Transcript Detail
| Transcript Title | Geall, Don (O 1998 .15) |
| Interviewee | Don Geall (DG) |
| Interviewer | Eve Sangster (ES) and Jean Purkis (JP) |
| Date | 03/11/1997 |
| Transcriber by | Jean Purkis |
Transcript
Hertford Oral History Group
Recording no: O 1998 .15
Interviewee: Don Geall
Date: 3rd Nov 1997
Venue: 47 Fordwich Rise ,Hertford
Interviewers: Eve Sangster (ES) and Jean Purkis (JP)
Transcriber: Jean Purkis
************** unclear recording
[discussion] untranscribed material
italics editor’s note
JR: This is Monday 3rd November, l997. This is Jean Riddell, perhaps I should say Jean Purkis now, and I'm at the home of Don Geall, 47 Fordwich Rise, Hertford and Don is going to talk about his boyhood in Hertford, principally spend in Bull Plain. Right, away you go!
DG: Memories, memories. The thing I can always remember is standing in Dad's cafe looking in the mirror to make sure my face was clean. Even though I hadn't washed, because if it was clean, it didn't need washing. And in those days we had no bathroom, we had a loo on the middle stairs, all the water had to come from the ground floor and it was the old bowl and jug job. And it was strip off and full wash every 2 or 3 days and at weekends it was the tub.
ES: And so what address was this?
DG: 11 Bull Plain, George's Cafe. I was born in 11 Bull plain, Hertford along with my two brothers. We were all born in the top bedroom at home. Luckily mother had a sister that lived with us as well. So she was able to help. And I can remember going to the first school - Faudel Phillips, in the churchyard. I cannot remember any of the teachers' names.
JR: It doesn't matter because you were little then. You might remember some names later.
DG: Very tiny, yes. The thing I most remember at school ...I was born left handed and in those days they used to try and change you. So being very stubborn as I always have been, I used to behave myself at school and use my right hand, and as soon as I got anywhere else, I used to use my left hand.
ES: So are you ambidextrous now?
DG: I'm pretty well l00% ambidextrous. I play table tennis right handed, I bowl left handed at cricket, but I bat right handed. I play snooker left handed, I throw darts left handed and for all the trying in the world I cannot spoon right handed. I have to change my spoon over. I just cannot do it.
JR: Did you find it hard to cope with that, because if you are naturally right-handed as I am, I don't know how I'd manage to use the left hand.
DG: Not to my memory, no. It's just one of those things I've gone on with.
ES: I think you'll have to tell us your date of birth, Don......
DG: Oh, of course, I've written it down.
ES: I know you're only teasing, well, say it for the listeners.
DG: 6th of the 7th, '3l.
ES: And how old were you when you were looking in the mirror?
DG: I must have been 4 or 5, I must have been. I can remember mother taking me to school because Dad had to work, I can remember that. And I can remember getting walloped with the cane when I'd been a naughty boy.
ES: What, at school, or home?
DG: At home. And always used to put my hands like this to save the cane going on the bum and of course used to get whopped on the hand and used to get blood blisters. IN those days we used to call them 'black man's pinch' !
DG: 'Black man's pinch' yes. Mum and Dad were Cockneys. Mum and Dad came down on the train one Sunday from Liverpool Street to Hertford on the train and they came to Hertford from the East Station and they walked around and had a look at the town and Dad said "I'd like a cup of tea, we'll try and find a cafe. " Well, they walked all round the town and they could not find anywhere. That was in l929. And my father then was a pastrycook, he was a trained pastrycook, wedding cake maker and the rest of it, and he said "this town needs a cafe " so they walked round the town and they found 2 prospective sites, 2 shops for let, one in Bull Plain and one in Maidenhead Street. And Dad wrote away a letter and he got the one in Bull Plain.
ES: And so when was that?
DG: l929.They moved down and in those days they weren't married so Mum used to live with Dad's sister at Rye House and Dad stayed at the building and they were married quite soon after they got the cafe. They were married in Rye House, St. Cuthbert's, from the older sister's house. And they started literally without anything. As Dad took the money for cups of tea, bacon sandwiches or whatever, Mother used to run round to Pearks and purchase new supplies in Maidenhead Street (opposite Honey Lane), and that's how they got started
JP: Like the 'Elves and the Shoemaker' a bit.
DG: We used to open 7 days a week because Dad used to open Sundays 'til 2 o'clock and get all the men, mostly men, who lived by themselves, a dinner. Saturday nights he used to stay open 'til the dances were thrown out - used to serve egg and chips and things like that.
ES: And what sort of cafe was it....I assume not a high-class cafe?
DG: No, a normal....I think it would be a workers' cafe. They used to have some lady customers, but not a lot. And it was a cafe where they used to play crib and used to play cards. And it wasn't very big.
ES: Sounds almost like a continental cafe.
DG: Yes. It was quite small and when Dad got rid of it I actually worked for the people that ran it after Dad had gone into the army in the second war, a lady by the name of Mrs. Allen had it and I actually decorated the whole place for her in the 'fifties when I came out of the Navy. I can remember doing it - I used to do it in the evenings for her.
ES: Is it actually where the toyshop was?
DG: No. The toyshop was Mr. Webb's. The toyshop was no. 7, then there's an archway that went to Botsfords, then there was no.9, which was a decorating materials' shop then there was Basil Ellis's father's shop which was a bootmender's, then there was Dad's and then there was Bumpy Harwood the hairdresser. Now Bumpy Harwood was the one that got done over in the barber's chair by his own necktie.
ES: Murdered?
DG: Murdered.
JP: I didn't know he was murdered with a necktie.
DG: Yes, his own necktie. I've been trying to think of the date, but I can't.
JP: It was after the war, wasn't it?
DG: It was the early 'fifties, we think.
ES: Did they ever catch the villian?
DG: Oh yes, and he did himself a favour, or he did the law a favour, because he hung himself.
ES: Who was it then?
DG: It was an Italian sounding name, but I can't think of the name at all, but it's renowned and this last week when they had the thing on ghosts, Bumpy Harwood's ghost was missed out (see Henry Sargeant’s file)
ES: Oh, so say a bit about that then while we're here.
DG: When we lived there there were always rumours that there were ghosts in no. l3.
Not that we ever saw them, or anything like that, there was just this rumour. Hello! (to Jill)
JG. I didn't know whether you'd got coffee but you have.
ES: Yes, very good, too.
JG: Do you want the pot brought in?
DG: Yes, please.
JP: Jill could come in as well unles she's got something........
DG: No, no, no.
ES: It'd be inhibiting!
DG: Yes, I should get told off!
ES: So that was at no. l3, but that's not where that Bumpy Harwood lived.
DG: Yes!
ES: Oh, was it?
DG: No. l3. 11 and l3. That's another thing the town has lost - there were so many barbers' shops in Hertford, it wasn't true.
JP: Yes, just one now, isn't there, just one true barber's shop now, that's 'Gents Hairdressing'....Ivan the barber in Parliament Square.
DG: Mm, well, I would say Mick's a barbers'.
JP: Oh, is, it...it's not a unisex......
DG: Oh, no. Well, he does do ladies, but he doesn't advertise it. The best cutting barber in Hertford is no doubt Mick Hart in Dragon's Yard. For cutting and style and that....Ivan is short back and sides variety.
JP: We've had Ivan actually, on tape; he was very good.
