Let's Reminisce.

[Margaret Pilkington]

And for that I am truly thankful.

[monkey hanger]

[QUOTE=dotti34;1242550]More memories – a train ride to the illuminations with my mum every year,

did you get those cheap half day train excursions where they seemed to use the oldest carriages that were available and returned home at midnight or later. as for what we called mischief night i thought it was in the same week as bonfire night as the hated halloween hadn,t drifted across the atlantic back then.

[monkey hanger]

moving on a little to our early teens in the early 60,s. we seemed to have a number of youth clubs around in those days when we started to realize that the opposite sex existed in a different form than they did even a few years earlier. its the efforts all seemed to put into their appearance back in those days. being a shy lad with lasses back then you had to be noticed. being an early developer physically i was shaving from 12 years old. i always made doubly sure i had no bum fluff present and spent more time in the bath room, shoe polishing and then trouser pressing that would be laughed at by kids nowadays. jeans on a saturday night was a no go unless you wanted lasses to laugh at you.

[taddy]

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

Apologies Taddy..it was Monkey hanger who mentioned mischief night...which explains why I could not find it in your posts.

No need to apologise Marge, maybe you had a touch of "Screen Burn"

[Margaret Pilkington]

Yes, I definitely had a touch of something..it wasn't HOBGOBLIN either

[pifco]

About 6 months ago I was telling a young lad about the railway line that ran through Priestley Clough and there was a bridge in Mount Street when he asked me where Mount Street was I said go to the end of Factory Bottom and that's the street that goes across. "Factory Bottom?" "Yes it was called that because it was factories from one end to the other and they were large mills and "Workers Playtime" was broadcast from two of them at least".
"Your pulling my p***er, workers playtime really, I'd get checked out for dementia if I were you". A couple of days later I met the lads mother "Our Jimmy's been telling me about chatting to you, Did you mean Victoria Street?" "Yes" I said, and she just nodded her head, give me a funny look and walked off and I started wondering if I did remember things properly.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Yes, the Railway line DID go at the back of the factories and the start of Priestley Clough....the Railway bridge was over Nuttall St....near the junction of Nuttall St and Belfield Road.
The Factories were Warburtons and Highams....there was a sewing room too.The Cotton Club was on Nuttall St....and it was the social venue for the factories....the panto and the children's Christmas parties were held there.....and I think there were dances from time to time.
Mount Street and Bath Street were at the Marsden st end of Nuttall St.
I think that Workers Playtime was broadcast from the big canteen at the corner of Victoria St.

I know these things because I lived up there until I was 19....both of my parents worked at the mills at one point or another...and it was a lovely place at that time....a real community.

[walker]

Remember home made trolleys (go carts). Kite flying also raiding other kids bonfires for their wood. Happy days.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Oh yes.....our lads had a trolley which they built themselves.
During the summer we used to slide down the hill...on the grass, on tin tea trays.....we got into trouble for picking gas tar from between the cobbles, mainly because we got it on our clothes and Mick(my brother) managed to get it into his hair.
He ended up with a shaved head.
Ma was ruthless.

[Margaret Pilkington]

And Mick was hairless.

[lol1944]

Spent many happy hours up Priestley clough but for the life in me cannot remember the name of the clough that was at the very end of Richmond Road. And Cockleum? Cannot remember where it was or how we got there.

[dotti34]

Okay, Margaret, so here’s another one. My brother (7 years older than me) was called William, and he often went searching for conkers so the school’s headmaster called him William the Conkerer (pardon the play on the spelling). One day my brother took me off to find some conkers, I was only a little thing but he let me tag along. We were a fair way from home when we came across a field which had a ‘No Trespassing’ sign but also had the horse chestnut trees which we were looking for.

We were doing no harm and we had got some conkers but wanted more. My brother had just started to climb another tree when we suddenly heard a shout ‘you little buggers, wait ‘til I catch you’. Sure enough the farmer had driven fairly close without us hearing his car. The door had been taken off the car for some reason and he was attempting to get out. He had a long stick that I’m sure he would not have hesitated to use on us, but the silly man had the stick sideways and it was blocking his exit from the car. Also being fat didn’t help him.

I can still remember my brother throwing the conkers towards the man and pulling me along to escape – I wasn’t very old and I couldn’t run fast but somehow he managed to get me over fences and once again to freedom. Of course we didn’t tell my mother.

[dotti34]

More things that come to mind. Liberty bodices (don’t ask!), camphor square hung round neck, Fennings Fever Cure, Malt and Cod Liver Oil, Cod Liver Oil on its own – yuk!, thick pink square of some sort of padding (can’t remember what it was called) held against chest by the liberty bodice, so many things to ward off colds – but I still got them……

If I had been ill and was still in bed recovering my mum would buy me an orange or a peach (wrapped in its special paper) from the fruit and veg man when he was selling his wares in our street, as this was sure to make me well again, having got magic powers (or so I believed). The peach especially was not cheap and so I don’t know what my mum had to do without to buy this for me.

Toffee being made for a treat. Stirring, stirring. Testing it on a saucer of water.

[dotti34]

I said earlier that I encouraged my own children to be adventurous – well they were and they did build go-carts and went off for the day with them, and when they came home I never asked……

[monkey hanger]

fennings fever cure. thats a real memory as my old man, who passed his perma cold onto me and my sister, swore by the stuff. tried it once, i prefered keeping the bad cold.