IT HAPPENED!

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 7.
By "REGGIE"

It was the occasion of the Annual Sports. The weather had been particularly unkind of late and can best be described as follows :

It rained and rained and rained and rained,
The average was well maintained,
And then, most curious thing of ail,
A gentle rain began to fall.
Next day, 'twas fairly dry,
Save for a deluge from the sky,
Which wetted people to the skin,
And after that the rain set in.
Folks wondered what they next would get,
Indeed they got a lot of wet.
But there will be a change again,
And we shall have a drop of rain.

Now, the mountain was the usual grandstand for the lads, as none of us had pocket money that would stretch to the 1/- admission. The grass was too wet to sit on so we hit on the idea of viewing the events from a large oak. " Why not build a big nest on that very big bough ? " said somebody. Yes, that would be splendid ! So we marshalled our labour and the least nimble climbers were sent off to gather fallen branches and large twigs ; also, ferns were to be uprooted and gathered into a pile at the base of this sturdy tree. Then the best climbers formed a chain, each handing up material to the lads in the upper branches. We were human crows building a gigantic crows nest. The shape of one mighty bough invited the making of a nest, as it was saucer-shaped. And so the busy workers got going lining the bough, first with large branches, then smaller branches, twigs and finally ferns—fresh green ones to give a soft seat. What energy was expended in those willing hands that made the work light! To think we had such a comfortable grand stand free of cost! The smell of bracken, the feeling of being nestled high over the shorter oaks, looking down on a sea of trees flanking the mountain-side. It resembled the rough houses of the natives in the teak forests—built on trees.

I beckoned to the next boy to join me in my ecstasy, and he, too, thought it was well worth the trouble. By this time the third lad had reached us, and the fourth. He too expressed the same opinion, then, CRACK ! ! I can almost hear that ' crack ' to-day. We swayed rapidly downwards. I had a feeling of lower branches suddenly brushing my face, then all went black. For how long the four of us lay on the wet grass, thirty-five feet below the nest, I know not. Some other boys had heard that ' crack ' a furlong away and had come running to see what was up (or what was down). When I came to, I imagined that I had been lying there for days. All sense of time was lost. I turned to see where my companions lay, and if they were intact, I had only seen chaps looking like that in the films. " Any bones gone ! " I shouted. Two responded about their bruises, a double lip and an egg on the skull, but number three was speechless, motionless. I remembered reading somewhere about the eyeball test, and having examined his eyes, I decided to get him carried home. As a short-cut, I crossed the railway lines and informed his sister. He took three days to recover consciousness.

As I said before, we lads loved the Welsh hills, these bracken-sided, wind-swept-topped hills. In the August holidays many happy days were spent on them. We made our own tents. They were made thus : a scooped out place was found or made, then stones and clods were gathered to make a wall. After that dead branches were laid across the wall, and then ferns piled on top till all was dark inside. Some of the more enterprising had an inner chamber for sleeping.

Having left home before the summer sun was too hot, we plodded to the chosen spot -usually by a stream - where we could drink and splash about. Enough sandwiches were taken to last the day, and we had a most enjoyable time, as good as the modern holiday camp, living on the nuts, berries and other good things the mountain naturally provided. The woody odour of the copse, the bleating of mountain sheep and the lapping of the streamlet added to our bliss. It was on the top of one of these mountains which I loved that I found adventure which ended up in a newspaper report.

The autumn morning had started gloriously. Streaks of red admixed with others of blue and amber on the southern sky as the sun mastered the heavens. It was too good a morning to stay indoors. I quickly decided on a walk across the mountain-top. My route came abruptly lo a halt at one point as there was a gaping crevice a few steps ahead. The working of the coal seams far be!ow had disturbed the stratum of the hills, causing a rip in the rocks. I lay down and crept to the edge, and there, a black abyss about three yards wide, seeming to be bottomless. I dropped a stone and the crashing and rumbling could be heard for half a minute. It must be very deep. I threw another and out of the blackness a face looked up at me. I was so scared I nearly fell over the edge. Then I could see it was the visage of a white-faced horse. It had fallen over during the night and came to rest on a ledge sixty feet down the crevice. When I had thrown down some hanks of grass for him to nibble in case he had been there several days I went down to the nearest village to break the news. It was afternoon before the police, the R.S.P.C.A. and the local council got to work with a crane and raised the poor animal out of his misery. Apart from scratches he was remarkably fit. The local news agencv was present and the report was in time to appear that evening.

February 1957

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 8.
By "REGGIE"

The old-time travelling fairs followed more or less a fixed pattern. The steam engine drew along the living vans, sleeping caravans and the vans which held the component parts of the various stalls and side-shows. What fascinated us boys next to the construction of the fair itself just after arrival, was the stationary engine which we imagined would need a rest after pulling all that heavy load, put to further good use generating electricity for the hundreds of pretty electric lamps throughout the fairground.

