Memories............

[Captain Kong]

I remember the Night Soil men, digging out the middens during the night. back to back "toilets" with next door, it went into the joint midden and you dumped the ashes from the coal fire onto the crap and the Night soil men came round once a week and spaded it out into their cart.
The Knocker Upper. he woke up the workers in a morning and charged a few pennies. No alarm clocks when everyone worked in`t mill.
The gas lighter with his ladder climbed up the lamp post and pulled a small lever to light the mantles. If the mantle at home broke we shinned up the lamp and nicked that one.
Three of us in a bed, no electric lights and me Dad playing his `E-Flat Bass,` he was in a Brass band, and seeing his shadow from the candle on the wall behind him , lovely, as we fell asleep.
No Central Heating, or radiators, in those days, we just had one coal fire that mother cooked on. no carpets, stone flag floors with peg rugs on to sit on. After the man from the Parish had been, sell those chairs, sell that wireless, kids had to stand at the table, we were allowed two chairs for parents. no wireless so Dad played his E-Flat Bass to keep us entertained.
We went and got our own coal from the coal yard on a truck and us kids pulled it home to dump in the back yard.
We went to the public baths once a week and three kids in a hot bath there was three pennys including soap and towells.
To get a bike we went onto the tip and found bits and pieces, after a couple of months we had enough to build a bike of sorts. also get old prams, etc to make a trolly.
But we had a grand life, dont know they`re born today, I say, they dont know they are born.
We were poor but we didnt know we were poor, cos everyone was the same.
Happy days.
Brian.

[Rocky]

Chris posted following the coal lorry round picking up the coal they dropped and taking it home.

Some places had a horse drawn cart and the coal was not the only thing we had to take home

[Lou Barron]

Delivering newspapers on a second hand bike paid five shillings for and falling of and breaking my collar bone and also getting a belt across the lug hole from my mam if i did not do as i was told those were the days

[Tony Wilding]

aged 6 years old my parents moved us from london to broadstairs in kent, that was 1945, coal ,milk and ice were delivered by horse and cart, often saw steam driven lorries, people used to run out in the road gathering horse droppings, we had gas lamps at home, a big iron mangle in the backyard, bathed in a big tin bath, only heat was a coal fire in the living room. Seem to remember a bun cost one penny, the radio was battery, had to recharge, allways went flat in the middle of dick barton, special agent at 6 45 pm, dick barton, snowy and jock, made our own fun, used to try to fish with a bent pin, scrumping in the local orchards, gathering blackberries in late summer, mum made pies with them, had many a clout from a copper for scrumping, but no vandalism, had respect for elders, needed permission to leave the table and had to eat what you were given. It was speak when you are spoken to, did me no harm, taught me to respect other people and my parents. Now all is gone. Milk bottles had wide tops, sealed with a cardboard disc, had many designs on them which we used to collect. It was a penny bus ride to school, but we walked and bought a bun with a penny, if you was lucky you could buy stale cream buns from day befor same price, cheese was cut from a whole cheese with a wire and weighed, as was butter, turkeys hung outside butchers fully feathered, , were great fun times, you had to improvise, dont regret one minute, local pleasureboat the perseverance owned by next door neighbour used to ask us 3 boys to sit on it while awaiting passengers, said it attracted others, we spent most of summer holidays doing that, were as brown as berries, learned a lot about boats, the good old days. Tony w.

[Captain Kong]

I remember when Church Bells rang on Sundays, all silent now, since the ******s moved in, just the sound of the Muezzin from the top of the Minarets on the Ring of Mosques that circle Bolton on his loud speaker calling all ******s for Friday Prayers.
I remember when they had the Sermons every spring time, all the little girls of the parish dressed in white satin dresses and a Boys Brigade band in front marching round the Parish stopping at street corners ,sing a hymn then onto the next street, all gone now because it upset the ******s
I remember the Whit walks in Manchester one week and the next Sunday in Bolton where the whole town turned out to watch, all the churches had their own banners with Brass bands playing and all the girls dressed in white satin dresses. All gone now because the ******s got upset about it.
I remember Christmas Day when the Salvation Army Brass Band stoped at the end of the Street playing Carols then onto the next street. all gone now because it upset the ******s.
I remember sitting on the grass in the park on a Sunday afternoon, posh people paid a penny to sit on a striped canvas deck chair, and listening to a Brass Band in the band stand. My Dad did that, Playing his E-Flat Bass, champion it was. all gone now the parks have been taken over by you know who.
I remember May Day, when all the kids elected the prettiest girl in the district to be May Queen, the local Rag and Bone man providing his Donkey and cart decked out in white ribbons, with an old arm chair on top where the `Queen` sat with her maids all in white, the lads with a May Pole behind singing and we went from street to street.
All gone now, probably get stoned by you know who now.
A whole British way of life extinguished for ever by Politicians opening the doors to the whole Islamic world to take over Britain.
How Sad is that.
Dad`s Bolton Borough Brass Band in 1932, all working class lads from the Cotton Mills, Dad is second on the right front row seated, with his E-Flat Bass.
Cheers Dad, they cannot take away the memories. ******s dont do Brass Bands.