DG: How many cigarettes did he have?
JP: He was doing people's hair so I don't think he was having a cigarette at the time....might have set fire to them! So, was Bumpy Harwood a nice man then?
DG: Not really. He was very very fat, very very bald and didn't like children. I'm afraid we used to tease him as children and he kept himself to himself and he opened more or less when he wanted to and I cannot remember a wife or anything.
JP: You think he was there on his own then.
DG: I think he was on his own. I could ask Mother. If I catch her right she remembers all these things. Mum's gone all arthritic but up here when people get older they remember every single thing.
JP: He features in quite a lot of tapes, Bumpy. People remember Bumpy Harwood.
DG: Oh, yes he was a character. Does Murphy the sweep(George Murphy, 13 Railway Street) feature in any of your tapes?
JP: No, I don't think so.
DG: Murphy the sweep used to live in Railway Street right next door to the fish shop which is still in the same place. After the fish shop there were 2 cottages. I think it was l3 Railway Street but it was exactly right after the fish shop, right next door. And when it finished being Murphy's we actually lived with Murphy for nearly a year because Dad had to pack up his working in mid l939 or else.....he worked himself to the bone, so he rented the premises and then we all moved out into this cottage with Murphy who lived there by himself and we lived there until we got a house to rent in Cowbridge.
ES: And was it a very soot stained.......
DG: ....house? I can't remember. He was quite a cleanish sort of character.
ES: Where did he keep all his gear?
DG: Down the cellar! He had a barrow, and that he used to keep in a yard just a little....do you remember Ibbott's....the dairy (31 Railway Street; also at 6 Port Vale)....he used to keep his barrow in the yard. All on foot, he was an 'on footer' and then I think he probably progressed to a bike.
JP: Was he a serious rival to the Dyes, at all?
DG: No, there were so many chimney sweeps around then.
ES: So many chimneys.
DG: Lots of chimneys and there was always something to do. He was the father of the lady who became Mrs. Cook. Now, Cook's a very famous name that's in Hertford, because many years ago in Bull Plain there used to be 2 fruit stalls. One was one side, one was the other. One was Cook's, I can't remember the other name. Cook's always used to be the Boots side which is now Hinds side and that was Daddy Cook and Daddy Cook had Bob Cook who when the Arcade opened they had the big corner shop, dead opposite my father's cafe, a big corner fruit shop all specially constructed with a lovely show of fruit and everything, and he stayed there 'til he, I think he sold it to Pearks and Pearks moved from Maidenhead Street to the bottom of the Arcade. And Bob Cook then went into Rose's on the corner. (Was Nicholls(?), who arrives after 1943 doodlebug on Mill Bridge. Cooks were also at 12, St Andrew Street)
ES: Oh yes.
DG: My father, when he came out of the army, he worked for Bob Cook in the Arcade, not on the corner, because that'd gone, but there was another empty shop farther up. There was the first bit then there was a bit upstairs to the offices, then there was another shop before Rush's the leatherwork shop, and he ran that when he came out of the army.
ES: So, he didn't go back into the cafe business....how did your father get into the army if he was so....
DG: No, he'd already, no, l939 he had to pack up, he had a whole year's rest then one Christmas Cook's father said'you can come and help on the stall if you like George, do something' and he said 'well, I'll give you a hand' and he did, and in those days he did that and then they had a shop in the Arcade and he said 'I'm going to expand' and he had a shop in St. Andrew Street which was more or less opposite where the doctors are now. Now it's....it was Jimmy Turner's.......a Chinese takeaway now (or next door to)........that was a greengrocer's. Now, he got exempt from being called up for quite a while. He was called up in '42, late '42 he got called up.
JP: These Cooks you were talking about, is that to do with the garden centre?
DG: That's right. Well, Robin Cook was the son of Bob. I'm talking of the Cook before that. I knew all 3 and when old Mr. Cook was quite young I used to go to Spitalfields Market with him and buy the stuff because I knew I'd get a breakfast in the cafes, but I knew I had to get up early in the morning, very early.
ES: My father had a business in Spitalfields - wholesale....Watson and Refell they were.
JP: So, were you the oldest then, or not?
DG: Yes, 2 younger brothers and the youngest brother died, he was the first of the family to die.
JP: He was fairly young, was he?
DG: He was 53.
JP: Well, that's quite young really. And the other one's still alive.
DG: Yes, luckily he's with Mother in Scotland. My young brother moved to Scotland because he put a silly bid in for 3 cottages in a village street on the Moray Firth. A little village called Rosemarkie. It was a ridiculous bid and he didn't think any more of it and 2 years later he found out that his bid was accepted and so he had to sell up and move up to Inverness, turn right and to the Black Isle. And in the end the whole family went there, Mum and Dad went there because they loved it and Dad had nearly a year - the best year of his life up there. They moved up in the July and then my brother rang up round about Christmas and said 'I think you should make an effort to come up - Dad's very poorly and I went up for the New Year; I went up New Year's Day, he wasn't poorly but luckily when I went up it was a blessing in disguise because it was the last time I saw my younger brother and my father alive. My young brother dropped down on night at l0 o'clock in the evening on his lounge floor in front of all the family and Dad lasted 3 weeks longer - he died of a broken heart because he said it should have been him and not Roy.
ES: One thing you could do when you've got the gist of what we do, you could record your mother, couldn't you.
DG: Oh yes.
ES: And it would please her - you've got a tape recorder have you, or you have access?
DG: We have access.
JP: She's still up there?
DG: Mother? oh yes, she's 88 Christmas Day.
ES: So when you were in the cafe, how old were you when you first had to start to help. I'm sure you did.
DG: Quite a young age. We fetched and we carried and I can remember doing jobs. We used to go round to help at Hilton's shoe shop which was in Maidenhead Street. It's Oxfam now and Mr. Brown, can remember him 'cos I used to tear around there and pull all the shoes off the stall in the front and he got fed up with me. He used to cuff me and he said 'I know what I'll do, I'll give you a job'.
ES: How old were you then, l0?
DG: We moved round to Cowbridge in '39 so I was 9, oh no, a lot younger than that.
JP: So you were working at an early age, then!
DG: Oh, yes.
ES: And did you give that money to your parents?
DG: I always, when I used to do a paper round, I used to give all my money to Mother and she used to give whatever she thought back. But unknown to me she used to put it all in my post office book. Old Cross 4l4l.
JP: That's kind, isn't it.
ES: That's mothers for you.
DG: And she did that all the time. When I was grown up and I went into the Navy all the money that came home all went into the post office.
ES: That's was nice, but of course it was good training for you. But did you have to help in the cafe?
DG: Yes, help clearing up. I remember sweeping and wiping tables, especially when I was older and especially fetching the coke up from the cellar.
JP: You were telling me that your father didn't have much room for the preparation of food.
DG: No, on a small landing, on a tiny landing and up here there were steamers, there was a big window, there was a sink and a tiny draining board and the stove, a big gas stove was there; used to have boards across the top of the stairs that went down to the cellar and he used to keep greyhounds in the cellar! And walk them on Hartham and race them at Clapton.
ES: Sounds verging on the unsavoury, doesn't it.
DG: Yes, when you think about it, all these hours he used to put in and he used to walk with his greyhounds and race them at Clapton.
ES: And was it a happy home?
