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Thursday 29 May 2014


Web Page 2056

31st May 2014


Top Picture:  School Plimsolls

Bottom Picture: Reckitts Blue Bag


I have to thank Steve Timms for this weeks observations.

I have to say how true are these…..

My mum used to cut up chicken and other raw meat, chop eggs and spread butter on bread on the same cutting board with the same knife and she used no bleach or hygienic wipes or sprays, but we didn't seem to get food poisoning or even an upset tummy!

Our school sandwiches were always wrapped in wax paper or an old bread bag and then put into a brown paper bag, not neatly packed in ice pack coolers or fancy themed lunch boxes as they are today, but we didn't seem to get food poisoning or even an upset tummy!

All babies’ nappies were soaked in a bucket of water under the kitchen sink overnight. Come the following day the water looked terrible but we didn't seem to get food poisoning or even an upset tummy!

Almost all of us would have rather gone swimming in the creek or at the beach instead of a pristine, regulated pool (talk about boring), no beach closures then but we didn't seem to get food poisoning or even an upset tummy!

We all took PE ......... and risked permanent injury with a pair of Dunlop sandshoes or plimsoll’s instead of having cross-training athletic shoes with air cushion soles and built in light reflectors that cost as much as a small car.  I can't recall any injuries but they must have happened because they tell us how much safer we are now. If we were really smart we had slip on plimsolls so we did not have to tie our laces, but we could tie our laces today’s kids can’t even do that!

We got the cane for doing something wrong at school, they used to call it discipline yet we all grew up to accept the rules and to honour and respect those folk who were older than us.

We had 40+ kids in our class and we all learned to read and write, do maths and spell almost all the words needed to write a grammatically correct letter......., FUNNY THAT!!

We all went to morning assembly (unless those who were exempt) said prayers in school and sang hymns and staying in detention after school caught all sorts of negative attention. 

We were taught that we were supposed to accomplish something before we were allowed to be proud of ourselves. 

I just can't recall how bored we were without computers, Play Station, Nintendo, X-box or 270 digital TV cable stations. We really weren't!!

Oh yeah .... and where was the Benadryl and sterilisation kit when I got that bee sting?  I could have been killed! All we had was a damp Reckitts ‘Bluebag’!

We played “British Bulldog” on piles of gravel left on vacant construction sites and when we got hurt, mum pulled out the 2/6p bottle of Mercurochrome (kids liked it better because it didn't sting like iodine did) and then we got our bum spanked.
Now it's a trip to the emergency room, followed by a 10 day dose of antibiotics and then mum calls the lawyer to sue the contractor for leaving a horribly vicious pile of gravel where it was such a threat.

The medical plasters (Elastoplast) in our day were plain pink canvas or Sleek waterproof, ours did not have cartoon characters or colourful slogans printed on them.

To top it off, not a single person I knew had ever been told that they were from a dysfunctional family. How could we possibly have known that?

We never needed to get into group therapy and/or anger management classes. We were obviously so duped by so many social ills, that we didn't even notice that the entire country wasn't taking Prozac or something similar! 

How did we ever survive? 


LOVE TO ALL OF US WHO SHARED THIS ERA.
AND TO ALL WHO DIDN'T, SORRY FOR WHAT YOU MISSED. I WOULDN'T TRADE IT FOR ANYTHING! WOULD YOU.

Stay in touch

Peter
DUSTYKEAT@aol.com

You Write:

Chris Writes: 
 
When I lived in Drayton my dad was in the police force and I can remember him on 'point duty' directing the traffic at what was them a main crossroad/junction at The George, top of Upper Drayton Lane.




News and Views:

70 year-old Mick Jagger has become a great-grandfather for the first time. His granddaughter, Assisi (by way of Bianca and Jade) gave birth over the weekend to an as yet unnamed baby girl.