Let us take a look around the stalls. I am sure there were features which have died out with time. The candy stall was invariably set up at the entrance, with candies of multifarious shapes and tints, ginger snaps, crunchies and toffees. Pillows, walking-sticks, hoops and other faimiliar objects were faithfully depicted in sugar, their manufacture being carried out while you waited and watched. A corpulent lady, I remember, used to twist the rock, whilst it was still warm, around her arms like skeins of wool until it was the desired thickness. Next to this stall was the woman goal-keeper, not clad in footer togs at all, but the ordinary long skirts of those days. She had a horizontal bar through her stuffed body, on which she would swivel if hit by the ball. For a penny you were allowed three kicks. Those who kicked very hard would turn her backwards and bring her undies into view of the cheering spectators. The coconut stalls were much the same as we see to-day, with this exception; there were three balls a penny and many more coconuts before the competitor. It was a marvel how you could miss any.

Then there were the swinging boats. Not as those of to-day. They we're higher, I believe, and the boats so arranged that if you swung high enough the boat would go right over and down the other way, taking you nearly up to the top again. But I never saw anyone attempt it twice running. One young man was getting a good momentum packed into his swinging, and whilst he was upside down his watch swung out of his vest pocket on its golden chain and struck him in the face. He left the grip of the bar with one hand to put the watch back in his pocket, and, becoming confused, fell off on to the hoop-la, and was killed instantly. The man with the water squirters did good business among the flappers and swains. A tube similar to a toothpaste tube was filled with water for the boys and girls to squirt down each other's necks, and much milling and chasing through the crowds would be seen before the victim was reached. For a halfpenny one could refill the tube. This was put into a gadget and a lever pulled down and there it was—fat and full for more mischief! The boxing booth was the centre of attraction by the men, and the proprietor offered 5/- for anyone who could beat Dai Slasho, the champion of the fair. Night after night the crowds thronged to see amateur boxers dancing round this human punching ball trying to get a break, when suddenly, Wallop ! the aspirant to the 5/- prize would be horizontal and still. Young as I was at that time, I distinctly remember two youngsters employed in a miniature ring set up outside the booth to attract attention. They were having a bash at each other with very unscientific boxing. One evening a young man challenged Dai Slasho and the fight did not last very long. He got home some damaging punches swung from that tiny frame and Dai SIasho was on the boards much earlier than the promoter would have liked. A deafening roar went up as the young man's arm was raised. This youngster never looked back. He went from that booth to do greater things. He became World Flyweight Champion. His name was JIMMY WILDE.

World War I began about this time. There was no B.B.C. in those days, But we read the news in the local newspapers. The Kaiser soon became the subject of many ditties and the lads used to compete at drawing his caricature on walls and the school notebooks. We saw a flying machine for the first time during the early part of the war. Teachers and scholars alike rushed out to the school yard to get a glimpse of this wonder machine. How different from the last war when we all ran in at the sound or warning of one! The height and speed was different too. Then it could barely pass 60 miles per hour and flew low. But the first real excitement of the War came when German spies attempted to blow up the local power station. This was an important requisite of coal-getting as it supplied power to pits for miles around. The enemy knew all about it because they fitted it out with machinery only eight years previously. I thought that the story of German spies visiting our humble village was all a yarn, despite the affirmations we got from the boys that lived nearest it. All doubts were allayed when we saw an anti-aircraft gun emplaced near the entrance, A barracks was hastily built nearby and I often took my sister for a walk to see the stern-looking soldier in the sentry box. And to think that this electric " heart " of all colliery life here was saved by a gardener noticing footmarks in his allotment which joined hard on to the power station.

But we were soon to feel the pinch of war. White bread and butter disappeared altogether locally. We had black bread and cottonseed oil. Teacher read the progress on the Somme to us day by day, and our geography was linked with warfare from Flanders to the Dardanelles. More devastating than warfare, however, here in Wales was the epidemic of influenza which swept the country, accounting for more deaths than the battlefield.

March 1957


German WW1 sabotage plot against Tylorstown Power station thwarted by a local allotment holder

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 9.
By "REGGIE"

The time had come when I should start earning a living, and my first job was a telegraph boy at a shilling per day. This did not last long for my brother, who worked in a boot mart, had broken his arm, and I took his place. Apart from dusting the boots before hanging them outside the shop there seemed little work to do, My time in the mornings went with nursing the baby, who was the proprietor's daughter. Afternoons were spent trying to collect bad debts, at which I was mostly unsuccessful. This meant a lot of running up and down flights of steps, which told on my boot leather. Father found me a job in a small bakery at 15/- per week, which was good going at that time for a lad of 13. My day started at 8 a.m. and finished at 5, but Saturday was pay day then, with the colliers, so we were kept busy from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.