DG: I think so, I can't remember it not being. We didn't get any holidays or anything for the first few years but I can remember us going to Walton on the Naze camping, just. We were taken by Fred Jubb, an old bricklayer who lived in Bengeo Street (number 112). Mother can remember you know, we had to get out and help with the tent.
ES: So, you father didn't really feel the recession did he?
DG: What, in the 'thirties, the early 'thirties? No, no because people always used to come in the cafe to chat and things like that. I don't think they ever had a lot of money but they were always working....this was the trouble.
ES: So you actually lived above the shop, above the cafe?
DG: Yes.
ES: What rooms, what accommodation did you have?
DG: Right. You used to go upstairs and there was a landing.
ES: This infamous landing?
DG: No, no this was the upstairs landing - now the loo was on the landing and just cold water, now there was a table with the water jug and the table had a little shelf underneath; then there was a litle tiny room which was Auntie Frances' room and the aunt lived there and then there was quite a big lounge in Bull Plain, you look up and you see the big sliding windows, well 2 of those were the lounge and then upstairs there was just a big bedroom and another little room which was above Auntie Frances' room but all 3 of us were in the little room. When they were babies they were in the other room with mother. We were allowed in the bedroom but we weren't allowed in the bedroom if we went upstairs - we always had to knock at the door. And I learned to say please and thankyou at a very early age.
ES: You say you got walloped, only as we all did, or were you a naughty child?
DG: Not really - I suppose I was - I wasn't naughty naughty, I wasn't vicious, I wasn't rude or anything like that and I was known to steal a roll off the counter and things like that. Stupid really because I was never really hungry.
JP: So when you said you'd come home and Dad used to hit you with a stick, was that when you'd been naughty at school and told them or for being naughty at home?
DG: No, it was for not coming home, or something like that. Instead of coming straight home from school I'd gone somewhere, or gone to somebody's house and hadn't told them because in those days there were lots of little cottages down Railway Street...the back of Colemans, you'd have friends in there and the back of Woolworths, there were all little cottages in there - lots of little places I used to go and where Sykes is now used to be a jewellers shop - Garretts - and they had 3 daughters but they were all older than us - one of them, Sonia Garrett used to come in and look after us. I remember she used to hear us read and things like that.
ES: And there was a market in Bull Plain in those days, wasn't there?
DG: Yes.
ES: And so that must have affected your father's trade, been good for it, I suppose.
DG: Oh, yes, yes, yes he was always busy. Another thing that Dad used to do, as I was telling you before, when the assizes were on at the Shire Hall and the prisoners were in the cells, their food used to come from Dad's and he used to prance along with his trays of dinners.
ES: It sounds quite Dickensian, doesn't it.
JP: Who were the other characters in Bull Plain, do you remember someone called Whisper Wright?
DG: Yes, Whisper Wright lived down in the cottages, I don't know what number, could work it out, l3 then there was l5 then there was Greens, then there were 3 cottages, l7, l9, 2l Whisper Wright was the last one but there were also Wrights in the middle one. Now Whisper Wright was the caretaker of the Arcade. He was a grumpy old B, his wife was quite a nice lady. When my dad was in the greengrocery business he used to give the Wrights all the rotten fruit and some of the veg if it was right, like swedes and turnips and they used to turn it into home-made wine. Pukker home made wine.
JP: Whisper Wright, Wrights?
DG: No, the middle one. I think Whisper Wright's wife used to make it, but I can only remember the other Wrights. There were 3 sisters together and I can't remember their names, but one of the ladies that lived in the very end house, her name was Butterfield and she came from Bramfield and the guy who works for me has just got married a year or so ago and his wife's father was looked after during the war as an evacuee by these aunts in Bramfield. When Paul got married he was married in Bramfield Church and I was at the reception. I met one of these aunts. I can remember coming to Bramfield when I was a little boy and we used to go to the end cottage just round the corner and she said"their name is Butterfield"and I said"that's right"and she said "there's still one living in Tewin". I went over there and I found this old lady and she remembered me. (In 1943 and for many years afterwards, Mrs Johnson and two daughters (one of whom was called Mary) were at 19 Bull Plain).
JP: Do you then know Joe Quince, because his mother married Whisper Wright?
DG: No.
JP: It was her second marriage and he lived there with them for a time.
DG: No. Where you go past the medical place, clinic or whatever it is called, two cottages are there I think they're still there.
ES: Where you can reverse the car?
DG: That's right, yes, there were cottages there.
ES: Of course one of those, the end one I think, the one that looks as though it's half a hexagon or something, ws where Jim Morris's grandmother lived. Of course the trouble is Don's a different generation to our normal caste of interviewees!
DG: You do quite old ones?
ES: Oh, yes.
JP: Yes, mentioning Joe, he's 74, I think.
ES: Oh, so he's not so old.
JP: No, just Whisper being his stepfather, I heard some stories from Joe about his stepfather. There was also a taxidermist down Bull Plain, wasn't there?
DG: I don't remember him.
ES: Joan Pamphillon lived down there didn't she, was she there when you were there - I think opposite the museum. He was in the fire service.
Side B
JP: I've been very absent minded and forgotten to include Eve Sangster as a named person in this recording - my apologies on tape to Eve - sorry about that, I don't know why!
Now you came out of the cafe in l939 and you went to live in Railway Street for a year.
DG: Or approximately.
JP: Yes. What school were you at then?
DG: I would be.....that's a good question....we went there when I was about 8 or 9....no, I hadn't gone up to big school, had I, so I was still at Faudel Phillips and then we moved to Cowbridge, then it was....."I don't want to go to Faudel Phillips, I want to go to Cowbridge School".....and then I can remember going to Cowbridge School; I can remember my teachers there.
ES: Is that in Dimsdale Street?
DG: Yes.
ES: Who were your teachers?
DG: Miss Doris Stocks.
JP: Oh, yes, a well-known teacher.
DG: Yes, a very good teacher, kept you under control with a foot ruler. I can remember taking coal to school to keep us warm.
ES: Did everybody have to take something?
DG: Everybody who could take a lump of coal took a lump of coal because we had these old tortoise stoves and used to keep it alight and whilst I was at Cowbridge School I had 2 weeks off school. Now, all through my life I've got Sunday School, this school and that school, l00% attendance, good attendance, I never used to miss anything, and that's through chilblains.
I had 5 on each foot and they were all open and I couldn't walk and Miss Stocks who lived in Port Hill used to call in and give me work to do at home and give me essays to write and I still wasn't at big school, so I was 9 or l0.
ES: Where did you live in Cowbridge?
DG: No. l0.
ES: Which is....
DG: On the right going towards Bengeo.
ES: Somewhere near the Liverpool Vic?
DG: Dead opposite the Cowbridge Hall.
ES: They're nice houses.
DG: They're lovely houses. My own father wouldn't sell me that house when He sold it.
ES: Why?
DG: Because he'd already sold it - he'd taken a deposit.
JP: You would have liked it?
DG: Yes! Well, as it happened, you know, but then I got another buyer for him where he would have got another £500 - Farnham the newsagent wanted to buy it and he still wouldn't change his mind, no, because he'd taken the deposit and that was that.
ES: Well, that was right, that was those days, wasn't it.