On this Day 31st May 1960-1965

On 31/05/1960 the number one single was Cathy's Clown - Everly Brothers and the number one album was South Pacific Soundtrack. The top rated TV show was Wagon Train (ITV) and the box office smash was Psycho. A pound of today's money was worth £13.68 and Burnley were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 31/05/1961 the number one single was You're Driving Me Crazy - The Temperance Seven and the number one album was GI Blues - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Bootsie & Snudge (Granada) and the box office smash was One Hundred and One Dalmations. A pound of today's money was worth £13.25 and Tottenham Hotspur were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 31/05/1962 the number one single was Good Luck Charm - Elvis Presley and the number one album was Blue Hawaii - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Lawrence of Arabia. A pound of today's money was worth £12.89 and Ipswich Town were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions. The big news story of the day was Panic on Wall Street.

On 31/05/1963 the number one single was From Me To You - The Beatles and the number one album was Please Please Me - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Conservative Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was The Great Escape. A pound of today's money was worth £12.64 and Everton were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 31/05/1964 the number one single was Juliet - Four Pennies and the number one album was Rolling Stones - The Rolling Stones. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Dr Strangelove. A pound of today's money was worth £12.24 and Liverpool were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 31/05/1965 the number one single was Where Are You Now (My Love) - Jackie Trent and the number one album was Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was The Sound of Music. A pound of today's money was worth £11.69 and Manchester United were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.




Tuesday 20 May 2014

Web Page 2054

24th May 2014


Top Picture:  Cardew Robinson in a still from Fun at St. Fanny’s



Bottom Picture: Remember reading very old copies of Radio Fun in the classroom on wet days?



Cardew the Cad

Douglas Robinson was best known for his characterisation of 'Cardew the Cad of the School'. Dressed in a striped school cap with a long scarf draped about his thin neck, this tall, bony bodied man with prominent teeth, once described as 'a double row of tombstones hanging out to dry', was a familiar figure during the last legs of the variety theatre and the early days of black & white television. So popular was his schoolboy persona that he adopted his fictional name, becoming Cardew Robinson for professional purposes from the Fifties.

He was born in Goodmayes, Essex, in 1917 and appeared in many of the Harrow County School concerts as a boy. Already six feet tall and as skinny as a rake, his appearance alone was enough to win the laughs. His ambition to become a writer led him to a local newspaper job, but hardly had he learned to type when the paper closed down. 

Remembering the fun of performing before his schoolmates, he bought a copy of the Stage, price at 2d. and immediately spotted an advertisement placed by Joe Boganny who needed recruits for his touring team of Crazy College Boys. One look at the long, lean lad with the protruding teeth was enough he was signed up on the spot.Boganny's Crazy College was a sort of downmarket Will Hay team. It consisted of Boganny and his dog, whose sole purpose was to walk across the stage with a false dog's head tied to its backside  The human part of the act was Robinson, two other boys, and two dwarfs. He took over from a small boy and was given the original cut-down costume to wear. 'That will look very funny on you, so you can be the comic,' said Boganny. And he was. He was given one line.  

In May 1934 he and the Crazy Collegians opened at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, dashed over to the Balham Hippodrome for two more houses, and rushed back to Hammersmith for the second house where they played to packed houses. Following an unsavoury episode when the College Boys escaped out of a boarding- house window to do a moonlight flit at the end of a hard week in Swansea, he decided the theatre' was more suitable a career. 

Enlisting with a touring repertory company, he followed a part in Peter Pan with perhaps his most macabre moment in his career, as the monster in Frankenstein. Then came the Second World War.Joining the RAF in 1939, AC2 Douglas Robinson found himself stationed at Uxbridge, where he quickly found a place in the camp shows. It was in 1941 that Squadron Leader Ralph Reader who had formed the pre-war Boy Scout Gang Shows and now organised the RAF Gang Shows, arrived at RAF Uxbridge to put on a performance. Robinson seized his chance, did a working audition, and soon found himself posted to RAF Gang Show Unit Number Five. 