The weekday turn was tolerable, but Saturday was so exacting that, after arriving home, and taking a bath, mother found me fast asleep in the water. We first had to make the bread, then sell it. One holiday Saturday I was so tired delivering the last basket of bread to steeply terraced houses that I let it drop and the loaves all tumbled down the mountainside, and by the pale moonlight I searched for them in a thick bush of nettles, whither they had rolled. Was my face red! and my hands tingling!

My employer was an ex-miner, and the baker who taught him the trade was by this time working in the mines, and when business was brisk the boss would ask him to give a hand out as soon as he had finished his mining turn. I recall that there was a tea-fight on, and a big order of confectionery to get up. Richard was called in and got me to knock up the slab cakes. This was done in an ordinary hip bath. Being a cold day I was told to keep it near the oven to promote aeration. Some eight to ten pounds of butter were put in and Richard ran up the loft tor the sugar, but must have used the wrong bag. No one suspected anything wrong, although, my hands were quite sore after bashing the batter for 15 minutes without any signs of aeration. The eggs were added, then the colour and flour and it was passed to the "old man''-- Richard's father, to scale off into tins. Finishing this, and scraping tile bowl, he put the last blob in his mouth as usual. Forthwith he spat it out!, " Salt be jiggered!" he exclaimed. And salt it was! very salt! Then followed a scene (if intense activity as we all got to work to get rid of it adding water to the mixing so that it would pass down the sink!

Coal-getting was the main industry in this area at this time; things have altered somewhat these days. Most boys, having reached the age of fifteen. would think of entering mining. Two of my brothers were already in this industry, one of them an electrical engineer for the local colliery was in a position ro pull the wires in more senses than one. He arranged for me to visit the mine to see if I, like other lads, would like to work there.

At eleven o'clock on a Sunday night, cousin, brother and myself repaired to the pit head to get the lamp that was to light our way. The banksman, as the attendant is called, opened the cage. We entered warily. He bolted us in, and the buzzer sounded. Then the bottom of the cage fell out (or at least it seemed exactly as if it did) and down we were dropping at a frightening pace. Then suddenly we felt the bottom of the cage materialise and even press our feet so hard that we appeared to be going back up. Everybody agrees that this is the sensation of descending a mine for the first time. We arrived at the pit bottom, not with a crash as we expected, but very gently. The first person I saw was my own brother busy making a train of empty trams ready for the pony to take to a nearby working. The stables claimed our attention first—so very like above-ground stables with ponies that had just come off afternoon duty munching their chaff at the mangers. Some of theso horses, we were told, had been born underground and had never seen daylight. Many an accident has been prevented by these intelligent ponies. They stop dead in their tracks at the least sign of danger—a roof about to fall or a post fallen across the road; these things they see in complete darkness.

As we walked onward to the seams we collected small pieces of coal from the "walls" as souvenirs, then up a steep hill. Half-way up we heard the roar of a train of trains approaching and were instructed to run into the holes made in the wall made for refuge. This deafening journey of trams quickly vanished and in their place, going up the hill rapidly was another train of empties. So simple! So ingenious! the full load pulling up the empties.

At the "hilltop" we were issued with a bag of sweets by a miner who kept a sweet shop. This was a welcome break, as our throats were dry with the dust kicked up by passing trains. Next. the seams. The place we were shown was like an ordinary room of 9 ft- height. This was the thickest seam and the miners were just in the act of cleaning the floor of the levelling of the roof they had jusl accomplished. These three black walls of shining coal is as vivid a memory as that night. Nine feet of best fuel. Where would it end? In our home? Abroad? Perhaps King George V would have some for his palace.

Another long passage brought us to a door right across our path, behind which was a noise of roaring water. This was actually wind and it took some strength to open the door for us to visit the lower seams. The purpose of this door, so we were told. was to direct the ventilating current along its prescribed path. The low seam of coal, two feet nine inches to be correct, was not high enough to admit a tram, so that it became necessary to cut the tram track alongside the coal face and below its level so that the coal could be pushed right into the tramwhen cut, without having to lift it.

It all sounds easy on paper, but this is really hard work because the collier has to work lying down, lying on pointed juttings of rock and coal. I saw no automatic drill or conveyer belt, for there were none in those days. We came back by a different route and there was a place where there were tram rails on the ceiling. This was because it was deemed advisable to run a working right under the old passage. The most impressive sight in all the mine was a mine within a mine. The miniature pit head gear let down a cage for 30 feet or more to a lower seam beneath the level of the pit bottom.

April 1957




"I saw no automatic drill or conveyer belt, for there were none in those days." - unlike my school contempory Tony Gazzi!

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 10.
By "REGGIE"



People of all walks of life, with pans. shovels, much chatter and clatter worked till nightfall.


The 1926 Strike was in many ways a turning point in the South Wales Coal Field. Many families could not endure the hardships of the Strike and drifted away to the more prosperous areas. Those who stayed at home developed quite a different outlook on life after that time of privation. When their penury increased so did their activities. In no way were they dismayed by their plight. New allotments sprang up around the villages to fight the gradual hunger that crept over the valleys, and how these allotments were made in the first place is truly amazing. A two-perch piece that we recall was surrounded by a foot thick, six foot high wall, made entirely from the stones dug out of the virgin soil.