DG: Whilst I was at Cowbridge during the war, I got up to all sorts of things. Well, during the war Cowbridge Hall was turned into a dining hall for HM Forces and Dad was away. While Dad was home we lived quite well because we could still get our veg and things like that because there always used to be the swapping and then Dad got called up and went away. And Mother had lodgers of all sorts because we had a big house and we had to share the things. And I was paper boy when the doodle bug dropped which was '44 and I was going out to do my papers on Sunday morning in Cowbridge and I actually saw it come over and go down and I was told what to do and I dived under the bush in the front garden. I didn't get a cut or a bruise or anything and Mother come down shouting because she knew I'd gone to do my paper round.
ES: Where you a paper boy at Farnhams?
DG: Yes, and I walked across the road and got my papers and did my paper round.
JP: Did you see the aftermath of it?
DG: Yes.
ES: The Mill Bridge bomb?
DG: Yes, but what I was getting round to say was that when the dining hall was over the road, our whole lifestyle changed because whoever was in there we used to go across and use our wiles and our cudgins and Mum used to have little bits of butter and little bits of marg, bits of bacon and some bread, but our house was always open house - we always had people coming in and Mum used to have ladies come and lodge because their husbands were in the forces.
ES: So she didn't go out to work?
DG: Oh yes, Oh...yes!
ES: What did she do?
DG: She worked in the British Restaurant in Fore Street. She can tell you the tale of the Batersea Grammar School boy who came through the roof and landed right in between the coppers instead of landing on the boiling potatoes or boiling cabbage, he landed in between.
JP: So what was he doing?
DG: He was up on the roof, and it was asbestos sheeting and it broke.
ES: Where was the British Restaurant?
DG: In Fore Street in the Hertford Motor Co. in the back of Hertford Motor Co. which was next door to Elliotts.
JP: The music shop.
DG: Yes. I'm trying to position it on the other side of the road. Well, Hertford Motor Co. was right next door to Charlie Brown's which in those days was a garage, it's now Charlie Brown's, well Charlie Brown's is still there.
JP: Is that the tyre place?
DG: Yes, well now as you are going along towards Ware, that's where the Hertford Motor Co. was.
ES: Almost opposite the Red House?
DG: More or less, yes. Sportsman, the Red House and then there was a gap then there was Elliotts the radio shop which kind of stood back a bit....had a nice big forecourt and then there were the lovely big houses........
ES: Those that we've got the photograph of?
JP: Yes, yes.
DG: ....which used to house the teachers from Christs Hospital and the tax office at one time.
ES: Who ran the dining room for the soldiers in Cowbridge, then?
DG: The army of whichever unit it was. We had the 5lst Highlander Division which got well and truly smashed, we had Americans, we had the Devon, we had the Worcestshires, because 2 of the lady lodgers came from Worcestershire while their husbands were in the army. Hertford was a kind of assembly point for despatching....off they used to go....they used to come to Hertford for their final training preparation and off they went.
ES: I suppose that meant that Hertford was a prosperous town during the war?
DG: Hertford was quite prosperous during the war and 'Balcony Kate' used to ply her wares from the King whatever cottages in Hertford.
ES: What, a tart?
DG: Yeah, Prince Albert Cottages...top one on the left.
JP: What, in Cowbridge....oh, I see!
DG: I didn't know her name but....
JP: Balcony Kate.
DG: Balcony Kate she was called.
ES: Why, did she sit on the balcony?
DG: Stand on the balcony with short skirts on.
ES: Oh, right!
JP: There's hardly any room!
DG: We weren't supposed to look.
ES: I bet you weren't!
DG: We were told not to look, and then the Cooper family that lived next door - you've got the cottages and then you've got an entrance to Dimsdale Street, next door to there was GA Cooper - hewas a signwriter, lots of sons and daughters, 2 daughters and that used to be a little general store and that is where Cecil Cooper, one of the sons set up his electrical business which is now with his sons in Market Place. He actually started....I put his first shop front in....well he had a shop front but I tidied it up for him because he came out of the forces and he started literally selling cleaners and he lived in the little cottage next to the Gospel Hall in Hartham Lane.
ES: We were told that the red light district of Hertford, such as it was....
DG: Diamond pub?
ES: Yes and at the bottom of Pegs Lane - the cottages there.
DG: I can only remember the Gladstone Arms and on the other side was where the taxi man used to live....Mr. Graves.
ES: Yes, I'm not saying he knew anything about it, but I'm not sure when those cottages were pulled down.
JP: Maybe the early 'thirties, before Don was aware of them.
ES: Yes, maybe.
JP: There have been older people telling you that.
E Yes, I somehow thought those cottages came down when the relief road was built, which is reallymost likely - anyway- so this Balcony Kate obviously did a good trade, but a lot for one woman to cater for. A whole regiment....I hope she got a gold medal and nothing else!
DG: Yes, and next door to us was the Liverpool Vic Insurance. He was a very nice man. He had a car and he had petrol and he was superintendent of the Methodist Sunday School in Ware so he used to knock on the door and say "would the boys like to come to Sunday School?" "Oh, yes!" I used to go and my youngest brother used to go but my middle brother didn't go.
ES: He wouldn't be bribed.
DG: No, but we used to get a ride in the car.
JP: That's to Ware.
DG: Yes, to Ware, New Road. I went quite a bit in my early years and I can remember going over there when I was l4. I used to belong to the Methodist Guild.
ES: Were you family churchgoers?
DG: No, and Mum and Dad had a job to get us christened. They were married in a CofE church in Rye House, St. Cuthberts, but when it came to Christenings we were all christened at the Congregational Church in Cowbridge because they were the only ones that would christen us.
JP: Why was that then?
DG: Because Mum and Dad weren't regular attenders. Why weren't they regular attenders?...because they were always working but we were all christened in the Congregational Church.
JP: That's before you went to live opposite.
DG: Oh yes.
ES: So where did you go to school after Cowbridge.....you mentioned something about a Jewish....
DG: No, the Jewish Orphanage came to Hertford during the war and they had to go to a school so they took over Cowbridge School and those in Cowbridge School went on turn and turn about with St. Andrew's School, Hertingfordbury Road which came down when the road went through and I used to like the mornings, but I didn't used to like the afternoons because we used to do turn and turnabout each week.
ES: Were they billeted round the town, the Jewish Orphanage (yes)...did you have one?
DG: No, we didn't have room, because Mother let 2 bedrooms on the top floor. We had one bathroom and we had the other two rooms, and during the war we had, the ones I remember most their name was Togovitch and they were Jews. They came from the East End, they were bombed out and he was a tailor and for many many years he had a stall in Hertford Market, open one. Then he went into the indoor market and he was the one that always sold little boys' trousers. He was a thin man with a moustache and while he was with us they changed their name to Morris. They had one child and they all used to have a go at him because he wasn't called up, but what they didn't know was, he was a fireman in the East End.
ES: So he'd done his bit.
DG: But he lived with us for quite a while. Then after him we had Mr. Bill Smith and his wife. Now, Mr. Smith worked for Botsfords for quite a while as storeman inBull Plain. He was a big fellow with glasses. Before that he worked on the railways as delivery man. The railwlay then used to do lots of parcels and he used to deliver the parcels but we always remember him....he had one son that rose to quite a high position in the Royal Navy but the thing we used to remember as children was that his wife used to play the accordian!
JP: Why do you think the other lodger, the tailor, why did he change his name to Morris?