His pre-war experience now came in handy, and he was promoted to Flight-Sergeant and put in charge of the unit. They played at RAF camps all over the country, and when the 'second front' was opened up in Normandy, Unit 5 followed, eventually touring through Belgium and Holland giving entertainments on the tail-flap of their lorry. A tour of the Far East followed, including a sudden detour when the first atomic bomb was dropped on Japan.

After demob, he continued his association with Ralph Reader, starring in a variety tour of the RAF Gang Show. Given the chance to perform a solo act as a stand-up comic, he developed an idea he had first tried out in 1942. This was 'Cardew the Cad of the School', inspired by his own boyhood reading of the weekly magzine the Gem. This featured tales of St Jim's school he had always enjoyed the caddish capers of Ralph Reckness Cardew, the schoolboy who was suave and slightly sinister, first as a rhyming monologue, then as a comedy act, eventually as a radio personality, the character began to take over his life. 

Listeners to the BBC's Variety Bandbox responded with delight and he became the programme's resident comedian for a while, reading out a weekly bulletin of school reports: 'Here is the news from St Fanny's and this is Cardew the Cad reading it]' In 1954 he formally changed his name from Douglas to Cardew, and established his catchphrase, 'This is Cardew the Cad saying Car-dew do'. 

He had entered films as early as 1938, when he appeared in a short in the series Ghost Tales. He resumed his film career in 1948 in a slightly longer cheapie entitled A Piece of Cake, starring Cyril Fletcher. He would continue in films for the rest of his working life, appearing in more than 50 parts, medium-sized, small and smaller, but never larger than the one film in which he starred. This was Fun at St Fanny's (1955), with a cast of comedians of every shape and size, from the Fred Emney to the diminutive Davy Kaye, plus the veteran Claude Hulbert, incomprehensible Stanley Unwin, bumbling Peter Butterworth and plump Gerald Campion, television's Billy Bunter. Young Ronnie Corbett played a schoolboy.

The film, still unshown on British television, was recently revived at the Museum of London, where Cardew Robinson himself emerged to introduce his one and only starring epic. The packed audience loved him, and also the film which, incidentally, was based on the comic strip which began in Radio Fun in 1949.

His longest stage stint was as King Pellinore in the Drury Lane production of Camelot - he appeared in all 650 performances - and in more recent times he was well received as an after-dinner speaker. His early hopes to become a writer were eventually realised, and, apart from comedy scripts for himself and fellow artistes including Dick Emery and Peter Sellers, he wrote a book, How to Be a Failure.

He also devised the radio game show You've Got to Be Joking, and guested on many television panels including Call My Bluff, Looks Familiar and Quick on the Draw.

Stay in touch

Peter

DUSTYKEAT@aol.com


You Write:

Jonathon writes:

One of my vivid memories from the late 50's early 60's was listening to the Radio production of "Journey into space" starring amongst others Alfie Bass as Lennie. I was transported by the sounds of airlocks closing and rockets firing up and could imagine just what it was like to travel on a space ship to Mars. I have the full set of CD's from the BBC and have listened to them recently........very simple stories now but still magic.




News and Views:

On this Day 24th May 1960-1965

On 24/05/1960 the number one single was Cathy's Clown - Everly Brothers and the number one album was South Pacific Soundtrack. The top rated TV show was Wagon Train (ITV) and the box office smash was Psycho. A pound of today's money was worth £13.68 and Burnley were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions. The big news story of the day was Stirling Moss wins Monaco Grand Prix.

On 24/05/1961 the number one single was You're Driving Me Crazy - The Temperance Seven and the number one album was GI Blues - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Bootsie & Snudge (Granada) and the box office smash was One Hundred and One Dalmations. A pound of today's money was worth £13.25 and Tottenham Hotspur were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 24/05/1962 the number one single was Good Luck Charm - Elvis Presley and the number one album was Blue Hawaii - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Lawrence of Arabia. A pound of today's money was worth £12.89 and Ipswich Town were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 24/05/1963 the number one single was From Me To You - The Beatles and the number one album was Please Please Me - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Conservative Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was The Great Escape. A pound of today's money was worth £12.64 and Everton were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions. The big news story of the week was Manchester Utd win FA Cup.

