

Unless I come across a Wallasey bus from the right period in this scale, that’s all for now, folks.

I am quietly pleased to observe that the number of hits on this blog has crept over 200,000 – I wasn’t going to mention it, but felt it was only polite to thank anyone who has read any of my ramblings during the last few years for their time and patience! So – thank you.

Hooptedoodle #185 - The ABC Man

Last month Ian Allan passed away, one day short of his 93^rd birthday. Who? Well, in his way, Allan was one of the most famous and influential men of his generation.

Ian Allan (left), in his early 20s - checking facts

You see, he more or less invented trainspotting in the UK. Well, he didn’t really invent it, but the books and enthusiasts’ guides he published (and which the company he founded continues to publish) organised it and codified it, and have been the backbone of the Nerd World since 1942.

Allan was born in 1922 in Horsham, Surrey, and educated at St Paul’s School. An accident at an Officers’ Training Corps camp when he was 15 resulted in the amputation of one of his legs, and he was not greatly gifted scholastically, so by 1942 he was employed in a clerical department at the Southern Railway, a humble role which, as it happened, suited him perfectly. He was fanatically enthusiastic about all things to do with trains and locomotives, and, since his employers refused to have anything to do with the project, he published at his own expense a booklet describing all the rolling stock of SR, and was rather shaken when all the copies sold out very quickly, necessitating a further printing. He went on to produce successful booklets for the other British railway companies, and the first edition of his volume on London Transport systems sold out all 20,000 copies within 4 days of going on sale. After that, things really took off.

In post-war, rationed, miserable, penniless Britain, Allan had provided the basic tools for an inexpensive hobby which became a near-religion, claiming the attention of vast numbers of boys (of all ages). In 1949 he and his wife founded the Ian Allan Locospotters’ Club, which eventually had some 230,000 members. His little booklets covered a remarkable number of titles, originally on railway topics, but later on trams, buses, aviation, all forms of road transport, shipping, military subjects, model-making – you name it. About half the kids in my class at grammar school were trainspotters – at weekends, on railway station platforms all over the country, there would be little groups of enthusiasts, each with a knapsack containing a flask of tea and a number of Allan's precious ABC books, so that “spotted” locomotives could be marked off in the lists.

Trainspotters at Newcastle, 1950

Just as well his mother never knew...

My cousin Dave had an astonishing number of the bus books – and I do mean astonishing. He was an easy kid to buy presents for. Not only was it necessary to have the booklet for every known vehicle fleet, but constant change in those fleets would require new editions every couple of years, and, naturally, they would be snapped up as soon as available. Though the individual books were only a couple of shillings each (in my day), they would form a major investment for the true disciple. Dave and I spent many hours at the Ribble bus sheds, in Liverpool and Preston, scribbling numbers into notebooks. I guess my unsophisticated tastes were honed at an early age…

Allan was always an enthusiast

Ian Allan Publications are still going strong – their output is glossier and more ambitious now, but they still seem to hold the same important place in the hearts and minds of transport fans, and their reputation for accuracy and quality still holds. Allan also produced market-leading monthly magazines on railways, buses and model railways, which I believe are still going strong, and at various times he bought the Hastings Miniature Railway and the Great Cockrow Railway (near Chertsea). He was honoured with an OBE in 1996.

If you wish to see how influential ABC books were, just have a look on eBay – any day, any week, almost any subject.

My old school chum Andy “Cocky” Roche once announced that he had seen a girl trainspotter at Carlisle station, but this was greeted with total (and somehow reassuring) disbelief. Anyway, if he had seen one, she would most certainly have had one or more of the ABC books with her; thanks very much, Mr Allan.

A Useful Bit of Nostalgia

A couple of weeks ago I bought this on eBay. It was just a whimsical rush of blood to the nostalgia gland, I guess, but I used to have one of these when I was a lad.

I hasten to add that the item was already pretty old when I had it. A great many of my boyhood outings to football matches and motor races, cycling trips and journeys to Preston with Cousin Dave to spot Ribble buses involved one of these - ideal for carrying a plastic mac, a package of pilchard sandwiches (in red, gingham greaseproof paper, borrowed from a sliced loaf), and a map in the front pocket.

It is, of course, a Mark VII gas-mask bag, dating from 1942, as issued to civilians (and the Home Guard, I think). The ones for sale on eBay are original, but new (if that makes sense), stored since the war, just in case. Oh no - it didn't come with a gas-mask - that would be silly.