Such was the unyielding nature of the hillside—and such was the enterprise of the miner in making it yield. But those unable to toil so hard for their garden vegetables spent their time in more attractive pursuits. Community singing and jazz band contests became a craze that swept the valleys like a flood. The miners' wives got busy with what remnants of cloth they found in their homes making costumes which were at once works of art and realistic. The various streets had their own special jazz band. The chocolate coons, the Scots, the Irish, Ali Baba's forty thieves, the augusts, the bowler-hatted Jews and the Zulus to mention only a few that linger at the back of the mind. Each had their particular signature tune played on a kazoo. These bands tramped miles to distant towns to compete with other character hands. The Zulus were true to name down to the last detail—the spear. But for the grass skirt, they went nude, and walked barefoot for miles, parading the streets, sometimes over roads not worth the name. All these activities brought a ray of sunshine into lives where the outlook would have been grim indeed. Women rushed outdoors at ihe humming of the multitude of kazoos heard in the distance. The year was crowned with a gloriously dry and sunny summer which made the scope of these interests so much greater.

Other men were busy digging coa! from the outcrop seams almost at the top of the mountaiins. This coal burned with a green flame, was oily and very brittle in nature and was invaluable for banking up fires overnight. As far as he was able the miner applied the same principles and diligence to mining coal in the hills as he did underground. Coal trams knocked up from soap boxes and an old pram chassis did good service. Trees were felled to make pit props, and it was a treat to note the tidiness governing these amateur mining undertakings. Water seems to be the bugbear in all these "level" mines, but some overcame it bv digging channels at the side of all workings, and the water run off quite obediently, carrying much of the gas with it. The coal, packed in sacks, sold readily to shopkeepers, teachers and others not directly affected by the strike, at a shilling per sack (approximately a hundred-weight).

This coal found its way into our bakery, for coke was at a premium. We had more business, as the soup-kitchens were organised by the council, and we made all the sandwich bread for them. We also dealt with the savory joints of meat that were cooked weekends, ready for the Sunday dinner, so that the air in the bakery underwent constant change from a smell of public baking to spilt fat on the oven floor.

At the pits it was usual in a lockout for only safety men to work, but we remember the case of a blackleg who was escorted by the police to and from the pithead. He lived in the next village, and once the police saw him on to a tram-car they withdrew. One day a crowd of objectors waited at a place where the council lorry had tipped a ton of stones for road repair, and when the tramcar passed, pelted the miner through the glass windows. While the police put their thinking caps on the tram went in dock for repair. This necessitated reinforcements, and a posse of cops took him home next day, but when home he was visited by another crowd of stone-throwers who put all his front windows in bad repair. These, boarded up next day, emboldened our blackleg to yet venture to work. I am unable to say who won in this contest but this one man made history as I recall, it was the only case in this area when police from another county had to be recruited. The Dorsets were much shorter than the Welsh Police and one had a strange feeling that they were not as authoritative by reason of their stature, but they certainly were not required as there was no further horse play.

Although, as we said, the miner worked hard in the "level" pits coal-getting, nothing like enough coal to go round was obtained, and the women started scratching and digging over the shale heaps for odd nuts of coal that had gone unnoticed for years. After a few davs of this, the tip looked like a boisterous sea, and the tops of people's heads could be seen down the bottom of these "waves." Someone chanced to find a good place for these odd nuts at the edge of the local football field, which the reader has read in previous chapters was made bv levelling off a shale heap. By noon half the field was dug up, and the photograph taken at the time shows women in basin hats which were all the rage at that time, with pans, boxes, buckets, and what have you, working with the kiddies, all feverishly trying to get as much as possible before dinner. Only an eye-witness would believe the tons of coal that were found on this site. Our street, which ran right alongside was agog with people of all walks of life, with pans. shovels, much chatter and clatter, and, by nightfall I suppose all available coal had been collected.

May 1957

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 11.
By "REGGIE"