On 24/05/1964 the number one single was Juliet - Four Pennies and the number one album was Rolling Stones - The Rolling Stones. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Dr Strangelove. A pound of today's money was worth £12.24 and Liverpool were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.


On 24/05/1965 the number one single was Where Are You Now (My Love) - Jackie Trent and the number one album was Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was The Sound of Music. A pound of today's money was worth £11.69 and Manchester United were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.The big news story of the week was Muhammed Ali floors Sonny Liston.

Wednesday 14 May 2014

Web Page 2052

17 th May 2014


Top Picture:  Put a Tiger in your tank





Bottom Picture: Whatever happened to Pepsodent?




The Advertising Age


We are all of the advertising generation; it is during our lifetime that the advertising of products and services has really taken off. I expect that many of you remember the advertising posters and hoarding that were displayed along our highways and byways; and the illuminated signs and displays in Piccadilly Circus are legendry as were the adverts on Radio Luxemburg. But it was the advent of commercial television that really brought mass advertising into our own homes. Most of us know, or even remember, the first TV advert that was the ‘Tingling fresh, fresh as ice’ Gibbs SR toothpaste featuring a tube of toothpaste in a block of ice.

We are a nation of animal lovers so they say which is probably why so how many television adverts feature animals; here are a few that I am sure you will remember. Fox’s Glacier Mints. For many years featured a Polar Bearand a fox to promote their sweets which are ‘cool and clear and minty’. Animals and birds from the cold areas of the world seem to be popular. Apart from the Polar Bear we all must remember that McVitie’s always asked us to Ppppp up a Penguin.

For one breed of dog the accepted breed name has almost been changed by advertising, now the Old English Sheep Dog is known almost universally as the Dulux Dog. Although featuring dogs in advertising campaigns goes back many years; the most famous being Nipper who featured on the HMV posters and apparently the name suited him as he was reputed to be a very bad tempered hound, One animal has covered two major products over the years. ‘Tony’ the Kellogg’s Frosties tiger has been on the cereal packet since I was a child; then of course Esso, in the mid 1960’s, urged us all to put a tiger in our tanks.

Food has always been a target for the advertiser, we were told that ‘kids would eat Dairylea until the cows come home’ and Tony Hancock (the lad himself) and Patricia Hayes spent a lot of time on our televisions urging us to ‘Go to work on an egg’. One of the advertising icons was the Cadbury’s Smash Martians who appeared on our screens for years; (are they related to the modern Brian of Confused.com I wonder?) After all this food we would welcome the ‘plink, plink, fizz’ as the Alka Seltzer drops into a glass of water.

Kitchen appliances and other mechanical items soon reached our screens. In 1961 a kitchen appliance which did ‘everything but cook, because that’s what wives are for’ (their words not mine!) was advertised. This was the Kenwood Chef food mixer that was made in Havant.

Also who can forget Victor Kiam trying to sell us the Remington shaver because he was so impressed with the product that he bought the company.

This was the era of the advertising slogan. How many of these below do you remember?

1960          Get away in a Triumph Herald. 

1962          Go well, go Shell.    The Milky Bars are on me.

1964          Heinz. 57 times better. 

1965          Brylcreem makes the most of a man.                              Did you Maclean your teeth today?  Easy peasy lemon Sqezy.  Help him to get out and about again with Lucozade.  
                   It's the sun that makes it Sunblest.  The happiest people you meet in the morning get their sunshine out of a box. And the box is Kellogg's.                                                                    The tea you can really taste. (PG Tips),                   The too good to hurry mint.  (Murray Mints)

1966           Sleep sweeter, Bournvita. 
1967           Now that hands that do dishes can feel as soft as your face with mild green Fairy Liquid. Schhh ... tonic water by you-know-who. 

1968           In the Inch War, Ryvita helps you win. 


And probably the most famous of all from 1960


You're never alone with a Strand. 