DG: I don't know. It was something like Torgavitchi...it was quite a long name. No, they lived upstairs but they were very self contained. They used to pass the time of day and pay their rent and that was it. I can remember them there and then the Smiths came. Then we had a lady called Sandra who lodged there for quite a while and then we had Nell Cable who lived with us for a while. I think Nell Cable is still alive but she's gone all dulali - she ended up in the nice little houses in Bengeo....old people's bungalows. Her son is still alive and lives in Ware but she originally lived in the big house in Cowbridge which was just over the bridge on the right. It's still there, there's a kind of garage in front of it. That used to be Mabel's field that was called. there was Mabel and her sister used to live together. was a big stocky fat woman and she used to have an enormous amount of lipstick on - 'inch lips'. (Miss Archer, 12 Chambers Street. Drove Austin 7).
ES: Oh yes, and was it a field?
DG: Yes it was a field, and sometimes she'd let you go in and sometimes she wouldn't. And I think, I may be wrong, but I think ...who was the wholesale potato man in Ware Road?....Taylor, Gordon Taylor. Taylors' Estates...I think he bought that field and Leslie Livings who I went to school with had a garage then he went to New Zealand but he still owns the garage and the people who are in it now rent it, and Leslie lives half time in New Zealand and half time in Hertford now. When he's in Hertford he's in the flat above.
JP: That's Walton Motors?
DG: Walton Motors, yes.
ES: And did you know any of the people in the cottages opposite?
DG: Oh, yes, knew his lordship - get there in a minute - Liverpool MP, large rotund, lived in the end cottage by the river.
ES: Well, we can supply the name.
DG: Oh dear.
ES: I always think first, I know it isn't Dennis Skinner but I always think of him first when I'm thinking.
DG: Yes, there are 3 lovely cottages down there.
ES: I mean, how old was he, was he older than you?
DG: Yes, he was about 67 when he died, he was I should say 8 or 9 years older than me. Harry Lancaster was his agent and Harry Lancaster and his family lived in (33) Molewood Road. He was a local communist man, Harry Lancaster.
ES: How did you know this chap whose name we forget, we'll probably all leap up in the air in the middle of the night.
JP: I know his name, Eric Heffer.
DG: That's right, Eric Heffer. I knew him because we used to get told off - I did things by his garden and things like that -I used to deliver his papers to his mother and father...I can see mother, I can't see father. But he disappeared very early on. Harry Lancaster stayed, he used to put up every local election as the communist candidate. I knew his son very well, I was in the scouts with his son.
ES: Were you interested in politics when you were young or is it only since you've......
DG: No, I'm still not very interested in politics. I know I shouldn't be saying this with my young lady but, no, no I've always lived in a blue household, I can remember that. I can remember Dad saying "no, I'm definitely blue but I can't afford to put a poster up and in those days no businesses would put a poster up in a shop.
JP: No, my father wouldn't, either.
DG: No, it's funny how you remember all these little things that your parents.......
ES: Did you have a Co-op number?
DG: A Co-op number, no we never dealt with the Co-op I must admit. I've only moved house twice and each time I've had the Co-op because someone said they're the best, and the Co-op will probably bury me or burn me, whatever.
JP: Not Scales then?
DG: No, no. I nearly bought Scales once!
ES: What, as a going concern?
JP: Were you going to become an undertaker then?
DG: Well, I don't know whether I'd have done that.
JP: They had a builders' yard, didn't they.
DG: Yes, well builders were the undertakers.
ES: Yes, why is that, why were they so associated traditionally?
DG: Well, builders always have to do the clearing up when anything happened because they were the ones that had the labourers.
ES: And they could knock up a coffin.
JP: They didn't have to do any grave digging....
DG: Oh, yes they did. Ken who used to work for me, Ken Rogerson who worked for me for l6 or l7 years, he used to work for a builder of the name of Reed who lived in Villiers Street and not only did Ken work for him but Ken used to do the undertaking bit as well. Ken used to lay out the bodies and all that business and he used to walk in the front with his suit and he used to help his gov'nor make the coffins and Ken's 73 or 74 and he did this with this gent Mr. Reed the builder of Villiers Street. His yard was in Currie Street. Another thing, the biggest mistake of my life was that I never asked Philip Botsford if I could borrow £2000.
ES: What would you have done with it?
DG: Bought this yard in Currie Street. It belonged to the Cull brothers and I could only raise £l000 and that wasn't enough. For £2000 I could have got the yard and I didn't know. Philip Botsford said "I've ben waiting for years to put one over on those"....he said "you could have had it at a wink" and I said, "sorry Philip, I just didn't think"....I went everywhere, to the bank first and it just didn't work out. The biggest mistake in my life.
JP: Were you friendly with the Botsfords then?
DG: Yes, more Philip than Harry. And I used to like Philip's father (Francis), he was a lovely old gentleman, yes. I was an apprentice boy then and I used to go in the shop a lot.
JP: You weren't apprenticed to them though.
DG: No, I was apprenticed to Ekins.
ES: How old were you, l4 or l5?
DG: Yes, I packed up school, l4 on 6th July, I left school about a week afterwards and that Monday after I left, I was working. I worked for AF Gunner the blacksmith at Old Cross, pumping the bellows. I was only there August, September, October. October '45 Dad came home. He ended up in Greece and if you rememberafter the war the Greeks were fighting each other and Dad ended up in the middle of it. And he came home and he said "how are you getting on with the job?" and he said "I think I want you to be an apprentice" and our back wall looked over Ekins' yard. He went round to the offices of Ekins' and got me an apprenticeship which he paid for.
ES: It's incredible to think from this viewpoint that there were still blacksmiths operating.
DG: Oh yes.
ES: Of course I can remember them.
DG: I can remember all the customers. The Corporation had 3 that used to go round with the carts; McMullens had 6.
JP: It was very much a country town, I mean living in Potters Bar, it was probably more suburban.
ES: Yes, though we had a smith.
DG: Both my friends when I was very young were very good to me in teaching me the ways of life. The blacksmith's name was Ernie Brown and every morning he used to go next door to the tavern and have his lunch, 2 or 3 pints and I was left to file a piece of metal square and if it wasn't right when he came back...........and if anyone wanted to know where he was, he was in the lavatory and he wouldn't be too long. But he was a lovely gentand the man I was under when I was at Ekins, name was Alfred Plummer, and he was a carpenter and joiner, a lovely man, now he was the one that really taught me to say please and thankyou and yes sir and no sir because you can always go round the corner and swear afterwards and he taught me the most valuable thing ever....always give yourself l0 minutes in the mornings. Now think about that, l0 minutes in the mornings. I never rush in the mornings, it's good advice.
ES: Well, it's worked for you over the years, hasn't it.
DG: And he and I built singlehanded, after the war built....there was a certain type of house that came into the country and they were Swedish and they were wooden and they're still uptoday. We built a pair in Birch Green right down the bottom on the right and we built a pair in Sacombe. As you go into Sacombe they're on the right. We pedal cycled to work for both of them and we did the whole lot except the plumbing and putting the roof on, the tiles. We did all the doors, hanging the doors, the floors, the roof rafters, everything, because they're double skinned...they were wood outside, then there's the insulation and the plywood inside and I was, well I wasn't even l5 and I remember planing because he used to give me the lovely jobs - he said "you plane the floor"....all the floor boards were put in.....4 boards and then you had to cramp them right up, then nail them - punch all the nails in -that was another of my jobs. I wasn't allowed to band nails in for a long time, punched them in.
JP: Punched them in?