Possibly one of the biggest surprises ever thrust upon the British public was clothes rationing. We had got used to shortages in food, and if one knew the grocer's assistant there was usually something under the counter to be popped into the shopping bag when no-one was looking. What with little bits of cheese which could be gobbled up at once, intended to last the week, and small cuts of meat for the whole family which could be consumed readily by one person, we were beginning to "take it". But when clothing coupons were issued it was a shock and surprise to all of us. It was a carefully guarded secret by Whitehall, and the day that it started found "Reggie" in the nearby market town looking at a pair of shoes at the same time as the bewildered shop assistant was looking at a sheet of paper issued to him that morning which was supposed to be his guide as to the wav that rationing worked, but nobody in the market seemed clear on the directions. There was a biscuit queue outside. No food points had yet been issued for flour-made goods, and there was a quarter pound of biscuits for all who could wait. I was always patient enough in a queue but there was something I could never tolerate—someone cheating the queue. It used to mike me boil, and I believe the worst culprits were women. On this occasion it was a man. He had adopted the usual method of coming along to speak to someone he knew in the queue—who happened to be the person right in front of me. As the front of the procession grew less he slipped into place and I left him there till it came to nearing the counter, when, with a dexterous piece of footwork and a lurch of the body he was placed just outside the queue without a word spoken, and with no place to re-enter he had to retreat to the very end for his biscuits. Not long after this I was in a bus queue to get to the bakery where I worked, some four miles away. I was first in the queue, and the second person who came along began to dilate upon the degeneration of etiquette and particularly the way in which people cheat the queues and jostle to get on. By the time she had finished her dissertation a dozen people had tailed behind. Whereupon, the bus pulled up, not exactly at the stop, so that the end of the queue boarded first, and the bus was full to the door. The lady who had been preaching about morals got on, wished me " Good evening " and left me standing at the bus stop—for the next bus!

All these things we bakers took in our stride, but I believe there was one thing that really got us. It was the blackout. We could manage in a freeze-up when alighting from the bus on to a patch of ice with a sore elbow and broken vacuum flask, but imagine a blacked-out bakery on a hot July night with thunder in the air and you have bakery conditions at their very worst. Dry heat I could stand with the next man—the stoking of a row of white-hot furnaces, one after another until one looked like a red Indian. But the steamy atmosphere of the draw-plate area, the shimmering heat when the blackout cloths and boards went up accounted for more ill health and deaths among bakers than trying to do some overwork on rations of semi-starvation forced upon us. I remember one summer's night putting my cheese ration on top of the slices of bread in my "tommy-box" as the familiar lunch tin is called in this district, only to find when break time arrived that it had melted and run down among the slices. We all looked forward to dawn in mid-summer when the black-out could be taken down from the windows as early as four o'clock, and the cool, balmy morning air allowed to enter when we had our last batch safely in the proving chambers.

V.J. Day was celebrated here in a special sense by us bakers. Ended was the reign of continual perspiration ! How sweet was the anticipation of the things we thought would shortly come back! The half-crown Sunday steak. The butchers who stood outside their shops on a Saturday night almost giving their meat away, and no messy coupons and food points to bewilder the already harassed housewife. Little did we imagine how many years would pass over our heads before even rationing ended. Much less did we think that the next shock was bread rationing, "The worst news since the war " as Sir Winston called it. But to get back to V.J. Day with its new-found bliss. How we danced that night in the streets, lit up by home-made lanterns. I do not remember whether candles were on ration but they were very much in evidence that night. We made sure that every window had some light remanating from it, and on each bedroom windowsill were rows of gaily coloured jam jars of blue, red, green, with a candle in each, making a very impressive sight, lighting up the erstwhile dingy, coal-grimed streets, shedding a ray of promise and new hope. The most horrible war of all time was over!

June 1957

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 12.
By "REGGIE"

During World War II, men were short. That was a general complaint. If other trades were short of men, the baking trade had reasons to be so. The wages rate was 1/3 per hour with a chance of working 70 hours per week if you were keen on earning a living.

In the plant bakery where I worked there were eight of us on the night shift, and I was the only tradesman, and, of course, in charge. The eighth man had been enlisted to replace the doughmaker who had just left for a more remunerative job. This presented a problem for the bakery manager. For the time being I was mixing the doughs and getting the boys to work off the doughs as they became ready. But this was not a practical proposition, as I could not be everywhere at once. The manager accordingly recommended that every man should be taught the way to make a dough, and the reader can imagine what this entailed when none of these men were bakers—some painters, miners, masons who had changed to bakery work "for the duration." We had a two-sack mixer and a 32 gallon tank. Ron was put on this job and did it well for a week. He shone at this work, as it was not as boring as standing by the table all night. Taking every care to see that all ingredients were in before starting up, he could be trusted to carry out his job alone. I should tell you that this mixer occupied 32 square yards of flooring space; a good machine, but very much out of date—a tip-out drum, which revolved as the arm dipped. It was so high that a stool was needed for all men under six foot to even see inside the lid. Needless to say the manager was so pleased with Ron's progress that he was anxious to put all the men on doughmaking in their turn. There were a few tight doughs, a few slack ones and a few unmixed ones before most of the boys shaped up, because these doughs had to be made at four per hour, that is, eight sacks per hour, all ready for the day shift to bake off at eight sacks per hour. Tommy, a miner who had left at the first signs of that dreaded collier's disease was a very willing man. He, too, was put on this doughmaking job. He had got seven of them mixed as perfectly as anyone would, but when running in the water for the next piece he thought of the wonderful idea of leaving the tank to fill up again ready for the following piece. By the time he had gone up the loft and let down his four bags of flour and returned to see how full his tank was he had time to realise that the tank could not fill since all the water was running out into the machine.