Then there were the Jingles:-

Here are the first lines of a few, I am sure you can add the rest:-
All around the house Spring Clean with Flash
It beats as it sweeps as it cleans
Omo adds brightness even to perfect whiteness.
You’ll wonder where the yellow went, when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent
The Esso sign means happy motoring etc
A Double Diamond works wonders
Drinka pinta milka day
A finger of fudge is just enough to give the kids a treat
Unzip a banana
There are two men in my life, to one I am a mother to the other I am a wife

Ah well back to 2014

Stay in touch

Peter
DUSTYKEAT@aol.com

You Write:

Stephanie Writes:-

I found your blog by chance whilst researching  family history. I did not go to Manor Court School, but all my first husbands (Wilson from Farlington) family did and I was bought up in Portsmouth and Drayton, my father and mother ran a newspaper shop in Drayton E and I Bryant.
I attach a couple of photos taken at the Drayton Methodist Youth Club,    (how on earth we got a man to do the washing up in those days I have no   idea. )
 
I cannot remember many names, but I am the blonde with the ridiculous    flick up hair do, the girl next to me I think was called Michele and the dark haired girl Jo who if memory serves me correctly was married to Rita      Elsom's brother from Slapes the fish shop but I can remember his name    either. 
They was taken I would think in about 1963.





News and Views:


On this day 17th May 1960-1965
On 17/05/1960 the number one single was Cathys Clown by the Everly Brothers and the number one album was South Pacific Soundtrack. The top rated TV show was Wagon Train (ITV) and the box office smash was Psycho. A pound of today's money was worth 13.68 and Burnley were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 17/05/1961 the number one single was Blue Moon - The Marcels and the number one album was GI Blues - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Bootsie & Snudge (Granada) and the box office smash was One Hundred and One Dalmations. A pound of today's money was worth 13.25 and Tottenham Hotspur were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 17/05/1962 the number one single was Wonderful Land - The Shadows and the number one album was Blue Hawaii - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Lawrence of Arabia. A pound of today's money was worth 12.89 and Ipswich Town were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 17/05/1963 the number one single was From Me To You - The Beatles and the number one album was Please Please Me - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Liberal Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was The Great Escape. A pound of today's money was worth 12.64 and Everton were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 17/05/1964 the number one single was Don't Throw Your Love Away - Searchers and the number one album was Rolling Stones - The Rolling Stones. The top rated TV show was Conservative Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was Dr Strangelove. A pound of today's money was worth 12.24 and Liverpool were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

 On 17/05/1965 the number one single was King of the Road - Roger Miller and the number one album was Beatles For Sale - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was The Sound of Music. A pound of today's money was worth 11.69 and Manchester United were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.



Wednesday 7 May 2014

Web Page 2050

10th May 2014


Top Picture:  1961 E Type Jaguar





Bottom Picture: A view of the Ladies department in 1959 Woolworths in Commercial Road


Please note the change of date for the get together from Thursday 26th June to Friday 27th June.


Life in the Swinging 50’s and 60’s

In the early part of the 1960’s we were all still at school and us lads had just moved on from wearing short trousers. During our later days at Court Lane, before we moved into Manor Court, there was always a group (I was not one of them) who congregated in the freezing cold outside school toilets to smoke. In their innocence the obviously thought that the teachers had no sense of smell, which may have be right because I cannot remember anyone being punished for smoking at school, but they must have been! Once we moved up to Manor Court there were heated inside toilets that must have put a stop to these smoking sessions. I suspect that they then must have moved out of sight and into the cycle sheds.

Most of us lads spent a lot of time looking at the girls but we were spectacularly naive and far too young for them even though they were in the same class! The girls always seemed to want older boys.

In the roads and streets in the summer we could cycle for miles (not on the pavement!) without being disturbed by cars and those that did pass us had no synchromesh in first gear and were prone to making terrible grinding noises.