DG: Punched....once the nail's in you have a punch to punch it below the surface of the wood, then you had to jack plane them which was a big plane so they were all smooth all the way along.
ES: But the designs didn't catch on generally?
DG: No, but they're still there.
JP: Have they got a name, that particular style?
DG: Well, I want to call them Airey houses but they're the concrete ones that were pulled down.
JP: They were similar to look at to those, were they?
DG: Well, no, .......well I suppose they were the same shape but they were lovely boards outside, lovely tongue and groove boards and they all came from Sweden more or less in kit form.
JP: Did you build them for private....
DG: No, built them for Ekins.
JP: They weren't council houses, were they?
DG: Yes they were!
JP: Oh, they were.
DG: Yes, and the houses in Cecil Road were....the chap, Paul's father-in-law lives in one....I can remember when I was a 'prentice boy taking plans and things up to the general foreman up there. Mr. Green. Another things I did early on in my career, I made the framings for all the old prefabs.
ES: So, when did you branch out on your own?
DG: When I was seventeen and a half I was rather buggerlugged that I wasn't going to be called up so I went home and told my father and mother tht I was going to join the Navy and sign the piece of paper. I had to break my apprenticeship - my father was very sad - and I went into HM Navy for 4 years, 9 months ?? th bilateral pes planus.
JP: What's that?
DG: Flat feet. I went in as a l0 stone weakling and came out at l6 stone 4.
ES: Good God!
JP: Good cooking there, was it?
ES: Wasthat flat or muscle, or both?
DG: Well, both. I was mess caterer. I was on a minesweeper and the system was mess catering so I had to look after the food for our mess.
JP: Sampling your own cooking?
DG: Well, I used to do the buying and the getting ready, not the actual cooking. They had chefs who did the actual cooking, but we had to do the preparation and all the rest of it. But then I came out, I was a trained electricial and I couldn't get a job. In those days I used to use the Hertford YMCA.
ES: Oh, that was Railway Street.
DG: Yes, we used to have our teas and coffees and play billiards and snooker and all the older generation....and I must mention here Don Mear (2 Keynton Close), who taught me all my skills in darts, billiards, snooker and table tennis.
ES: All those raffish accomplishments....
DG: ..........and I still have the table tennis bat he made himself and it's still inmy garage to this day. I then met a guy who was very friendly with a mate of mine. Peter Tidd who used to live at the top end of Queens Road (number 91) and he said "oh, you want to see Preston" and Preston had come down from the midlands and he was running a contracting firm for a man of the name of Shepherd who used to do open-cast mining in the midlands and he wanted to start a company in this area. So I went to work for a firm called Mechanised Contractors for l0 months. Well, Mr. Geoffrey Preston who was the surveyo, the chief in charge was being naughty - he was running 2 firms so I saw the writing on the wall even in those days and he said "I don't want you to go because I want you to look after all the Irish navvies" who used to do all the work. And he said "no, no, no," so I went self employed and I worked for them for quite a while and then things caught up with him and he disappeared to South Africa. But I must mention that we havd a couple of lovely holidays in Scotland in a big old Bugatti which he owned! But then I had to find something to do. The first job I ever did for myself was to decorate the big house over the road - AF Gunner's - where I worked (at the blacksmith's) and he said that Ekins had put in a quote for £l4. l8s. and whatever. I said I could do it for £l3 and that was the first job I ever did and I can remember to this day running round and asking my father what to do, and how to do it and I can remember running down to Ekins' yard and asking the plumber man what to do and asking my old foreman what to do and I just started like that. And the first plumbing job I ever did was next door in Liverpool Vic. I had to go out and buy 3 spanners to renew a ball valve and I still have those spanners - they're still being used.
ES: You sort of learned on the job, then.
DG: Yes, literally. But when I was apprenticed at Ekins not only was I uner the joiner man but when the plumber man didn't have a mate, I had to go. When the painter foreman didn't have a made, Donald had to go. Both the foreman painter and the foreman plumber were of the same ilk - miserable old 'Bs' but they used to say well, if you want to take notice, take notice because it's always handy and you never know when you're going to need it and I did. I know how to make a lead joint, I can tell you how many heatings it takes to make a horseshoe.....
ES: How many then?
DG: 7. That's to shape them, holes in and everything, that's from a straight piece of.......'cos I used to have to do this.
JP: How long did you stay living in that house in Cowbridge with your mum and dad?
DG: I went round there, I went in the Navy from there, I went back when I came out of the Navy and I worked from there - I had a sign which is still in the garage, a sign of l0 Cowbridge and I worked from there.
JP: So you first started up on your own from that house.
DG: From that house, yes. And I had, when I was on the contracting firm, we did Ware then I went to Hemel Hempstead, Boxmoor....where I drove a 22 RB - that's a kind of crane with a bucket at the front and we dragged out the river at Boxmoor and we built a thing called a floom to measure the flow of water - I forget what the river is at Hemel Hempstead - I bought my first car which was an old box Ford for 84 pound notes. When I sold it and bought my first van, I was paid for this Ford car I served my apprenticeship on, because everything had to be done on it and I was paid for it in National Savings Certificates and the fellow still lives in Bengeo who bought that car. Yes, and he said "will you accept these! £84 in National Saving Stamps! And then I worked there until I was married, first marriage and I wen to live at Brickendonbury in the farmhouse in Brickendonbury and first marriage lasted l0 months - couldn't stand me and went home to Mummy. And I lived up there for about six or seven years and when I married Jill, Jill lived up ther for 6 months. this is why this year when she had her civic reception we had it in Brickendonbury, by hook or by crook, the wheels turned and she put everything on a plate. She said I'd like it here because I used to live in that house. And they made us very very welcome and it was a very successful do all round. It was lovely.
ES: You say you lived in the farmhouse at Brickendonbury.....where is that then?
DG: As you go up from Brickdon Lane it's the first one on the left...it overlooked towards Brickendon Lane...it was up a bit.
JP: Before you get to the main gates?
DG: Yes.
JP: Before?
DG: No, no after......up the drive.
JP: Oh, you went up the drive.
DG: Yes, I used to put my dog out at the lodge - I had Benjamin - a bearded Collie then - I usedto put him out at the lodge and I used to drive up as fast as I could up to the farm and he nearly always beat me. That dog could run at 45 mph. in short bursts and he used to beat me in the yard. He used to sit by the back door.
ES: So who were your friends when you were at school?
DG: When I was at school?....the Coopers, the Capels who lived in Talbot Street. (Number 7)
ES: Thats C-a-p-e-l...
DG: That's right. A very famous family. Dad was a very famour dustman with a little whisper of curl. (Jim)
JP: Can I ask you, Coopers....C-o-o-p....for when we do the transcript, not the famous Cowpers from....
DG: Not Cowper, no!
ES: Not that famous!
DG: I've just remembered where I went to School, you've reminded me.
ES: What the Cowper School?
DG: Cowper Testamonial School.
JP: Did you call it 'Cooper'?
DG: Yes. My headmaster was Mr. Stalley.
JP: So you know Len Green then.
DG: Yes, Len Green was away in the army. Len Green taught my younger brother. Mrs. Green taught me, but she ran away with an American officer.
JP: Oh, is that what happened?
ES: That's not......
DG: Yes!
ES: What, Len Green's wife?...oh, poor Len.
JP: Well, we're on tape now.
ES: Well, he's not going to hear it.
JP: Well he is, he listens to them all.