If it's a fake, please don't bother to tell me - I'm quite happy with it. Apart from a pleasing nostalgia value and a kind of lowbrow utilitarian appeal, it will be a useful conversation piece if we now get endless re-runs of Dad's Army on British TV.

Anyway - there you go - it doesn't take a lot to make me happy. I'll have to see if I can get pilchards online.


Completely Separate Topic

I was intrigued by this picture from the 1920s of a social day out for a local branch of the Klu Klux Klan. It may be a fake - I have no idea, but it is an image which will stay with me for a while...

Hooptedoodle #375 - OCD Holidays with Soss

Portreath Harbour

When I was a kid, my closest relative and friend was a cousin, Dave, who was the same age. I had a pretty gruelling couple of years when I was 11 and 12 - it's a daft age anyway. Most of my friends at school lived some distance away, and I wasn't allowed to invite anyone to our house - this was in case they met my sister, who was mentally handicapped, which is a separate story altogether - my dad wasn't very good with stuff like that.

So I recall a dismal few years when there was a lot of homework and a very small amount of television, and I filled in my spare time by reading in my bedroom, and going for long walks with the dog. I later got some relief when I discovered the pleasures of cross-country running, but for a long time there was pretty much nothing going on. My family didn't talk much.

My cousin, whose parents were separated, got a place as a boarder at Liverpool Bluecoat School. The Bluecoat was an unusual school - it had day pupils - I also knew someone who attended there as a day pupil, but he said he was basically an outcast - the boarding school was very much the heart of the institution. There was a long tradition of places at the school being allocated on a charitable basis, which is how my cousin was accepted. Many of his friends in the boarding house were from military families, frequently British Army people stationed overseas - so he had pals who used to go home to Kenya or Malaya for the Summer holidays. Dave used to go home to sunny Wavertree. *

Liverpool Bluecoat School - I think that's the chapel

He also had a friend called Soss. They were pretty much inseparable. I used to go with Dave's mum to the chapel service at the Bluecoat most Sundays. The boarders all paraded in - very disciplined, full uniform - and there was a full, drawn-out service, organ, choir, proper sermon - the lot. The chapel was dark and cold and grandiose - lots of busts of Lord This and Viscount That, and General The-Other. And very, very hard pews. At the end of the service, the boarders were allowed to meet with any personal visitors - I think I used to get 5 minutes with Dave. Any items passed across had to be approved by a member of staff. I'm sure it was character-building, but my recollection is that it was a bit like a very dignified prison.

Dave was invariably accompanied by Soss, who never had visitors of his own. Soss - short for Sausage (his love of sausages was legendary at the school, apparently), his real name was Danny Burgess - was an odd character. He was quite small, and he never spoke. He would occasionally shrug, or grin nervously when spoken to, and he blinked constantly. He looked like an urchin - he had a pudding-basin haircut, years before the Beatles made such things fashionable, and his blazer was too big, and he always looked uncomfortable, and fidgeted. He was constantly in trouble for not polishing his shoes for the Sunday service.

Soss came from Cornwall. He was at the school as an Army orphan. His dad had been killed during the Suez Crisis. His dad was a driver in a transport section somewhere, and he died in a road accident around Suez time. This gained Soss a lot of contempt from those of his school chums whose families were senior officers in Colonial Places, and it added to his general exclusion. Soss's mother used to come up a couple of times a year for Speech Day, and to meet with his teachers. Her name was Antoinette, and she was a tough, rather battered little lady - very kind and very polite. She was as poor as a church mouse, and used to travel up from Cornwall to Liverpool on a relay of buses, which must have been dreadful. Because she couldn't afford to pay for accommodation, she used to stay with my aunt, and on one occasion, though it seems incredible now, she actually stayed with us. My mother got on very well with her, and they maintained a regular correspondence for some years. My mother was always fascinated by people who had had difficult lives, so I fear Antoinette may have been something of an exhibit.

When I was about 14, I suddenly learned we were going on a Summer vacation to Portreath, on the North Cornish coast, for a week, and we were going to stay with Antoinette. Sounds idyllic, but we were going in a car my dad borrowed from a work colleague who repaired cars in his spare time, and the whole spirit of the trip was along the lines of never mind how awful this is, just think of the money we're saving.

Our destination was Portreath, not far from Redruth. The holiday itself was not great. Antoinette had arranged cheap B&B at a friend's house, about a mile from her own home, for my parents and my sister, and I stayed in the village with Soss (I shared Soss's bedroom) and his mum, and her partner, Walter, who was a bit of a problem. Walter was an ex-marine, and covered with tattoos (by the standards of the day, anyway), and he was loud and aggressive, and argumentative, and he drank a great deal.

