Reflections -The End of the Book

200.  Reflections

When I started to write this book in early 2015, I wondered what had been the motivation.  The answer was quite simple: we all have a story to tell but few of us put thoughts into words.  However, as we get older, and are able to view our history in perspective, some of it is certainly worth sharing, particularly when one is fortunate enough to grow up during the “swinging 60s”.

As teenagers, we evolve from childhood to adulthood. This involves physical changes, intellectual expansion and social developments and probably constitutes the most dramatic and eventful stage of our lives.  Some people think that these teenage years are the ones that make a man out of a child.  While this is undoubtedly true, in some cases such as my own, you sometimes can’t take the child out of the man, a happy situation that has allowed me to dwell on, take pride in and remember with some clarity many of the events of my childhood and early adulthood.

In the 60s, there did not seem to be the same peer pressure as today to engage in either dramatically positive or negative activities. In those days, we were far more interested in simply enjoying ourselves, being positive about our achievements in the realms of sports, the fair sex, love of the countryside and physical fitness. Similarly there was little pressure to indulge in less acceptable things such as sex, drugs and rock and roll, all so prevalent in the 21st century.

But let me say that we were by no stretch of the imagination “goody, goody two shoes” which I hope the tales and memories in this book will bear testament.  On the whole though, we would be considered to be innocent by today’s standards. Tattoos, body piercings, depression and suicide were not words that featured in our vocabulary and certainly didn’t form part of our everyday business.

Today, teenagers are adolescents who are treated like children but are expected to behave as adults. In my teenage years, I like to believe that we were expected to be like children and were treated as such. The kindness shown by the older generation to us in Hungerford was engrained, part of the upholstery, and I wonder if this was because of close family ties within such a small community.

Over the past 50 years, teenage behaviour and overall expectations have dramatically altered.  Teenagers now seem to be a breed of people that expect everything, have everything and appreciate nothing.   Contrast this with the 60s, when we never had this plethora of expectations but appreciated everything, above all the kind of fun and enjoyment featured in this book.  It makes me realize once again that money can never buy you happiness and that the best things in life are still free.

On a sobering final note, while writing this book, I learned that I was writing posthumously about many of its characters, people I hadn’t seen for many years.  Nothing could so clearly remind us that we have only one life to live.

I am so fortunate to be able write about my beloved Hungerford and more importantly, the many characters and friends that passed through my teenage years.  Writing about   these joyous time allows me the privilege and luxury of sharing with our children and grandchildren the many happy memories that past generations of their family enjoyed during the fabulous 1960s.

1.The Leaving of Liverpool

1. The Leaving of Liverpool

1. The Leaving of Liverpool

When I was about 10 years old, my parents, Ernie and Marion and I were living in a prefab in Liverpool and my dad had been ill with silicosis and pulmonary tuberculosis, contracted whilst serving in the army in North Africa during World War II.

One day my dad took a turn for the worse and my mum called our family doctor Saul Ellenbogen.  For several weeks my dad had been so ill that his bed was in the living room and it was the only room in the house where we could afford to have some heating.  In those days it was coal, which my dad and I used to collect on the railway embankment. The trains in the late fifties were all steam trains, and as they pulled out of Gateacre station, they would shed some of their load.

I overheard Dr Ellenbogen say to my mother that “if he doesn’t leave Liverpool soon, he’ll only have six months to live.”  In Liverpool in the late fifties the city was surrounded by a constant cloud of smog. During the winter months, it was so bad we had to wear smog masks whenever we travelled at night time.  Occasionally it was worse.  Sometimes if we went on a bus to see both sets of my grandmas and granddads, who lived in Wavertree, the conductor would walk in front of the bus holding a paraffin lamp to guide the bus and its driver through the city streets.  Such was the extent of the smog, that the gauzes fitted inside the masks were stained a yellow-brown coloration after just a few hours of wear.