He came tearing along to me where I was busy at the divider and shouted "Reggie, the machine is full of water!" And so it was! It looked like a huge bowl of porridge. We tipped another bag of flour into it with salt to match and it seemed to make little difference. It could hold no more. There must have been enough water for three sacks. There was nothing else for it but to get it out. How this was to be done was a major problem because this machine being the tip-out type would throw this sort of dough like a huge wave over the floor.

We got two two-sack troughs alongside, and undid the catch. It forced my hand away rudely and I had to step back quickly before I was deluged. It shot into both troughs, and very little spilt on the floor. The two troughs were wheeled aside to await instructions from the manager when he came, who proved very sympathetic over this costly mistake. But Tommy paid dearly for his folly. I can see him now, working long after the night shift had gone home, assisting the day doughmaker to add two buckets of this slop to each piece. He looked a pathetic figure with slop all down his front, on and under his shoes, the stool plastered with it, and the bucket handle all slithery. He never attempted to try any more unorthodox ideas.

No doubt many of my readers can recount similar experiences. What characters one meets with in the bakery! How the tie of the trade keeps men working together who would be at loggerheads! What tradesmen are more zealous of their craft; What other men work day in day out—a humdrum existence, just to see that their fellow men get a good loaf to eat, and a fresh one at that? I have worked with men who had a grudge, but a mistake they made never came to official ears, and the breach was healed. I am thinking of Sammy, back in the days when I was attending evening classes, and the Boss arranged for this lad to make a dough ready for me when I came back from school on my pushbike after 40 miles pedalling—all ready to work off the dough he had made. A second dough was usually churning away when I rode in.

This particular night he had forgotten the clip. The machine had taken in both bags of flour, then, with this extra exertion, had tipped forward over the floor which was spotlessly clean, having been hand scrubbed that afternoon. This was ten minutes before the Boss used to come in with the orders. We got it all back in the machine, the floor cleaned up, finishing the job the very instant the master came in. Nothing looked suspicious, except ourselves who were wringing wet with perspiration. But that cemented our friendship. He had his bacon saved by prompt action.

July 1957

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 13.
By "REGGIE"

No doubt many of my readers can relate incidents that have happened at some time or other in cycling. There is no medium quite like the cycle for getting a close view of either town or country. It takes you (and sometimes you take it) to scenes off the beaten track away from petrol fumes—and petrol-drivers' fumings !

From the bus window one sees people or views or incidents on one side of the road but on a bicycle you are a personality in and among people and views and incidents, and when you are going through our beautiful countryside you are never lonesome. You might set out alone, but soon you meet up with someone going your way for so many miles, turning off down some lane or other, leaving you, but not for long, alone, as you soon get another "cheerio" and a chat that eats holes out of the tedium of the journey. I started with cycling the wrong way. I was about 18 and had my first bicycle on the instalment system. A friend of mine contemplated buying a new bike, and offered his old one for a few shillings down and a shilling per week (my entire pocket-money) until paid for. I was told about the happy hours one could spend away from the coal dust down in the pleasant country and I was enticed. After all, I couldn't go wrong, he was willing to teach me in the evenings, and the local football field was at our disposal with its heaps of horse manure that the colliery stableman had had tipped there, as it was the nearest place to tip it. It had dried well and formed a good padding for my falls off the bike. And the steering around the various heaps was tantamount to turning sharp bends in roads. Three or four days of this training, and I considered myself to have passed my driving test. Sunday morning was chosen for a start- on the main road, as there was no traffic (in those days) and the weather was in my favour. Within minutes I was descending my first hill, where I could practise using the brake. Whilst doing so I shuddered to behold both brake blocks fall off into the road. The bike leapt forward, and I leaped upward. I did not fancy keeping on that racing steed down that hill. I was unhurt but when I picked up the cycle I could see that I could ride it no more. The chain fork was broken. This was serious, the very frame, the most important part gone, and I was doomed to give up my pocket money each week, for the rest of the sunny season, and no hope of ever reaching that much-talked-of countryside. But if I had broken my bike I hadn't broken my back, and I had at least learned how to jump off a cycle whilst in motion—a trick that has saved my life more than once. The rest of that summer will be remembered for my remorse. After leaving the bakehouse each Saturday with my pay which was handed over neat to mother, I next set off to pay the instalment, often waiting a few minutes at my friend's home to see him " romp home " on a glittering new bike from his jaunt in the country. Had the weather been rainy it would not have been taken so badly, but we had a tantalizingly sunny summer. To make sure that the frame of my second bike was sound bought the frame first, then added parts until I had built up the entire mount. Our editor has no room for all the escapades I could write about on that bike, but two will have to suffice.

