Web Page 3066 4th May 2023 First Picture: Marion Ryan

Second Picture: With Paul and Barry Ryan

Third Picture: Spot the Tune

Forth Picture: With Jackie Rae

Marion Ryan Marion Ryan was born on 4th February 1931 and died on 15th January 1999 she was a British singer in the 1950s in the early years of British Independent Television. She was once called "the Marilyn Monroe of popular song". Marion Ryan was born in Middlesbrough, North Riding of Yorkshire, England, where she attended Notre Dame Collegiate School for Girls in Leeds, now Notre Dame Catholic Sixth Form College. She was working in a hosiery shop in Leeds and broke into show business when she approached Ray Ellington who was performing at the Locarno in Liverpool in July 1953 and asked to sing with his quartet. He allowed her to do so and the audience reaction was so good he signed her up to work with the quartet. She made her debut with them at the Locarno, Glasgow in September 1953. Her first radio appearance took place on the show "Stepping Out at Radio Roadhouse" on the Light Programme on October 27, 1953 when the Ellington quartet were the guest band She continued to tour with Ellington until 1957 and made further radio appearances with them including the popular Goon Show. She began recording for Pye Nixa in 1956 and mainly made cover versions of American hits. Her version of "Love Me Forever" peaked at number five on the UK Singles Chart in 1958. Her first LP "A Lady Loves" was released in 1959. Beginning in June 1956, she was the regular singer in the popular musical quiz Spot the Tune[ on Granada Television for seven years, with a total of 209 half-hour programmes, which featured several star hosts including disc-jockey Pete Murray, the Canadian pop singer Jackie Rae, and the comedians Ken Platt and Ted Ray, and also Peter Knight and his orchestra. The show re-emerged in the 1970s as Name That Tune. Marion Ryan went solo in 1957 and undertook her first variety tour[ and then went on tour with Cyril Stapleton and his Show Band. She made six appearances in BBC's Six-Five Special in 1957 and 1958 and she appeared in the Royal Variety Performance in 1959. She appeared on Sunday Night at the London Palladium in 1963 and made one brief appearance as herself in the film It's All Happening, with singer Tommy Steele the same year. She had important guest spots on The Bob Hope Show in 1958 and The Bing Crosby Show in 1961. Her first marriage at the age of 17 was to Lloyd George Frederick Sapherson (known as Fred) (1913-2001) in the second quarter of 1948.] They had twin sons, Barry and Paul (born Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire, 24 October 1948). In 1969 she married the show business agent Harold Davison (1922-2011) and they had a daughter named Caroline. After which she gradually eased herself into retirement. She died from a heart attack at age 67 in Boca Raton, Florida, United States. Stay in touch Peter