ES: Well he doesn't have to listen to this one.
JP: I won't show him this one. Well, I did know that something happened but he's never told me what actually happened.
DG: No, no he was away in the war and he lived at North Road and she got involved with and American officer and he came back and she wasn't around. It was very tragic. There were no children.
JP: No, but I think she took his job, didn't she?
DG: Yes, she worked at school - I can see her now - she was a very very good English teacher she was, she was excellent and she wouldn't stand any nonsense.
JP: Was she quite pretty, nice looking?
DG: No, striking as against a darling. She was quite large - she used to wear posh sweeping goggles - glasses up here.
JP: Did she? Oh, OK.
DG: Yes, there was 1a, 2a and 3a there and 1b,2b and 3b - they were all famous teachers, Mr. Marks used to throw chalk at you and Charlie Booker who was a right dapper, he ran 3b and he lived in North Road Avenue. I've just remembered my first headmistress.
JP: Was that at Faudel Philips?
DG: No, this would be late juniors - I don't know whether the war was over, or things changed - anyrate Cowper School (Cowbridge I think!)....then went to Port Vale. Port Vale was then the senior girls' school and then Cowbridge School all went up to Port Vale.....and my headmistress there was a Miss Bradbeer.
JP: Oh, I've been reading about her...I've done, I've been through the log books of what was called 'the British School' - Cowbridge and yes, she features largely in these log books.
DG: Miss Bradbeer?....yes, I can remember doing knitting in Miss Bradbeer's. We used to have to knit; we used to have to fold our arms behind our backs.
ES: Did you ever do fraying at school?
DG: Fraying?
ES: Yes, because I was at school during the war and we had fragments of material and we used to fray them into their separate threads.
DG: No, no I used to knit dishcloths.
ES: Yes, I did too, I'd forgotten that until you said it. What happened to those dishcloths, did they go to the war effort?
DG: I think they did, yes.
ES: Cor, what little heros we were.
DG: When I went to Scotland for the summer, my mother said "we never did get anything for our railings!" They say now they were never used, they were dumped. They were only a kind of morale booster exercise. People gave all their pots and pans and railings and thought they were helping the war effort. In actual fact they were dumped in a trench in the ocean between England and Ireland.
JP: Shame because we could have done with them all back - the walls were spoiled.
ES: Certainly could. So can you remember who your best friend was? I don't know why I'm intrigued..............(pause).
JP: You said Cooper and Capel....
DG: Yes, they were early on. Maurice Hawkins was always a good friend at the junior school. Now, Maurice, I haven't seen him for ages. He was about a year older than I am. I played rugger with him at the Rugby Club.
ES: Did you have a nickname when you were young?
DG: Yes, Rabbit - I had big front teeth and I had very good dental treatment when I was at junior school and at the clinic an Austrian dentist did lots of my fillings and I think 2 of them are still in there. Every time I go "who put those in?" you know! They've been in there for yonks.
That still doesn't answer the question of my best friend then. He lived in Railway Street, his dad was driver for Dyes and I think his name was Young - he had crinkly curly hair and I was always round his house. When I said I was home late, that's where I was. I used to get tea and toast...I couldn't get it at the cafe! (Golly Game)
JP: Whereabouts in Railway Street?
DG: Where Molly Warner's was, then there was another shop then there was an alley and then there was the first cottage....in those days........they're all shops now....there's one cottage left.
ES: That's where Ronald Mills lived. You didn't know the Mills?
JP: Second hand shop.
DG: No, no, Sonny Neal lived in the last cottage, I think he's just died. His wife's there.
JP: Joan.
ES: Oh, Joan Neal.
DG: Yes. Sonny Neal was a great table tennis player, his brother George Neal who was (Deputy) Town Clerk, was a great table tennis player. They all used to play for the YMCA. They were the first team.
JP: So how many cottages down from that was where the Youngs lived?
DG: Right on the end, so I should think it was about 1,2...about 4 there and Dan Dye the mayor lived in the one next door to Sonny Neal. I think it could have even been the end one.
JP: We'll look in the street directory. They didn't have a business, then, the Youngs?
DG: No, he was a driver for Dyes when they had their coaches. He was one of my best friends and I'm trying to think of one round the back of Woolworths.
JP: Maidenhead Yard?
DG: Well, that was what it was officially called, yes.
ES: What did you think it was called, or didn't you think it had a name?
DG: I can't remember it having a name but it wasn't Maidenhead Yard.
JP: Was it Dolphin Yard?
DG: No, Dolphin Yard's off Maidenhead Street.
JP: That's right. It wasn't Adams Yard?
DG: No, that's the next one.
JP: Nicholas Yard? I've just discovered that some of the photographs in the museum are actually called Nicholas Yard.
DG: I should know, because I used to deliver papers there. I can still remember my paper round off pat. I can tell you what books they had....the Mercury, or what.
ES: Go on then, give us a sample.
DG: Right, you come out of Farnham's shop. The Ship pub jused to have the Sketch.
ES: Oh God! Two old names at a stroke!
DG: I then used to go to Pharoah's.... she used to have the Chronicle. I then used to nip across the road to the baker's......it was the Daily Mirror. I then went to the cottage top of Hartham Lane, that was another Mirror. I then used to run down the road and the Unicorn pub was the Sketch, beg pardon, before the Unicorn pub there were 2 cottages, one of them was Browns the old sports shop ("Home of Sports", 18 Castle Street) ....he used to be on the War Memorial, used to have the Daily Herald, then there was the sketch in the Unicorn pub, and then there were 2 Mirrors in cottages there; around the corner there was the Daily Express, then I used to start down Thornton Street. There was about 4 Expresses in that stretch.....then there was another Mirror then I used to have to kind of double back on the other side and then I used to go down Old Hall Street.
ES: What did you get for it?
DG: When I first did it, 2/- comes to mind.
ES: And was this weekly?
DG: No, I used to do Sundays as well.
ES: Saturdays and Sundays?
DG: No, the whole week, 7 days a week.
ES: Cor, the whole week for 2/-!
DG: No, I used to get extra on Sundays and I used to finish up in Bull Plain.... the cottages you were mentioning, Whisper Wright's there. Then I used to run back round to Mill Bridge.
ES: Quite a nice little round.
DG: Oh yes, it was close knit and you could lean over, you could lean over fences and do twos.
ES: And that's important, isn't it.
DG: I had a big row with Farnhams once and so I went to work for Spriggs which used to be down on Cowbridge, but that was a terrible round. that was Port Hill, Bengeo Street and finish right down those houses at Sacombe Road, then the Five Harts or 3 Harts pub. That was the last delivery.
ES: Last straw I should think.
DG: I was on a bike then, I was older then. I gave that up and I went back to Farnhams
and I had another row and I went to work for Mr. Hebbes at WH Smith at the North Station.
I lasted one week.
JP: Did you get on with him?
DG: No.
JP: Why was that?
DG: I had to call him 'Sir' and I had to jump and if I was a minute late he argued, so I said I wouldn't be coming any more. "You've no stamina" and all that. Now I see he lived in West Street, didn't he and I went back to Farnhams.
JP: They kept having you back at Farnhams.
DG: Yes, oh yes. Beaky Farnham as Ruffles calls him. He had a huge nose and there was always a drip on the end of it.
JP: The father of....
DG: The father of Bob who's now retired and lives at North Road Avenue. He's got a good tale to tell.