I found that I had been allocated a camp bed which rocked like a see-saw, so I stuck my suitcase under one end and a box under the other, and that stabilised things a bit. Soss had part of a large room which had been split into two by putting a partition down the middle, and this partition divided a large bay window in half, so that each half-room had a half-window, which made a sort of alcove where my bed was situated. 

I needed to add a simple map here, since the placing of the bed was one of the themes of the holiday. Problems were threefold: 

* the bed was dreadfully uncomfortable, and smelled of having been stored in someone's garage for years

* there was a street lamp right outside the window, which sounds odd, but the street lamp was a normal-sized lamppost, and the lane outside climbed steeply and turned very abruptly, so the lamppost from down the hill illuminated Soss's room quite brightly, even with the curtains closed

* the bed was tucked into the alcove to save as much space as possible, so I was at an angle to the rest of the room. Because I couldn't sleep anyway, I was constantly staring at the edges of the ceiling, which made very odd angles with my bed, which disturbed me greatly - bugged the hell out of me, with those vivid shadows! In the dead of night I got up, shifted the chair from next to the bed, and moved the camp bed so that it lay against the partition. That was better. The world was straight again, I could go to sleep.

I became acquainted with Walter after bedtime, since he came back from the pub very drunk, and started shouting and banging things about. Soss said we mustn't talk any more until the morning, or there might be trouble.

When I got up in the morning, Walter had gone to his work. He worked irregularly, and it seemed to involve a van and people that Antoinette wasn't happy with, and anyway Soss wouldn't talk about it. Fair enough.

It was a lovely day, so after breakfast Soss took me swimming in the harbour. In those days I had a glass face mask, which I got a lot of fun out of, but with hindsight it probably messed up my swimming, because I never swam any distances - I was always looking at the bottom of the pool, or playing around underwater. Whatever, off we went to the harbour. Soss, of course, swam like a tadpole - well out of my league. Because I had my face mask with me, he came up with a great idea that we would dive down, swim under some wooden fishing boats (they were two-abreast) and come up against the ladder on the harbour side. This was pretty good, actually, but on about my 4th turn the bow-wave from another vessel caused the boats to drift against the harbour wall, so that when I came up the gap had closed - I had a few seconds of absolutely blind terror, but I turned around and had enough breath left to swim back under the boats to the clear water on the far side. There was no real danger - in fact, I could have gone forward to the prow of the boat I was under, which was a shorter distance.

Soss laughed like a drain, of course, and I put a brave face on it, but I'd had a bad fright, whether or not it was justified, and I'd had enough underwater swimming for the day, thank you. I can still remember exactly how it looked and felt when I thought I was stuck down there.

We went back to Soss's house, to get rid of our swimming costumes ("cozzies" in both Liverpool and Cornwall, I recall!). My bed had been shifted back to its angled position, and there was a handwritten note:

DO NOT MOVE THE FURNITURE OR THERE WILL BE TRUBBEL. REMEMBER YOU A VISITOR HEAR!

Soss said don't worry, that was how things were in his family. I worried.

This looks about right...

OK - next adventure. Soss seemed to have a gift for targeting my neuroses - or possibly helping me create new ones. We took packets of egg sandwiches with us and went for a walk along the beach, round a couple of headlands, to what Soss called his secret beach. That was really very nice - it was deserted; we played around on the sand and in the water until lunch time, threw about a billion pebbles, and then Soss announced that we would have to get off this beach by climbing the 200-foot cliff behind us, since we were now cut off by the tide and the beach would be underwater soon. Once again, he was completely relaxed, totally in his own element, and had never considered that there might be townies who were pathetic enough to be scared of heights (as I was, and still am!). Up the cliff we went - only fear of letting myself down in front of my cousin's friend kept me going, I think, though I can't imagine what alternatives there were. We made it to the top, and I found that I had been clutching my package of sandwiches in one hand all the way up, which can't have been an advantage. There was a lot of very nervous laughter at the top, I can tell you.