Web Page 3064 27th April 2023 First Picture: Children’s Film Foundation banner

Second Picture: Early Haley Mills film

Third Picture: Still from a Foundation film

The Children's Film Foundation (CFF) was a non-profit organisation which made films for children in the United Kingdom originally to be shown as part of children's Saturday morning matinée cinema programming. The films typically were about 55 minutes long. The Foundation was formed in 1951 following the Wheare report that criticised the suitability of American programming for Saturday morning pictures. Mary Field was appointed chief executive. The Foundation was initially funded by the Eady Levy (a tax on box office receipts), receiving 5% of the Levy and the initial budget was £60,000 per year. The Foundation made around six films a year most lasted less than an hour and were shot in less than two weeks. The films featured future British stars including Leslie Ash, Keith Chegwin, Phil Collins, Michael Crawford, Phil Daniels, Dexter Fletcher, Sadie Frost, Susan George, David Hemmings, Frazer Hines, Gary Kemp, Richard O'Sullivan, Linda Robson, Pauline Quirke, Sally Thomsett, Dennis Waterman, Carol White, Jack Wild and Matthew Wright. The films also include early films from British directors such as James Hill, Gerald Thomas, Don Chaffey, Lewis Gilbert and John Guillermin. It also used established directors such as Charles Frend and The Boy Who Turned Yellow (1972) was the last film production by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. Some of the films were critically recognized, winning awards at the Cannes Film Festival, Moscow Film Festival and Venice Film Festival. The films were also popular on US TV and in 16mm showings in public libraries in Germany, Japan, Canada and South Africa. By 1980, attendances for Saturday morning matinées were dwindling and the Foundation's annual funding was reduced from £530,000 a year to £330,000. The Eady Levy was abolished in 1985 and the Foundation made a few further films in the mid-1980s, by which time it had been renamed the Children's Film and Television Foundation. Its last production was Just Ask for Diamond in 1988 It made no films of its own after the mid-1980s, but it survived under its revised name, and in recent years has provided fun ding for other projects. Many of its films, dating back to the 1960s, were shown on the BBC in the 1980s, in the Friday Film Special strand. Frank Richard Wells (1903–82), second son of H. G. Wells and Amy Catherine Robbins, was a main executive at the CFF. In 2012 The Children's Film and Television Foundation changed its name and broadened its role to become the Children's Media Foundation. Its archive is now held at the BFI National Archive. Stay in touch Peter GSSEDITOR@gmail.com

Web Page 3062 20th April 2023 First Picture: Gas Poker

Second Picture: Gas Fridge

Third Picture: Gas Light

Forth Picture: Gas Iron

Gas With the recent problems of within the energy area it got me to thinking how the used of gas has changed since our formative days. Here are some examples which have come to mind. One of the strangest items in my home in those days was the gas poker. We had a gas plug in point next to the fireplaces in the front and back room. This appliance was rarely used as my parents relieved on laying a proper fire so it would catch and burn away on its own. One strange things that I remember is when the engineer came to convert us to North Sea gas he insisted on converting the gas poke even though my mother told him that we did not use it. My wife’s grandmother lived in a cottage in St. Ives just outside Ringwood which was built in 1897 in the year of Queen Victoria’s Jubilee and was the first brick built house in the village, However not all rooms had the full domestic services. The upstairs rooms were only lit by a wandering lead attached to the stair rail, rather precarious. However, there was no electric light in the kitchen just one gas light on a bracket on the wall. I remember the comforting pop as the mantle lit and the soft warm light around the kitchen as it hissed away quietly to itself. Mind you that was not the only feature in the kitchen as in one corner was a built-in washing copper which was heated by a wood fire underneath, Looking at the other side of my family my maternal grandmother, when she was living in London owned a gas iron. The gas was attached to the iron from the domestic gas supply through the tap and tube at the back of the iron. There were two rows of six jets inside the body of the iron, and gas flowed from these jets, which were then lit. This heated the metal base, making it hot enough to press out creases. The thing always made a scary hissing noise which scared me intensely, luckily when she moved south to live with us she left it behind. I never really understood how a gas refrigerator worked as we never had one but our neighbour did and I remember my father being asked to go round and relight her fridge. I went along and watched but I still do not really understand how they worked. Some folks had a three legged free standing boiler in the kitchen for boiling whites the but my mother always boiled her white in a large pan on the gas cooker. I cannot finish without mentioning the geyser we had mounted over the bath in Drayton. This thing had a pilot light that was turned sideways into the main gas burners. The geyser would then make a horrendous pop and would scare us all to death. Stay in touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