JP: Do you think we should get Bob on tape?
DG: He'd be a good one to get on tape because he's a newsagent....rattle, rattle, rattle, he chased after....his wife was married to an air force pilot who got killed.
JP: Bob's wife, or the father?
DG: No, Bob who was the son of Beaky. He married this lady whose hubby was an air force pilot and got killed in the war. But she was rather a madam and still is a madam I think. But he'd be a good one.
JP: How old is he then, because....
DG: Bob is 74, 75.
JP: Oh, I was thinking he was younger than that.
DG: No, you see, he went in the war. And if they went in the war they are now 72.
ES: Yes, that's right.
DG: 72, 'cos Ken who worked for me, he was in the back end of the war and he's 73, so that's the way.
JP: She must have been very young then when she lost her husband.
DG: Yes, oh yes. I can remember her coming in the shop and things like that when I used to go over and do the evenings sometimes.
ES: So, what did you do for entertainment when you were young?
DG: When I was very young? Not a lot. We used to play in the street quite a bit and used to go at one period ....into the hall of the Ebenezer Strict Baptist when it was in the middle of the road. They used to have a litle kind of meeting....it wasn't until I got older that we started doing specific things. I went into the YMCA at a very early age.
ES: And that provided a lot of your entertainment?
DG: It did. I think I must have been l5 or l6 when I first went in because when I was in the Navy and I used to come home at weekends I still went into the YMCA. It was a kind of a meeting point, you'd get a cup of tea and you'd chat, and things, play whatever....and it was always warm, they always had a good fire.
ES: But you went to the pictures, presumably?
DG: Oh, yes, a great picture one, 'cos we had the Castle.
ES: And the Saturday morning pictures you'd have gone to?
DG: Yes, at the Castle, and then there was the Regent which closed. When the doodle bug dropped, now that was at the end of the war, when I was an apprentice boy the doodle bug came down. There was bad damage to the Castle cinema and I helped to completely re-do the ceiling with Alf Plummer (1, Tower Street) - and we re-did the ceiling with a boarding called Tentesse board. It's like a soft cardboard about that thick and it breaks up and we tacked it....pulled down the old plaster and we tacked it up and we put a big piece, a smaller piece and a smaller piece to form a tighter pattern and then they came in and sprayed it and then all the powers to be came in and stood about clapping their hands for the acoustics because also when it damaged it one side of the roof, it was a slated roof, went, and they didn't have slates to replace it so that side, they felted it but the other side was still slated.
ES: So slightly upset the balance.
DG: It did. But the acoustics were better when we did it than before! So every time I used to go in the pictures I used to look up....I did that! Yes, I was allowed to bang in the nails there...every 4 inches. I think there was old fashioned spacing for the rafters which was l4 inch centres so when you were on a rafter it had to be every 4 inches and you had to measure them and every nail had to be........even though they were going to be gunged up and no one was going to see them. A piece of wood 5 feet long, I can see it now and they were all marked off. Yes. Yes, he lived in Tower Street, old Plummer. I missed him when he died. I used to come home on leave and go and see him. Ernie Brown the blacksmith died when I was in the Navy. I used to see him as well - he died quite suddenly ....he wasn't old old at all, he died in his late 'fifties. Another good thing at Cowbridge, there was a fish shop, a wet fish shop on Cowbridge....not the fish and chip shop in Dimsdale Street. There was a wet fish shop on the corner, which is now Bob Hill's motor cycle shop ......that was Fosters the wet fish shop. Used to sell wet fish and veg. Now, he was quite a good friend ....John Foster, now John Foster's still alive and he lives in...very tall...a couple of years younger than me and he lives in Sele Farm. John Foster, he looked after his mother for years, never married.
J So quite a few names coming out here...was Earles the butchers still.......
DG: Yes, butchers was still there. I can see him now with his straw hat on and his lovely apron, the boss man.
JP: Where exactly was it?
DG: Where the Empire takeaway is. Exactly there and Mr. Earle used to live above the shop, and the Bell and Crown, that's where I spent VJ Day, no, VE Day...all this area, they had the party down Chamber Street because it was off the main road. VJ Day I spent in Clacton with the scouts and we were on Clacton front with bonfires, yes, Mr. Wilf Brown was our scoutmaster.
JP: Was that Baden Brown's father?
DG: That's right, 3rd Hertford. I was thrown out of the scouts.
JP: Why?
DG: Why? Throwing flour bombs at the scoutmaster and turning off the gas. Our clubhouse was the Company of Players' Theatre. When I go in there with my wife I say I remember when I used to say "Bridges/Breeches Baldock"...that was my corner.
JP: So you think you had quite a good boyhood?
DG: Oh yes, and going away in the Navy, it did a power of good. I'd seen half the world by the time I was 2l and I was home for my 2lst birthday.
JP: Yes, excellent - well done.
ES: It didn't make you think it was a provincial place?
DG: No.
ES: You appreciated it?
DG: People who say they don't appreciate Hertford, what they want to do is what some of them do, they go away on their holidays and they come back and they decide it's not too bad.
JP: No, it's nice to get back home, isn't it.
DG: I come back home and I go up in my bathroom and I've got a 30 mile viewing point from my bathroom....all the way round.
ES: What were your grandparents....you say your parents were from London.
DG: All I remember of my grandparents....Mum none at all; Dad's mum died very early on and Mum's dad died when she was about l4. She was brought up by Auntie Lil - another Auntie Lil because Dad had an Auntie Lil - and some of Mum's family had to go into a home until they got a little bit older and then they came home, because Dad was a bit of a tippler.
. Side B
DG: Cable Street (home of grandparents).
ES: Is that the Isle of Dogs?
DG: No, Cable Street's....no, the Isle of Dogs is farther down the river...not too far from the City, Cable Street...going down the river. We went up to the Houses of Parliament and we filtered through the back way, we went all the way along the river from the 'barrage' and it was a job trying to recognise the place. My grandparents that I remember had a general store in Ponders End, Durance Road.
ES: My grandparents had a general store in Ponders End, I think it was, or was it Balls Pond Road...would it be Balls Pond Road, Ponders End or not?
DG: No, where they were it was definitely Durance Road. It wasn't too far from Ponders End Station and I can remember going over there as a boy and seeing all the general store. It was a general store that sold everything..sweets, paraffin, the whole lot and Grandaddy was quite a big man, Grandaddy was a farrier, but he was a naughty boy and he married below his station - he put a servant girl in the pudding club and so he was given the proverbial shilling and off.
ES: Did he marry her?
DG: Oh, yes, he married her and they had my Daddy, Uncle Bert, Auntie Lil and Auntie Gladys. 2 boys, 2 girls. Auntie Lil remains. She was the one who stayed alive and stayed with Mum, looked after Mum and then she went to South Africa and she's now in a home in Ware and we're her only....we look after her, but she's gone - I walk in there and you have to tell her who you are.
JP: Is she ninety something?
DG: No, she's 86, very hale and hearty, always eating.
ES: But you could do a tape with your ma, couldn't you?
DG: I think it would be a good idea and she would enjoy doing it.
ES: She would enjoy doing it and it would bring back things to you if you start with her - oh, do you remember....if you don't mind.
DG: I'll try and go up New Year and I'll se what's what.
JP: Well, thank you very much, this is wonderful.
DG: I haven't told any porkies, my wife said I mustn't tell any porkies.......not to my knowledge!