Triumph Mayflower - not one of the British classics

And more of the same. I persevered with the oblique bed, dutifully went into hiding each night before Walter roared back from the pub, enjoyed the peaceful days when Walter went to work, and relished a few walks that did not involve cliffs or drowning in the harbour. I saw very little of my family - they may have been pleased to have got rid of me! To be honest, I am astonished that I can't remember much more about my stay in Portreath, though I do know that the weather changed on about day 4, and after about a day of looking at horizontal rain outside (and, I suspect, an argument between Walter and my dad, which could have left me an orphan as well) we cut our losses, and my family drove back to Liverpool in the borrowed car (which was an old Triumph). That was one occasion I was glad to get home again!

* Footnote, nundanket style: One of Dave's great friends at school was Brian Knowles, an exceptional musician, who earned his crust for many years touring as Musical Director with Roger Whittaker (quiet at the back, please), but eventually was established as a composer and performer in his own right. He is now Composer in Residence at the Royal School, Haslemere. I find it hard to imagine him hanging around in cold, dusty corners of the Bluecoat with Dave and Soss. Dave died of prostate cancer when he was only about 50 - Knowlesy played some music at the funeral, in Birkenhead. I have no idea what happened to Soss - my mother's correspondence with Antoinette stopped fairly abruptly!

Hooptedoodle #232 - First Recognition at Last

My good friend Francisco Goya emailed me to report that this blog - this actual blog you are reading - is now blocked to passengers using the wi-fi on First buses in the UK, since it contains inappropriate content.

Good heavens. Whatever next. Etc.

My first reaction is that, since I was brought up to trust that responsible business corporations cannot possibly be wrong, First are almost certainly correct to take such action. Further, it pleases me to see that protection of the feelings and moral values of their customers should figure in First's strategic gameplan. Good for them.

I am not well placed at present to research just why I am off the official reading list, but I am free to play games in my mind, and to imagine some story which happens to suit me. I may look further into this, but I sincerely hope that First still allow their passengers to visit the website of The S*n, plus various dating agencies and gossip fora, to keep their views clean and patriotic.

I may not lose a lot of sleep over this.      

Tey Pottery Buildings – Another Back-Door Collection

A couple of people have expressed interest in the ceramic buildings which I used in my ECW siege testing a couple of months ago. For the most part, these were made by the Tey Pottery company, now defunct, which operated from various locations in Norfolk. The range of which I seem to have become an accidental collector is the Britain in Miniature series, which suits my purposes admirably.

Tey Pottery "Britain in Miniature" - Grannie would have been delighted. The
white-backed buildings in the background make effective town blocks - the
textured-all-round items nearer the camera are more suitable for standalone pieces

I didn’t really need another unofficial collection, but I am pleased with what I’ve obtained, and have consciously cut down on purchasing now, in the sense that I am very picky about what I go for. I note that at the start of this year I wasn’t sure at all about the viability for the wargames table of items primarily intended for your grannie’s sideboard – these are ornaments, let’s make that quite clear – pottery knick-knacks, and they are neither serious models nor exactly accurate.

Some points (for and against) and things to watch for, if you have half a mind to acquire some of these miniatures:

(1) They suit me perfectly – they have a cheerful, almost playful brio which I find very appropriate to accompany toy soldiers – the Britain in Miniature (BiM) series are (mostly) to an approximately constant(ish) scale which I would describe as “smallish 15mm”. I deliberately use underscale buildings with my 20mm figures, because the smaller footprint is more acceptable (given the constant paradox of incompatible ground and figure scales), and because I believe a cluster of undersized houses looks more like a village than a single representative structure which matches the figure scale.

(2) Tey’s BiM range – if you are selective – will fit nicely in a 17^th Century setting. The buildings are, mostly, what in ship model terms would be called “waterline” representations, without bases or landscaping, and can be combined into effective town blocks which would be difficult and expensive to achieve otherwise. Be careful with sizes – the churches are too small for my taste, and the Countryside Collection and a few others contain smaller-scale items – anything which is obviously a generic cottage usually will not match.

(3) They are readily available and splendidly cheap – on eBay you can pick up nice examples for just a few pounds (they are available on US eBay, too though slightly dearer). Typically, I obtained lots for about 3 to 5 pounds each, and was the only bidder. On occasions, an attractive off-catalogue or commissioned item will attract heavier bids, so I normally duck out when the going gets tough. It’s only a hobby, for goodness’ sake…

(4) They are ornaments – they are delicate (though not too bad, if you store them sensibly) and they are glazed to a high gloss. Being a very bad person, I give them two coats of acrylic matt medium – if I need to do any touching up, or obliterate any anachronistic shop or pub signs, I can do that with acrylics between the varnish coats. I expect serious Tey collectors to be outraged by my destruction of their collectors’ value by this varnish business, but these things are plentiful, the value is not great and they are mine anyway (heh heh) – consider it equivalent to converting original Hinton Hunt figures!