Web Page 3060 13th April 2023 First Picture: Portsdown Hill

Second Picture: Chalk Pit

Third Picture:Farlington Marshes

Looking Back. When we were growing up we never once questioned what our parents income was. We did not eat a lot of fast food as it was considered a treat and not a food group. We ate home made meals consisting of mainly meat, potatoes and vegetables and the vegetables were not an optional choice because if you did not eat your vegetables there would be no dessert for you that day We grew up during a time when we mowed lawns, pulled up weeds, babysat and helped our neighbours to earn extra pocket money. We were, by no means given everything that we wanted but we were satisfied. We went outside in the open air to play, we toured around on our bikes, went out with friends, played hide and seek, we went swimming, in fact we rarely sat inside at home. After school we went home and we did our homework before going out with friends or having friends over to visit our own home. Bottled water was unheard of we used the milk machine for cartons of drink. We always had to tell our parents where we were going, who we were going with and what time we would be home. We would ride our bikes for hours. We learnt from our parents and what they said was law, we did not even question it. The words please and thank you were always part of our vocabulary. We watched what we said around our elders and a telling off was not classed as abuse, it was called discipline and you did not hear swear words on the radio or in songs. We were very lucky as we had the slopes of Portsdown Hill to explore and the chalk pits to play in and the beaches to bathe off, plus the wilds of Farlington Marshes we could always explore. We could mess about in boats or go fishing in the creek. Life seemed much simpler then our only worries were to get our homework in on time. So much for progress, maybe I am looking back through rose coloured glasses but I know I enjoyed growing up when I did. Stay in touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

Web Page 3058 6th April 2023 First Picture: Buttered crumpets

Second Picture: Halloween Crumpets

Third Picture: Breakfast Crumpets

Crumpets. What better way to pass an evening when we were kids by getting the toasting fork out and cooking crumpets in front of an open coal fire? A crumpet is a small griddle bread made from an unsweetened batter of water or milk, flour, and yeast, popular in the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and Australia. Crumpets are regionally known as pikelets, a name also applied to a thinner, more pancake-like griddle bread a type of the latter is referred to as a crumpet in Scotland. Crumpets have been variously described as originating in Wales or as part of the Anglo-Saxon diet. In either case, breads were, historically, commonly cooked on a griddle wherever bread ovens were unavailable. The bara-planc, or griddle bread, baked on an iron plate over a fire, was part of the everyday diet in Wales until the 19th century.[4] Small, oval pancakes baked in this manner were called picklets, The word spread initially to the West Midlands of England, where it became anglicised as pikelet, and subsequently to Cheshire, Lancashire, Yorkshire, and other areas of the north; crumpets are still referred to as pikelets in some areas. The word crumpet itself, of unclear origin. The early crumpets were hard pancakes cooked on a griddle, rather than the soft and spongy crumpets of the Victorian era, which were made with yeast. From the 19th century, a little bicarbonate of soda was also usually added to the batter. In modern times, the mass production of crumpets by large commercial bakeries has eroded some regional differences. Crumpets are distinguished from similar sized muffins by being made from a batter, rather than a dough. English crumpets are generally circular, roughly 8 centimetres (3 in) in diameter and 2 centimetres (3⁄4 in) thick. Their shape comes from being restrained in the pan/griddle by a shallow ring. They have a characteristic flat top with many small pores and a spongy texture which allows butter or other spreads to permeate. Crumpets may be cooked until ready to eat warm from the pan, but are also left slightly undercooked and then toasted. While premade commercial versions are available in most supermarkets, freshly home-made crumpets are less heavy and doughy in texture. They are usually eaten with a spread of butter, or with other sweet or savoury toppings. While in some areas of the country the word pikelet is synonymous with the crumpet, in others (such as Staffordshire and Yorkshire) it refers to a slightly differing recipe. If differentiated from the crumpet, a pikelet is defined as containing no yeast as a raising agent; as using a thinner batter than a crumpet; and as being cooked without a ring, giving a flatter result than a crumpet. In Stoke-on-Trent, pikelets were once sold in the town's many oatcake shops and still are. A 1932 recipe for Staffordshire pikelets specifies that they were made with flour and buttermilk, with bicarbonate of soda as a raising agent, and suggests cooking them using bacon fat. The term pikelet is used in Australian and New Zealand cuisine for a smaller version of what in Scotland and North America would be called a pancake and, in England, a Scotch pancake, girdle or griddle cake, or drop scone. A Scottish crumpet is broadly similar to the crumpet of parts of Northern England. It is made from the same ingredients as a Scotch pancake, and is about 180 millimetres (7 in) diameter and 8 millimetres (0.3 in) thick. It is available plain, or as a fruit crumpet with raisins baked in, usually fried in a pan and served with a fried breakfast. It is also sometimes served with butter and jam. The ingredients include a leavening agent, usually baking powder, and different proportions of eggs, flour, and milk, which create a thin batter. Unlike a pancake, it is cooked to brown on one side only, resulting in a smooth darker side where it has been heated by the griddle, then lightly cooked on the other side which has holes where bubbles have risen to the surface during cooking. While now relatively uncommon in Ireland, crumpets were once produced by Boland's Bakery in Dublin during the 19th and much of the 20th centuries; Boland's recipe was subsequently used by a number of other bakeries. Irish crumpets differed from most British recipes by having a yeastless batter and being cooked on both sides, giving a smooth rather than spongy top. I must admit that I prefer them with lashings of butter, some friends like to put Marmite on theirs but I am one of those people who actually hate Marmite. Stay in touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