All the policemen seemed to be well over 6 foot tall and some even still wore capes. All police cars and ambulances has fast ringing electronic bells but the fire engines still had roof mounted hand operated traditional bells.

Education for some meant corporal punishment and the cane, bullying and all sorts of non-pc behaviour by the staff. British Bulldog was played in the playground, although this was against school rules, and seemed to involve at least 50 boys at any one time.

There was always homework! Most of us fretted and worried over it and with great trepidation handed it in each day to be marked. This all lead up to the mock and actual GCE and RSA exams to be taken in the 4th, 5th and 6th years.

Every so often we were obliged to set off on the obligatory school cross country run which was usually routed across Farlington Marshes or the slopes of Portsdown Hill. This torture was followed by compulsory mass showers that were either ice cold or scalding hot - never in between.

In the early days at Court Lane School I was allowed out after I had done my homework and could be out until half past seven on school days and eight o’clock on Saturdays. Even when I was in the 5th year my father still insisted on me being home by 10.30 during the week and 11.00 at the weekend. How things have changed!

I can remember that one year I was given a ten-bob note for my birthday, I was rich! It took me ages to spend it, on what I cannot remember.

When I look back at the early 60s I think of my mother buying my school uniform from Beaumonts in Cosham High Street and also buying me a long navy blue gabardine raincoat big enough to last for several terms and also, when I went to Court Lane, having to wear a school cap and carrying it in my pocket on the bus and only putting it on when we reached the school gates.

But there were up sides. I used to enjoy playing around and repairing valve radio’s and so could avidly listen to Radio Luxemburg through the wow’s and whistles of the almost deafening static depending on the weather conditions. Radio Luxembourg, in those days, provided the only pop music in the evening, pirate radio had not been born yet.

Now lads do you remember the new style make up of the 1960’s that the girls started wearing? Woolworths had begun to sell various flavoured lipstick (was that Rimmell, beauty on a budget tray?) that came in pink, red, orange or beige, I can vividly remember one evening kissing a girl wearing light pink lipstick and suddenly tasting peaches. It was quite a surprise. One of their other ‘teenage’ fashions from Woolworths was unusual coloured nail polish. The gold one I especially remember as when it was exposed to the dance hall lights the gold resembled nicotine stains. I have never liked to see bright nail polish maybe this gold polish put me off for life!!!

Ah well so much for nostalgia! Have you any memories of the late 1950’s and early 1960’s that you could share with us? If so drop me an email and I will try to combine them all into one long article if I can.

And lads we all wanted an E type Jag!


Stay in touch

Peter
DUSTYKEAT@aol.com

You Write:

Steve Writes:-



Hi Peter, your article a couple of weeks ago brought back a lot of the same memories you wrote of.  Building our own bikes, there were three of us that I knew did so, in our case it was track bikes. I suppose the forerunners of today's BMX and mountain bikes or rather a cross between the two. Small frames, bigger rear cogs, higher and shortened mudguards and of course the must have 'Knobbly tyres'!
When built we used to ride them around 'Dead Man's wood' racing each other around for hours and imitating our Scrambling heroes. Back then it was accessible and not slap bang in the Golf Course as it is today. My last trip to Pompey we did have a sneak around the wood, which brought back those great memories. The three racers were Rex Whistler, David Costick and myself.
 And as you remarked who plays those board games nowadays, not Adults or Children, Monopoly and Scrabble were the last games we played many years back and don't have either now! Regards Hornby train sets and Scalextric tracks, someone around our age are more likely to have either in a spare room or a boarded out loft space. No, I don't have either but often fancied the latter in ours maybe one day.....

I did see a group of youngsters in the park at the rear of us over the Easter weekend, acting more like the exploring kids we were, one was even overheard suggesting building a den amongst the very few trees there. So there is still some hope for some of them, if only they could leave their computers, I-pods, I-pads, mobile phones etc; and get out in the fresh air like we used to! Remember all those weeks of School Summer Hols, I bet like me you were never in? Many happy hours a day spent either exploring over Farlington Marshes, or around the chalk pits and woods and fitter than most of today's kids.