(5) Some serious bad news – many of these pieces are untextured and plain white on the back, so have to be placed with care to make a convincing street scene, but this doesn’t cause me any difficulty. This can be a fairly confusing aspect of collecting Tey buildings – some of them are textured and painted all round – these tend to be detached-style buildings rather than sections of town blocks – and I mostly go for these now if I can. Some of the buildings have changed during their production history, so I have (reluctantly) been forced to learn more about the catalogues than I might have wished – in particular, Anne Hathaway’s Cottage appeared in a number of versions, some of which had plain white backs and some, like mine, are finished all round. Yes, I know, this is getting nerdy. 

So, overall, if they suit your purposes (or porpoises – thank you, Jonathan), these guys are cheaper and handier and quicker to deploy than wargames-specific  resin buildings, lighter and more robust (and less irritatingly cute) than Lilliput Lane or David Winter houses (though I cherish a fair few of those, too), and I find they bring a pleasing, colourful vibe to my siege activities, which really benefit from a bit of scenic interest. I still need specialist Hovels houses and similar, but as a bulk buy to make an easy, flexible town the Tey houses are great. Buy them selectively, keeping a careful eye on sizes and they do a nice job. For matching churches, I have found the most satisfactory source is the products of Sulley’s Ceramics, but these are rarer and more expensive.

At a whimsical level, I find it deeply amusing to set up a town which features Shakespeare’s birthplace, the Bronté family’s parsonage, the Rows of Chester, the Siege House (Colchester),  John Knox’s House (Edinburgh), and all manner of famous tourist sites – all in the same spot. Fantastic – I should wheel out one of my miniature tour buses to show off the rich heritage! I am cutting down on watching eBay now, but I keep an eye open for Anne of Cleves’ House, the Mermaid Inn and a few others. No – of course I am not a collector.

Hooptedoodle #354 - The Obstacle Course Game

This is rather a whimsical post - I wasn't sure whether to publish it. Maybe I'll delete it later.

Recently I've been corresponding with a friend about memories of childhood - especially about family get-togethers, in an age when it seemed everyone lived locally, and almost the entire family could be assembled from a small area. My friend and I had some laughs about social rituals, things that our families always did (and said, and sang), and about how the roles of various family members have changed. Since he and I come from different parts of the UK, it has been interesting to note the similarities and the regional differences.

Terraced street in Aigburth, some 10 years later than my tale

I got to thinking about the New Year parties at my grandparents' house, when I was a kid (that's my dad's parents, in Aigburth, South Liverpool). I think we only attended a few times, mostly because my dad would normally have fallen out with one or other of his siblings during the previous year!

The gatherings were large - a lot of people crammed into a small terraced house. They were good-hearted folk, in a tough, noisy sort of way. We must have been at that itchy post-war period when the working class had a bit more money, and everyone was becoming keen on what they saw as middle-class status symbols and values. It was all a bit competitive, and all of it was loud and in-your-face. My posh Auntie May had definitely "rose up", and she had married the boss/owner at her work, developed a new Hyacinth Bucket accent (see clip, below), sent her kids to private school and moved to the Wirral. In a strange, ambivalent way, the family were proud of her, yet envied her, and really hated it when she drove over for New Year in the new Vauxhall, even though they bragged about it when she wasn't there, and stood in the freezing cold to watch it drive away when she left.

Vauxhall Wyvern

At this time, everyone still had their feet and their roots in traditions that were, at the very least, Victorian. The family would come on various buses (only May had a car), some would walk, bearing biscuit tins filled with sandwiches, home baking, even bowls of trifle. When people arrived, all the big winter coats would be piled on the bed in the upstairs room at the front of the house (the smell of moth-balls was stifling), and everyone was issued with the regulation cup of tea to warm them up.

And, I guess, a good time was had by all. Occasional neighbours would appear (though the family was not noted for being very open to strangers), and eventually there were boyfriends of my various cousins (my cousins were legion, and they were all girls, now I think of it). If there were enough newcomers to the family throng, the inevitable party games in the kitchen after the tea-party would include a game called The Obstacle Course. I think my participation in this game came when I was about seven, after a number of years of non-attendance (politics). It was a game you could only play once, but when you could no longer take part you could be involved in the organisation and, of course, spectating.