Web Page 3054 23rd March 2023 Steve Race First Picture: Steve Race at the piano

Second Picture: The My Music team

Third Picture: Sheet Music for Nicola

Forth Picture: Steve Races’ autobiography

Stephen Russell "Steve" Race OBE (1 April 1921 – 22 June 2009) was a British composer, pianist and radio and television presenter. Born in Lincoln, the son of a lawyer, he learned the piano from the age of five. He was educated (1932–37) at Lincoln School, where he formed his first jazz group, which included a young Neville Marriner, later a major figure in the world of classical music. At sixteen, he attended the Royal Academy of Music, studying composition. After leaving the academy, he wrote occasional dance band reviews for Melody Maker and, in 1939, joined the Harry Leader dance band as pianist, succeeding Norrie Paramor. He joined the Royal Air Force in 1941, and formed a jazz/dance quintet. After the Second World War, he began a long and productive career with the BBC, where his ready wit, musicianship and broad musical knowledge made him much sought after as a musical accompanist for panel games and magazine shows, such as Whirligig and Many a Slip. At the same time he was playing in the bands of Lew Stone and Cyril Stapleton, and arranging material for Ted Heath. In, 1949 The Steve Race Bop Group recorded some of the first British bebop records. He also developed a sideline arranging player piano rolls for the Artona company. From the 1950s to the 1980s, he presented numerous music programmes on radio and television. Additionally, in 1955, he was appointed the first Light Music Advisor to the independent television company Associated-Rediffusion. He is probably best known as the chairman of the long-running light-hearted radio and TV panel game My Music which ran from 1967 to 1994. He presented and wrote most of the questions for all 520 episodes . He also presented Jazz For Moderns on radio and Jazz 625 on television for the BBC in the 1960s. As a composer, he produced a number of pieces in the jazz, classical and popular idioms. Faraway Music, the theme to an ITV Play of the Week in 1961, was issued as a single by Steve Race and his Orchestra. Others followed, including one of his better-known compositions, the short instrumental piece Nicola (named after his daughter), which won an Ivor Novello Award in 1962. But his best-known and, according to his autobiography, his most lucrative composition is his music for the Birds Eye frozen peas jingle, "Sweet as the moment when the pod went pop". Windsor Blues, a duet written in 1970 for Prince Charles (cello) and the Earl of Chester (trumpet) has been recorded. Race's autobiography, Musician at Large, was published in 1979, and in 1988 Souvenir Press Ltd published his book about his grandfather's short but interesting life, from lead miner to missionary, entitled The Two Worlds of Joseph Race. He married Marjorie Leng in 1944 and they had a daughter, Nicola. Marjorie died from cancer in 1969. He married again in 1970, to radio producer Léonie Mather, who survived him. He had his first heart attack in 1965. He died of the second attack at his home in Great Missenden, Buckinghamshire, in June 2009. Stay in Touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com