P.S. I still spend more time outdoors when the weather is fine, either in my garden or someone else's, failing that I'm out on my Motor Cycle fresh air fiend me.

News and Views:

On this Day 10th May 1960-1965
On 10/05/1960 the number one single was Cathy's Clown - Everly Brothers and the number one album was South Pacific Soundtrack. The top rated TV show was Wagon Train (ITV) and the box office smash was Psycho. A pound of today's money was worth £13.68 and Burnley were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 10/05/1961 the number one single was Blue Moon - The Marcels and the number one album was GI Blues - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was No Hiding Place (AR) and the box office smash was One Hundred and One Dalmations. A pound of today's money was worth £13.25 and Tottenham Hotspur were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 10/05/1962 the number one single was Wonderful Land - The Shadows and the number one album was Blue Hawaii - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Lawrence of Arabia. A pound of today's money was worth £12.89 and Ipswich Town were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions. The big news story of the week was London trolley buses decommissioned

On 10/05/1963 the number one single was From Me To You - The Beatles and the number one album was Summer Holiday - Cliff Richard & the Shadows. The top rated TV show was Labour Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was The Great Escape. A pound of today's money was worth £12.64 and Everton were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 10/05/1964 the number one single was Don't Throw Your Love Away - Searchers and the number one album was Rolling Stones - The Rolling Stones. The top rated TV show was Conservative Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was Dr Strangelove. A pound of today's money was worth £12.24 and Liverpool were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions. The big news story of the day was Comedian Max Miller dies.

On 10/05/1965 the number one single was Ticket to Ride - The Beatles and the number one album was Beatles For Sale - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was The Sound of Music. A pound of today's money was worth £11.69 and Manchester United were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.






Thursday 1 May 2014

Web Page 2048

3rd  May 2014


Top Picture:  A TV set was a piece of furniture in the 1950’s



Bottom Picture: TV with a round screen did not catch on.


TV the Early Days

One of the fallacies during the early days of television viewing  was that it had to be watched, like in the cinema, in the dark. This may have been true of the very early sets but by the mid 1950’s thoughts had changed and it was then recommended that TV be watched with a small table lamp behind or on top of the set so as not to damage or strain the viewers eyes. I remember that one of my friends parents actually had a socket that was built into the set so a two pin plug to a table lamp could be plugged directly into the set and so automatically came on when the set was switched on. One of the selling points being that this extra light allowed mother to carry on with her sewing whilst the television was on! Not very PC today!

The salesmen in the television shops did their best to persuade our parents to buy the best they could afford, maybe even using the ‘never, never’, but it in those days it was recommended that an average living room would only need a set with a 12” screen! Anything larger and the picture quality would suffer and people would have to sit far away, maybe in the hall, to see a decent picture. Everything was in monochrome but to add realism our parents could buy, usually from the magazine Exchange and Mart or Practical Wireless, a sheet of plastic coloured green at the bottom and blue at the top to place over the screen to make the picture appear coloured. It had a weird effect on the head and shoulder shots of people though!

TV was most certainly a status symbol and you knew that if you had a TV annual under your arm it told all your friends that your house had a television set, that and the large ‘X’ or ‘H’ ariel attached to your chimney stack.

One thing of course is that in those early days we only had the choice of one channel and then only at limited times of the day. It is well documented that the announcers were either dressed in Evening Suits or Evening Dresses even though they were only ever seen from the waist up, but, they did always appear between each programme to introduce items and provide a link or introduce an ‘Interlude’.

We have all heard of the early programmes especially the children’s ones and I have spoken about these several times before, however who really remembers the very first television serial? This was ‘Little Red Monkey’ and involved espionage and the killing of British atomic scientists, the Little Red Monkey turned out to be a Russian midget who specialised in dirty deeds! I think we all know that ‘The Quatermass Experiment ‘ was the first drama serial especially written for television and that each evenings viewing, if we were allowed to stay up that late ended with the playing of the National Anthem.