Even by the prevailing standards, this was an unusually noisy game - it must have been audible a good way up the street. It was necessary to have a minimum number of first-time visitors to play - maybe 3 or 4. There was an element of initiation in it, to be sure. The family's taste in jokes and fun activities was always dominated by practical jokes, some humiliation, just a whiff of sadism, and giving a newcomer the opportunity to demonstrate that they were a "good sport", prepared to laugh at themselves - certainly to be laughed at by others. Maybe this was a test to see if they were going to fit in...

The Obstacle Course game required the identification of suitable (first-time) participants, and then my Uncle Harold and Cousin Joyce (who were the loudest of all) would take charge. The players would be led into the hall by Joyce, where they would be prepared for what was to follow, and while the course was set up. When everything was ready, they would all be admitted to the kitchen (living room), and would be shown an improvised obstacle course, which they had to memorise as best they could; then they would be taken out into the hallway again, and would be given some additional instruction on rules and so on. All the non-playing family members would be seated around the walls of the room - they would be the spectators, and later would vote for the best performer.

1950s clothes horse - we used to call ours a "maiden"

The course itself featured all sorts of household items, arranged in time-honoured constructions that you had to crawl under, step over, wriggle in-between - there was a horizontal broom handle, supported on boxes, to be stepped over without touching it, there were all sorts of cunning arrangements of sofa cushions, the wooden clothes horse, covered in rugs, a step-ladder, stacks of food tins - a lot of ingenuity came into play. And, of course, you would have to negotiate the course blindfolded, with plenty of instruction from Harold - and the spectators, obviously.

The participants (or "explorers" as they were termed) were solemnly blindfolded, and led into the room one at a time. Others went in ahead of me, and the noise was indescribable - the main object of the game was that everybody shouted at the same time - support, conflicting instructions, occasional sympathy, lots of banter. My turn came - I was completely blacked-out. I could hardly breathe, in fact.

The door closed behind me, and Harold said, "righto, Tony - come forward two steps - that's good - a little further - very good. Now, the first obstacle is you have to walk under the step-ladder without touching it, so stoop down a bit - right a bit - no not so much - good. Now edge forward slowly - good - a bit lower - right a bit more..."

And from the onlookers came a deafening uproar of "lower - not so low, turn left a bit - keep your elbows in" and so on.

After the step-ladder I was sweating profusely, but was pleased to have got past it. There was loud applause. Harold shouted, "OK - now you have to step over the bucket of water, so you need to turn left, where you are - righto - stop when I tell you - now - stop - two little steps forward - stop - now - you're going to have to turn sideways for this one..."

And so it went on. In spite of all the conflicting shouting from the sidelines, I did remarkably well, wriggling through sofa-cushion tunnels, tiptoeing through little mazes of tins, stepping over things, all without touching anything. At last, clear so far, I had to jump right across a little hearth-rug, without touching it. In a blaze of glory, I managed to do this. The applause was fantastic - I was as pleased as I could be. Then I was allowed to take off the blindfold, and I realised that the room had been completely cleared, apart from the spectator gallery around the walls. All my gyrations and extreme high-stepping and wriggling had been in an empty room. Of course I was embarrassed, but I got to join the audience and watch the last competitor in action, and I have to say it still seems to be one of the funniest things I have ever experienced. Cousin Pauline's new boyfriend, in his fashionable new shoes, keen to make a good impression, earnestly stretching his legs to impossible angles to avoid a broom-handle which was no longer there, all to the accompaniment of riotous approval.

Harold did a virtuoso performance as ring-master, no doubt. Fantastic noise, tears of laughter - it is sobering to realise that probably only about three or four of the people present are still alive - where did all that noise and camaraderie go? Of course, there are dozens of descendants, but they live in Australia, Singapore, Canada - even London. I have no idea at all about my extended family now - certainly it would be impossible to bus them all to my grannie's house - it might not even be possible to trace who they all are. Changed times.

I also remember that everyone that took part in the Obstacle Course that year got a prize. The bad news was that it was one of Auntie Laura's home-made rock cakes, left over from the festive tea, and quite rightly so, since anyone who had eaten one before would know to avoid them.

Hooptedoodle #319 - Nostalgia Trip

Posts have been a bit sparse of late on this blog. No matter. One thing I had been meaning to say something about was a recent visit I made with my wife to Liverpool, my birthplace, at the start of December. We went only for a few days, and we weren't very lucky with the weather, but it was good fun, and I did a few things - mostly rather silly, personal things - that I've been meaning to do for years.