With the doctor’s encouragement, my father applied for a training program in Enham Alamein near Andover. During the next two years, we saw him only about three times a year but his relocation saw his health vastly improved and in April 1960, he returned to Liverpool with his bookkeeping diploma. Within weeks my dad had a job with Everest (I think they made fridges) but this was short lived and my dad’s health declined once more and again he was not able to hold down a job. In 1955 he had a lung removed and the healing process was slow. His surgery scar was about two feet long and I didn’t realise then that in order to remove his lung, the doctors had also to remove a couple of ribs to gain access to the lung.

My parents decided that they needed to get out of Liverpool for health reasons, and started to buy the Daltons Weekly in order to secure a council house exchange to somewhere in the South of England. After many months of searching, they found an advert seeking an exchange to Liverpool. Tony Mayall and his family all drove from Hungerford to see our house in Liverpool, then picked up my mum and drove her down to Hungerford and back all in one day. So the decision was made to move to Hungerford in the summer of 1961.

And just in case you are wondering, why did Tony want to move to Liverpool?  He had been offered a good job with Walls--the giant paint firm of the day.

Prisoners were Boys

112. Prisoners were Boys

Walton Jail-Liverpool

We must have been approaching no more than fifteen or sixteen as we were still getting around on foot instead of on our scooters. Ali, Mick Bay and I had bought light-coloured jackets from Crowe’s, the army surplus shop in Newbury.  I drew on the back of them a series of arrowheads and inscribed the words “Walton Jail”.   One day when it started to rain we sought shelter in an open-style hay barn and climbed up to the top of it. After a short while, an old farm hand  climbed up the ladder and was surprised to find us. On seeing us, he wildly took flight, much to our astonishment.

That night, while watching the local news, South at Six, I heard that three escaped convicts had been seen earlier in the day in the Sanham Green area and that the police had mounted a roadblock and a helicopter search was underway to find them. The farm hand was interviewed ,for the TV and he said, in a broad Berkshire accent, “They looked like they were dangerous and seeing that they were a lot younger than I, I had to take care of myself. Being a public minded person I hot-footed it out of danger, and phoned the police".

After I had watched the news item, I told my dad and he walked up about six houses away to tell the police sergeant what had happened. It must have been quite embarrassing for Sergeant Bob, since he was Mick Bay’s dad!

The headline in that week’s Newbury Weekly News read “Prisoners were Boys”. It was ironic that three real prisoners were actually on the run from Walton Jail. Apparently they had been playing an away game for the prison football team and made their escape. How the police thought that they could make a journey from Liverpool to the Hungerford area still remains a mystery!

Preface to Teenage Tales of Hungerford

Written by Jimmy Whittaker

Preface

So much can happen during one’s lifetime and I view that I have been blessed to have spent my teenage years growing up in Hungerford, despite it being classified in some generic travel guides as a small sleepy market town in southern England. When you speak to strangers about Hungerford, they remember only the Hungerford Tragedy of 1987 which purports to have put Hungerford on the map. In some respects, I regret that Hungerford is now globally known for this; however, in this book, I describe in a series of tales, what a wonderful place to have spent one’s teenage years and, more importantly, the 60s when things were changing for the youth of the day.

One of my gifts in life is a superb memory which has allowed me to describe the events, people and places as accurately as is possible for an old age pensioner in his dotage.  I would probably estimate that 95% of this book is true, with economies of truth making up the rest.

Hungerford in the early 60s had a population of just over 2000: with such a small population everybody knew each other and therefore knew everybody else’s business. In many ways, this made Hungerford almost a family business, but I won’t dwell on in-breeding!  Indeed, if you were to investigate census information from 1901 to 1971, you would see that the same family names pop up time and time again.

Today in 2015, the population has almost trebled and the purpose of this book is to record what a great place Hungerford in the swinging 60s offered youngsters growing up there.  You will find details of my adventures, the friends I made, descriptions of people and local characters, the town and its environs and a little bit of history.    Probably most important, was all of the largely innocent fun that we had, and that our children’s children would still enjoy today.  I consider myself very lucky to have had my teenage years full of adventures from start to finish.

Whoever said that the teenage years are the most difficult part of growing up, must have just jumped off a plane from Fantasy Island.  Mine were the best that even money could not buy.