But what of the television sets themselves?  They were big and cumbersome difficult to operate, the contrast and brightness had to be adjusted by hand and most sets had a habit of making the picture roll or drift sideways at times which meant reaching behind the set and adjusting the horizontal or vertical hold. No remote controls in those days! Most sets were housed in wooden cabinets, which provided plenty of room for the large single speaker in the front, and the wood had the benefit of enriching the sound. All sets were pieces of furniture and some had inlaid patterns on them, some were enormous incorporating folding doors on the front, maybe with a built in radio and record player and some, for the better off (not us) a cocktail cabinet. Screen size slowly became important but all I can say is that it is  lucky that the circular screen never caught on we would all be living in round houses!

How things have changed over the years today I can carry a television around in my jacket or trouser pocket, in those days it took two people to move a set just to dust behind it!

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Peter
DUSTYKEAT@aol.com

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Mary Writes:

I confess to playing many a game of Ludo, Snakes and Ladders, Tiddley Winks etc. My brother loved his Meccano and we both enjoyed playing Cowboys and Indians with other children in the road. We loved cowboy films on TV and I suppose that was our inspiration. I can remember playing post offices. I also played draughts and shove halfpenny with my older and much loved cousin. When my children were small they liked board games. My younger daughter was 7 when she had a nurses outfit one Christmas. Little did I know that  18 years later she would wear the real thing! My older daughter lined up her toys in a row on the floor and they had paper and pencils. She was the teacher and they were the pupils. Guess what she is today, a teacher! My grandchildren like dolls, prams, pots and pans, mini kitchens etc and I`m pleased about that. I don`t like to see them stuck to laptops all day. My grandson loves playing with a wooden rifle but what really made me laugh was when he ran along the road with a large stick shouting "I`m Viggo the Viking!" Well, he is half Swedish! 


News and Views

:Barry Gibb and his wife, Linda have sold the site of the former home of Johnny and June Carter Cash in suburban Nashville. Records indicate the sale occurred March 18. Barry actually took a $300,000 loss on the property, which he bought in 2005 for $2.3 million. Renovation of the Cash home was nearly complete in 2007 when a fire started by renovators broke out and destroyed most of the wooden structure.




On this Day 3rd May 1960-1965
 On 03/05/1960 the number one single was Do you Mind - Anthony Newley and the number one album was South Pacific Soundtrack. The top rated TV show was Wagon Train (ITV) and the box office smash was Psycho. A pound of today's money was worth £13.68 and Burnley were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.The big news story of the day was Soviet Union shoots down American U2 spy plane flown by pilot CG Powers

On 0305/1961 the number one single was Wooden Heart - Elvis Presley and the number one album was GI Blues - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was No Hiding Place (AR) and the box office smash was One Hundred and One Dalmations. A pound of today's money was worth £13.25 and Tottenham Hotspur were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.The big news story of the day was Castro makes Cuba Socialist.

On 0305/1962 the number one single was Wonderful Land - The Shadows and the number one album was Blue Hawaii - Elvis Presley. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Lawrence of Arabia. A pound of today's money was worth £12.89 and Ipswich Town were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 0305/1963 the number one single was How Do You Do It? - Gerry & the Pacemakers and the number one album was Summer Holiday - Cliff Richard & the Shadows. The top rated TV show was Conservative Party Political Broadcast (all channels) and the box office smash was The Great Escape. A pound of today's money was worth £12.64 and Everton were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions. The big news story of the week was Churchill retired.

On 03/05/1964 the number one single was A World Without Love - Peter & Gordon and the number one album was With the Beatles - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was Dr Strangelove. A pound of today's money was worth £12.24 and Liverpool were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.

On 03/05/1965 the number one single was Ticket to Ride - The Beatles and the number one album was Beatles For Sale - The Beatles. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was The Sound of Music. A pound of today's money was worth £11.69 and Manchester United were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.