I have only one surviving relative in Liverpool these days - cousin Mark, with whom we met up for dinner one evening while we were there - so normally there are no pressing reasons to visit the place, apart from self-indulgence, and my last visit was in 2012. We stayed at the Campanile, which is very cheap and cheerful, at the Queen's Dock. We visited the cathedrals (on the wettest day I can remember) and trogged around the old city centre, with me trying to recall what old buildings used to be on particular sites in my day. Yes, I know - how pointless is that?

I have to say that the city is far cleaner and more prosperous than I remember it, but it is disturbing how much it has changed - I have a feeling that some of the change has lost a few things as well. Babies and bath-water come to mind.

I went to have a look at the house where I was born - well, all right, I wasn't born there at all, I was born at the Maternity Hospital (in Oxford Street?) like most other people from the South end, but I lived there from ages zero to 10.

6, Belvidere Road - that's Liverpool 8, Toxteth, if you insist, but it is certainly among the posher bits of Toxteth, and I suppose it's more accurate to refer to it as Princes Park. We got the bus from the city centre to Princes Avenue, and walked down to Belvidere, which had changed very little (though the houses look better-maintained, and some charitable soul has replaced the railings and gates, which obviously were not required to be thrown at Hitler after all).

We had a splendid walk through Princes Park to Sefton Park, and then through Sefton Park to my grandmother's old house in Mossley Hill. When I was a kid we used to do this walk (both ways, in fact) most fine Sundays, and I was keen to see it again. It always seemed an enormous distance to walk with small children, but in fact it's not nearly as far as I remembered - probably only a couple of miles each way.  It was a fairly dry day, and everything seemed very fresh and familiar. I haven't walked through Princes Park since the 1960s, I guess, but it hasn't changed much.

From my grandmother's old house we continued up Penny Lane to Smithdown, had a coffee and took the bus back into town. That's another one for the bucket shop list - I'm really pleased I did it, and I don't need to think about it any more!

We also took advantage of our only other dry day to travel by ferry across the Mersey to Seacombe. Then we walked along the riverside promenade past Wallasey as far as New Brighton, on the end of the Wirral Peninsula, complete with the Perch Rock Fort, which Turner painted in some of his wilder sessions, but the old Tower Ballroom, where as a youth I once saw Little Richard, is long gone. New Brighton was definitely looking a bit gone-to-seed - we took the Mersey Railway back under the river to James Street. Great walk - I was impressed by the number of fishermen on the promenade - when I lived in those parts there would have been nothing alive to catch in the Mersey, that's for sure!

On our last evening we went to the Philharmonic Hall in Hope Street, to see the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra in action. Marvellous. High spot of the concert for me was Stravinsky's Firebird, which is a great favourite of mine. The previous occasion on which I was in the Phil was probably Speech Day in my final year in the Sixth Form at Quarry Bank School. Hmmm.

Some photos follow - nothing too onerous, I hope.

Over the hills and faraway - travelling south on the M6 over Shap Fell. The Lake District is somewhere over to the right

It still surprises me that Liverpool has become a tourist centre...

Jesse Hartley's old port sometimes doesn't sit well with the new buildings - my father, his two brothers and their dad all worked at Liverpool Docks at various times - I wonder what they'd make of it now

6 Belvidere Road - my first home - we lived in the top flat (which I think is two apartments now). It looks better maintained now than it was back in my infancy. The street is quite elegant, and hasn't changed a lot, but the labyrinth of little terraces around the back - Miles St, Clevedon St, South St, Hawkstone St and so many others - real Toxteth - has been knocked down and replaced many years ago

Let us not speak of the purple dustbins...

Princes Park - scenes of childhood...

...and its lake, which once had rowing boats for hire

Linnet Lane - apart from the lack of my kid sister's pram and a few modern cars, looks about the same

Lark Lane - quite arty these days - leads to Aigburth and my old primary school at St Mick's

The cafe in the middle of Sefton Park - seems to have sprouted some modern wings, but recognisably the same place. I think it was painted cream, and I remember there was a Wall's Ice Cream man selling ices from a pedal-tricycle cart here on Sundays. Note the shadow of the Ghost of Christmas Past

The quiet end of Queen's Drive, Mossley Hill - this is the great ring road which loops around the city to Seaforth and Bootle in the North.

My Nan's old house, on the corner of Briardale Road and Herondale. She was still resident here when she died in 1980 - not much has changed, though someone has roofed over her backyard - how very odd?