I was being followed by a fast car and in front of me was a stationary lorry serving the shop. I was on a foot-wide tramway cobbling with rails each side. The car did not slow down to enable me to round the lorry so the bike went smack under it and myself "flew through the air with the greatest of ease" and landed on some sacks of potatoes in the front of the wholesalers' lorry. Coming out of the shop and seeing me on the sacks, the salesman shouted "What yer doing up there?" "Cycling, I am,—or was!" I retorted," where's my bike? "We tugged hard to get it from under the chassis, but it was none the worse, save for a rumpled cross bar.

Later in life I was on a visit to my sister in Cheltenham, and read in their local paper that some "point of lay" pullets were for sale on a farm some miles out in the Cotswolds. I must get those birds, just the breed I wanted. Borrowing her bicycle I set out next morning for this out-of-the-way farm. I eventually reached same by a tortuous route and having seen the fowls, paid a deposit and arranged for their rail transit to Wales. Getting back to the main road was easy enough, in fact, I do not remember much about it as my mind was full of egg baskets and happy hobby days with those hens. Some premonition told me that I ought to make sure that the return tickets from Cheltenham to Wales were still safely in my pocket, seeing that that pocket had contained my wallet from which I had paid for the birds. I searched in vain. There was only one thing to do—go back and see if I had left them there. Now when I had left the farm in the first place the field in front of the farmhouse was empty, but now I could see there were about twenty bulls in it, and most of them near the gate. I am not averse to one or two cows, but bulls do give me a shiver. I must reach the farm, and there were these bulls. I was resolved! I must dash past somehow. I opened the gate, mounted the bike and charged for the first bull. He politely moved aside, and away I dashed up the track, but noticed in the corner of my eye that all the others had decided to give chase. Did I perspire ? Did I pedal fast, I can hear those hooves thundering behind me to-day, getting closer and closer. The field ended with a rise of several feet and I was hard put to, trying to press upon the pedals, but to my relief only one or two were pursuing. These too dropped away, and I got off the bike, exhausted.

Arriving at the farm I told the farmer about the incident and he merely laughed and exclaimed, "Them thar bulls be harmless, you can stroke them!" Well, there it was, that ticket, on the table where it had dropped an hour earlier.

August 1957




I was resolved! I must dash past somehow

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 14.
By "REGGIE"



We wonder whether initiative was weakened when the games which were handed down from one generation of children to another were almost suddenly discontinued and the school teachers took over. Children now were taught new games suitable for the school yard. When I was at school there was no time set apart for P.T. Playtime was playtime, when each child chose what games he and his friend wanted to play. The games which were played in the streets in my early days are not even mentioned nowadays let alone played and enjoyed.

Pigeon Walk was one of these. What connection this had with pigeons I was always at a loss to fathom. About ten boys with caps in hand stood with feet astride in a row, one behind another, and the last boy got down on hands and knees and quickly crawled through this arcade of legs as fast as he could, for the caps were in hand to whack the hind quarters of the "pigeon." Speed was essential—the sooner you got through, the less wallops you got!

Then there was Cutter. This was leap frog of a special sort. Only one boy bent forward with hands rigidly fixed to his knees; the other half a dozen lads who jumped over his back marked their individual effort by a cut in the road with the tip of the boot. (No boys wore shoes then). A few yards start was necessary for this flying leap and so mighty an impact came on the back of this human vaulting-horse that he must perforce brace himself or he would be bowled over. The contestants would strain to add an inch or two to the mark of the previous "cutter."

Something similar to this was What's In The Grocer's Shop? Lots were cast to find who was
"on it" then he would bend over similar to the previous game, but it was his brain rather than
his dorsal muscles that was to be used this time. He must listen carefully to all the boys who
jumped over his back, as they enumerated the various articles sold in the grocer's. If he heard
a boy chant "Hobnails," or "flatfish," it was obvious that this boy was in error, and therefore "out." But he must also listen for repetitions of the same article, which also disqualified the
"frog."

Jack Cross The Water was another favourite. The roadway was supposed to represent the river and the pavements each side were the banks. The master of the game was called Jack
who mustered a group of children on the opposite bank. They all yell together, "Jack, Jack,
shall I cross the water?" "Yes, today, but not tomorrow," shouted Jack. They call again but Jack refuses and the children rush to attain the opposite bank. Jack has to catch one, while he or she is still in the roadway or "river," and if he succeeds, the captured child becomes "Jack."

Next The Airship Game. An airship model was made from a ribbon of paper gummed or fastened after looping it. In the loop a small stone was inserted and both flung high into the air. Airship and stone kept together until the limit of momentum was reached, when the stone usually fell out and the craft spun round prettily till it reached the ground, but often got caught up anew with a gust of wind. Airships were jettisoned together and the competitor whose paper remained in the air longest won.

I have never laughed more than when playing Cap Touch. Three or four boys are enough to play this game to get the best out of it. Once you are hit by a flying cap you are "on it" and must not only run but dexterously throw your own cap so that it does not fail to strike your opponent. But the cap that struck you fell to the ground and the boy must retrieve it without being " touched " by you. This causes a breathless spate and excitement and the humorous situations in which one finds oneself makes for laughter, and, of course, more breathlessness.

