THE FLATLEY DRYER

[Stanley]

That's the one..... And then there is all the stuff quietly festering in Beaufort's Dyke.....

[Stanley]

It struck me this morning ho similar my diet today is to what we ate in war time under rationing in terms of types of food. The only difference is that then we ate lots of spuds and bread which if I remember rightly were never rationed......

[Stanley]

Stockport (where I was born and spent the war) had municipally owned gas and electricity generation and I can never remember any power shortages or gas outages during the whole of the war.....

[Stanley]

The original power station at Stockport. Putting a bit of a puther out!

[Stanley]

I suppose it's a symptom of old age but almost every time I see a service 'improved' by 'modernising' the operation ownership or management I don't see any improvement and often an increase in cost. Education in particular bothers me, are we teaching our kids any better now than 70 years ago? Would most of the real improvements I see have happened anyway as technology advanced. The main benefit nowadays seems to me to go in dividends to private shareholders, many of them off shore. I'm not a Luddite but I often wonder........

[Stanley]

I have lots of memories about the trams in Stockport and always regretted their passing. When they were new they must have been quite magnificent because the interiors were fully wood panelled to a high standard with light coloured veneered plywood. However, over the years the colour had darkened due to tobacco smoke and they were heavily coated with the products of many many cigarettes and pipes, smoking was the norm in those days.
It might surprise some people but I am totally in favour of the ban on smoking indoors and in some public places, at home I never smoke upstairs, particularly in the bedroom. Another surprise for you might be the fact that I hate the smell of cigarette smoke.....
I can still see that stained panelling in the trams.......

[Stanley]

Mention of the essentially wooden construction of the old trams reminds me that if my memory serves me well, Manchester Corporation ditched their trams at the same time as Stockport. They finished up with a large proportion of the rolling stock parked up in the big tram depot at West Didsbury. Their approach to stripping the trams down for scrap was to set fire to the lot and I can remember going down on my bike with my mates to watch what was perhaps the biggest bonfire I have ever seen. No doubt an affective way of dealing with the problem but can you imagine such a solution being allowed today? Truly, the past is a different country!

[Stanley]

At that time the whole length of Wellington Road through Stockport, which was the A6, was paved with granite setts. I can't remember when it was paved with black top but it was almost certainly after 1950 because I think I remember the setts when I was cycling to school. I have an idea that most of these would be from the Shap Granite Company but might be wrong. When it was first paved it would be easier to bring in setts from Shap by rail than from Derbyshire by road.

[Stanley]

I still have vivid memories of Italian POWs working on road works and I have an idea they were taking the tram tracks up on Wellington Road. I looked it up on Wiki (LINK) and this is possibly correct as I know many prisoners weren't repatriated until well after the war.

[Stanley]

The Italians were a cheerful bunch. Many of them taken captive early in the war and well treated so they were safe, warm and well fed. I think they saw this as a better option than fighting for Il Duche! We had no problems talking to them and they gave us sweets when they were on ration!

[Whyperion]

Stockport (where I was born and spent the war) had municipally owned gas and electricity generation and I can never remember any power shortages or gas outages during the whole of the war.....

Many local authorities were unhappy with the 1948 state nationalisation of the Electricity network ( there were private companies too like Balfour Beatty in electricty generation for example ).

[Stanley]

One source of energy for heating which is long gone now is the ability to go down to the town gas works with a home made two wheeled truck and buy coke cheaply. This was the coal after gasification and was porous and grey, almost pure carbon. It was very cheap and not easy to burn but householders soon learned how to get it to burn brightly on a house fire. Tip. A small piece of cast iron in the middle of the fire aided combustion and ironmongers sold cast iron cheek plates for use in the standard coal grates. Almost all public buildings were heated by municipal coke burned in the ubiquitous Robin Hood Beeston boilers.

[PanBiker]

In 1963 we got to go sledging every day instead of school which was closed for lessons as the coke deliveries could not get through to Gisburn Road or any other of the local schools. We still had to tip up for registration then we all went down to Loughber down Rainhall with our teachers for the day. If you had a mum at home you could go home at dinner time, everyone else had to bring a packed lunch. Most Barlick kids were on the local hills during school time, good way of keeping warm, especially with the unlimited energy that we had as kids.

[Stanley]

Those were the days! When common sense still had a place in school life. Elfin Safety would ban it today!

[Stanley]

When I was at Hope Memorial during the war many mothers were working in industry of course because of labour shortages and the long summer holidays were a problem. During the holidays the school acted as a crèche and opened every week day for play supervised by teachers and volunteers. My mother was at home but as my mate George Davidson was home alone he went each day and I accompanied him. We got into French knitting and during the holidays we made yards and yards of what was in effect woollen cord (we worked on opposite ends of the same piece). Eventually this was made into place mats by our mothers and was not wasted. One thing that is often forgotten today is that the origin of the long summer holiday was the need for child labour during the harvest.

[Stanley]

Thinking about entertainment in leisure time in the days before electronic gadgetry our addiction was 'going to the pictures'. It was the universal leisure activity and there were more picture houses than you could poke a stick at. We had a regular date on Thursday night when my dad's mate, Mac Parker, who was manager of what was then the Carlton Cinema in Stockport (Later renamed the Essoldo. The name came from the Jewish family who owned the chain, Essie, Solomon and Doey[?]) gave us free seats in the Front Circle. Apart from that there was the Saturday morning children's matinee at the Savoy on Heaton Moor and the occasional adult film, I remember sitting through the three hours of Gone With the Wind.

[Stanley]

I've remembered that half way through Gone With the Wind an usherette (yes, that was what they were called) went up and down the aisles spraying us all with a dilute scented disinfectant! I never noticed that we smelled bad and thought it was hilarious!

[Stanley]

My mind goes back to the number of refugees and foreign nationals who wanted to fight with us that we took in during WW2. Different times!

[Tizer]

Do the Aussie's still spray in airliners landing in their country?

[Stanley]

I don't know Tiz. They used to do it in the last century when I was flying there regularly. (Sound funny referring to last century.... Makes me feel older than I am!)

[Stanley]

One of the things I don't miss from my childhood is the prevalence of bronchial complaints and spitting in public. My dad used to spit in the fire and I hated it! A vivid memory is the notice in all trams and buses 'Spitting strictly prohibited. Penalty 40 shillings'. That was a lot of money in those days......

[Stanley]

Another public notice we were very familiar with was a large yellow sign often painted on walls; 'EWS' You can still occasionally see faint remnants of these. EWS meant Emergency Water Supply. It signalled that there were available natural bodies of water for fire-fighting but also signalled where prefabricated steel round water tanks had been erected and filled by the Fire Brigade. Great potential for sailing toy boats!



A survivor in Burnley. Look up 'ghost signs' in Google.....

[Tizer]

Great potential for sailing toy boats!

...and drowning small boys!

[plaques]

And water their horses at the same time.

[Stanley]

No more dangerous than natural bodies of water and the sides of the tanks were quite high.