[alf corbyn]

remember the knife grinder peddaling his little lathe on his barrow and the muffin man ringing his bell with a large tray balanced on his head. the shellfish man selling cockles and mussels from his barrow, sunday teatime all those loverly winkles with bread and butter don't forget your pin.
our evening entertainment shadow pictures on the wall created by the light of the living room coal fire. what rotter started this thread?.

[Captain Kong]

Nearly had me in tears there Alf,

I remember the Knife Grinder with his stone wheel. Fresh fish from the Fleetwood fish man calling in the street every Tuesday.
I remember being in the Boys Brigade and going to camp in TyNewidd Farm in Rhyl, in 1944 when I was 9, Five shillings [25p] for a week at the seaside including train fare to Rhyl. A thousand lads from Bolton in Bell Tents and a Latrine we dug at the top of the field; No Boys Brigade here now.
I remember the School Board man looking through our window as our gang who were always playing hooky from school were hiding behind the settee, hearing him shouting,"I can see you lot".
I remember being in the nursery, with Miss Dawes, she always sat me on her knee and my head snuggled between her lovely breasts. [ I was an early starter]. When the war started she joined the WRNS I was heart broken.
I remember Mr Manfredi, the Ice Cream man, he came round every week with his donkey and cart with one barrel of ice cream and "rasberry vinegar". Then in 1940 he vanished, Mr Manfredi was Italian and he was interned in the Isle of Man for the duration, He came back after the war and started up again, His son has a huge ice cream factory now, he was amazed when I told him I remembered his Dad before the war.
I remember collecting bullets, shells and bomb cases, our back garden was full of them, In 1942 a German plane just missed our roof and went through the house opposite, killing the lady inside. Our gang first on the scene, in the back street, a pile of rubble and a dead German in the cockpit with flames licking around him. a wing had broken off, we were dragging it down the back street to take home, when the Police and Air Raid Wardens arrived and took it off us.
Happy Days
BrIan

[Kevin Mercer]

I remember my Uncle John on leave from the army about '43 making us a bogey with three pram wheels. We couldn't find four. He made holes for the axle pivot with a red hot poker from the coal fire in the living room . Filled the house with smoke till my Mum sent him outside.
It got nicked soon but since it was the only three wheel bogey in Accrington we soon spotted it outside another house and simply brought it back!
We lived near a local council dump and used to run behind the tipper lorries and hang off the back for a free ride to the tip. The trick was to get behind bfore the driver spotted you in his mirrors.
My Mum used to make us "volcanos" for our dinner.....Pom mashed potato formed into a cone,
a dimple in the top and ketchup poured in to dribble down the side....a volcano!

[John Gill]

We had a knocker- up called Liza who used a long pole to rattle the upstairs bedroom windows to wake us all up. No alarm clocks then. I often wondered who knocked Liza up to start work. Bonfire night brought out the worst in us. Not a gate or wooden fence was safe as we erected our fire. November 6th usually revealed a crater the size of the grand canyon which was swiftly filled in and resufaced by the 'Corpy'. Nobody hurt, nobody burnt, nobody arrested, some of the houses adjacent to our 'Bommy' did get a bit blackened, but along with the missing fencing etc all was made good in the fullness of time by our friends ' The Corpy.'
gilly

[Captain Kong]

I can remember spending Farthings, four to a penny, still have one or two, last time I spent farthings was in Wales at the Boys Brigade Camp in Rhyl, in 1945, a shop across the road sold small loaves, tuppence three farthings, We were always hungry and we eat them as is, no butter, if you had no farthings they were threepennies each.
I can remember going on a Charabanc on a day trip to Blackpool before the war, everyone singing all the way there and back , all for about two bob, that was our summer holiday for the year. Dad in the Mill only got one week a years` holiday. no pay for that, so the boss deducted a bob or two every week out of the wages and paid it as a holiday with pay, a bit bent that.
I can remember a lady in our street who acted as a `midwife` if someone was giving birth and also she laid out the neighbours who died, big hearted woman. Anything like that just knock on her door.
Cheers
Brian.