All such games on the streets are now forbidden, and rightly so, as we live in a different world. A world of rushing to and fro—a world in which everyone strains to finish his work more quickly than his father did. And if the question be asked "What for?" we get very unsatisfactory answers.

Excuse this bit of philosophy, but we remember the first car that came to our valley. It was bought by a doctor and it disturbed us children in our street games, but not on account of its speed! We could run faster! It was the chug chug of the engine that tickled us and more so when the doctor was on all fours attending to something that had unstuck under the chassis. Then the bonnet was hinged to one side and the surplus vapour attended to. It seemed to cure after Mrs. Lloyd came out with a jug of water and gave it a drink. The second motor vehicle was an Express Delivery as it said on the side of its body. An enterprising grocer had this for the delivery of the weekend foodstuffs. Express ? Well, yes, when it went! but this one too often broke down, and the errand boy who sat next the driver got out and delivered the goods by hand as heretofore.

September 1957

Airships were cool! They became the subject of playground games.

[JohnPitt]

Both photos in ch 8 and ch 10 show the isolated explosives hut for the Colliery dynamite

[JohnPitt]

IT HAPPENED Chapter 15.
By "REGGIE"


My aunt lived in the heart of the country; we lived in close reach of the sea, and it was only natural when she came on holiday to want to sit beside the seaside. It was fair weather when we set out but when we reached the beach it had started to drizzle. It was one of those backward beaches which have all the natural material for a popular resort, but a slow local council.

It was early afternoon when we arrived and the people on the little area of the beach itself set apart for a small fairground, had got busy erecting the little stalls and amusements which they did daily when it was fine and they could reasonably expect visitors. The last structure to be set up was the tiny tots' roundabout— hand-propelled. Four men were detailed to fix it up, and the parts had been brought by lorry and dumped on the sand. They got the platform all fixed except one part, which refused to fit, no matter how they tried to adjust it.

They decided to pull it all down and start afresh. Starting with a different component this time they got on well until they tried fixing the last portion, which again refused to go into place. They unfastened the whole contraption and started again from scratch. And scratch they did ! The more they swapped parts the more puzzled they looked, and my jolly aunt, who weighed some 18 stone was beginning to rock with laughter. This time I believe they fixed up the platform perfectly but when they started to assemble the parts for the top they were in difficulties again. Time was going, and by this time they should have been taking money, but they had to unbolt the whole of the platform to try to get it straight for fixing the top. They set it up again and failed so the foreman sent for the boss, who arrived amazed and angry, to find all the parts lying on the sand just as he had left them. Looking in another direction for shame's sake, my jolly aunt was in convulsions of laughter. How an incident like this will stand out in the memory. What was to all appearances to be a dull afternoon was spent first in smiles, then titterings, then uproarious laughter with a crowd gathering to find out what it was all about. Of course, the boss got the thing swinging round in minutes, and taking money in fares. Was this a trade trick to gather the people around? Who knows?

I have already provided two hours of reading, describing incidents that actually happened, but cannot conclude without this one.

I had just come off night shift, and had had little sleep the day before. We had to catch the 7.30 to Liverpool, through which I would travel to Southport, taking my daughter for convalescence. November was bright that year and we enjoyed a good view of British countryside all the way to Crewe where we were to change. Considering I had not slept since the day before I felt very wakeful and bright, but at Runcorn, sleep got the better of me and I had a half-hour nap before those grimy railway walls of Liverpool came into view. We arrived at Southport just after 4 p.m. and the hostess at the Home provided tea for me before returning. As I returned on the electric railway to Exchange Station I thought about my brother living at Stockport. Why not visit him before getting back to Wales? I could still get across to Crewe and my return ticket could come into play at that point.

So it was a single ticket I took from Lime Street, and was told that the express was due to leave, and if I change at Manchester I could have the evening at Stockport. Settling myself in the train, I thought of the things I would tell my brother, and see his sons whom I had not seen for years. "Is this Manchester?"
I enquired when I drew in to a large station. "No," came the reply, "not yet." Again settling myself I fell asleep. When I awoke I felt refreshed; the night-shift headache had gone, and the train was moving out of a station. I could see a name engraved on a seat. It read "Huddersfield" I WAS awake now, and brushing up my geography quickly I realised I was in Yorkshire! The passengers from my compartment had gone. I rushed into the next, where only one man sat. and I asked if I was dreaming or had we passed Huddersfield. He assured me we had, and were heading for Leeds. He advised me to have a word with the guard. The guard was sympathetic, and advised me to get off (for we were already in Leeds) and stay on the same platform where in half an hour I could get a train for Wales, as it was now 9.10 and no hope of any evening in Stockport. I had been asleep two hours in a train doing 60 miles per hour and was about 100 miles out of my way. But the Yorkshire hospitality of which I had read, came into being right away. The guard came over to me with tea from his own can.

October 1957

1930's beach ride