Sefton Park's celebrated Palm House, a fabulous old facility which has been rescued from vandalism and general wear and tear numerous times over the years

The Peter Pan statue in Sefton Park - one of my earliest memories from childhood; in fact it has been shifted - it is now located near to the Palm House; as far as I remember, it used to be in the flower garden near the big lake.

This is something - very quirky building - Dovedale Road Baptist Church, where my parents were married in 1945. They had met at the youth club here. The building was completed (I think) in 1903, and by the perversity of history it had closed as a church about 6 weeks before our visit! Right opposite was Dovedale Rd Primary School, which included John Lennon and my cousin Dave among its alumni. Yes, I believe the church may have been designed by a madman.

Absolutely - THAT Penny Lane. Lucky to have kept its name - the city council was planning to change the names of all streets in the city which referred to families who were associated with slavery or slave-supported businesses - the plan was shelved when they realised that Penny Lane was one such, and that there would be a great many disappointed tourists if it had been called Nelson Mandela Street instead.

The Lady Chapel in Liverpool Anglican Cathedral. Speak it in whispers, but I was a member of the choir here when I was about 12 - that was until they found out what was wrong with it.

The Royal Iris - the latest of a great many Royal Irises - the ferry for Seacombe (Wallasey) - back in the day, the Seacombe ferry had a white funnel, the Birkenhead ferries had brick-red ones.

Wallasey Town Hall, looming above the River Walk

Nothing else to do now but wish everyone all the very best for the New Year. 2018 has definitely been a duff one for me and my family - we are hoping for rather better in 2019. Once again I regret to observe that I have been overlooked in the New Year Honours List, but I thought I'd share with you my great pleasure that John Redwood has been knighted, presumably for being a pain in the arse for so many years, and for services to xenophobia. How lovely. Gives me a warm feeling in my stomach - possibly dyspepsia?  

***** Late Edit *****

Penny Lane Supplement...

In response to Steve's comment, a couple of old pictures. Penny Lane is an old street in the Allerton area of Liverpool (Liverpool 18, in old money) which runs between Smithdown Place and Greenbank Park. Apart from the fact that it intersects with the road where my Nan used to live(!), it is not all that interesting. On the other hand, "Penny Lane" was the name of the old tram terminus which was at the intersection of Allerton Road, Smithdown Place, Church Road (Wavertree - where the Bluecoat School is), Elm Hall Drive and - well, Penny Lane. The area was known as "Penny Lane", mostly because that was what it said on the front of the trams and buses. As it says in the song, the shelter for the transport terminus is on a roundabout in the middle. That shelter has now been tarted up into a Beatles-themed place. The barber's shop still exists, though back in the 1960s it was owned by Roger Bioletti's granddad (Roger was a year below me at grammar school) - nowadays it, also, lives on the Beatles connection. The main point here is that both the shelter and the barber were, and still are, in Smithdown Place, which is the (sketchy) setting for the song, at the area which has been known for donkeys' years as "Penny Lane", though Penny Lane itself is only one of the streets which runs into that junction.

I may have explained that so brilliantly that even I can't understand it any more. Here are the pictures - all borrowed from elsewhere:

 

Bioletti's barber shop, Smithdown Place, 1960s

The shelter, in 1956 - looking in exactly the opposite direction to previous photo - this time looking along Allerton Road - the barber's shop must be just off the left edge of the picture

Somewhat later view of the shelter - circa 1970? - here we are looking towards Church Road, with Allerton Rd off to the right and Smithdown to the left, and Penny Lane itself directly behind us.

The actual song is a bit of a montage of boyhood memories - some poetic licence in there - the Fire Station is in Mather Avenue - a couple of miles away past Allerton Road, on the way to Garston - on the way, in fact, to McCartney's home at Forthlin Road, which is off Mather Avenue.

All the Beatle-theming and tourist exploitation is probably OK, but ironic to those of us old enough to recall that Liverpool youth in the 1960s was regarded by the local authorities as just as much of a pestilence as you would expect. Visitors today may be directed to the New Cavern in Mathew Street, but they will not see much information about the fact that the council closed the original place down the first real chance they got. Mind you, it was unhygienic and failed every possible H&S test you could think of, but it's nonetheless true that they had regarded it, and places like it, as blots on the official presentation of Liverpool the Commercial City (and former Second City of the Empire, if anyone could remember that). That particular rubber stamp must have been banged down with a lot of satisfaction. How times change. How attitudes are re-engineered to suit.

Slavery and Beat Clubs - choose your viewpoint to fit the times in which you live!

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