Bedford Falls Revisited

 

Bedford Falls Revisited

One of my seasonal favourites. Thought I would show it again just to get in the Festive mood.....

It's a wonderful film and yet, as with most works of genius it was not recognised in its own time. Perhaps its sentiment in 1946 was too nice for a world emerging from war and austerity. It has at it's root laudable themes of brooding unhappiness , selfless service to the community, heartless business and contemplation of suicide and not that many pitch battles, bombing missions, beach assaults and no notable explosions which were otherwise popular movie features of the period.  It represented a return of humanity and values that had been sacrificed or as the lead character, George Bailey, played by James Stewart remarks 'all is fair in love and war'.

I am of course referring to the Frank Capra movie of "It's a Wonderful Life"

It's a regular event in our family to watch the DVD in the run-up to Christmas. It does rank and climbs the poll every year as the best Christmas film of all time although my son still contends that Die Hard (1) would be hard to be pushed off top spot. Recently , a re-digitised and colour version was released but to really appreciate the heart warming emotions it has to be seen in original black and white. The movie does impact in all its glory on a small domestic TV screen, especially when cocooned in a duvet on the sofa and surrounded by loved ones. In the privacy of my own home I will be a bit misty eyed by about 30 minutes into the running time and completely useless and blubbering for the duration. I issue a spoiler alert at this stage but you must, if not familiar with the film, just watch it, wrapped up, with family or close friends and keep some tissues up your sleeves.

It's a rare privilege therefore, some 66 years after the release of the film, to get an opportunity to see it on the big screen in a cinema. It is something altogether different to contemplate being seen crying in a public auditorium. In my favour the screening was in a town some distance away from my home and so there was a low to acceptable risk of bumping into a friend or acquaintance. I had mentioned to colleagues and just passers by in the street, in the preceding weeks, that this was on the cards but was very careful not to divulge the location, day, date and time. I was astounded by the number of blank expressions from those with no knowledge of the film although the enthusiastic reminiscences from the majority did outweigh those poor unfortunate and unfulfilled souls.

It's a small cinema, one of the very few still surviving in a market place setting in a commuter town. The nearest multiplex would be around 20 miles away in the nearest cities which will have helped it to persist. I would willingly have paid more than the £4 admission charge which did include a glass of sherry and a micro-mince pie. Forget your deep and plushly upholstered back massaging, centrally heated and wired for sound luxury seating and just get comfortable if you can in a blue cloth wrapped bucket. Not much chance of being seduced into a sleep for the duration which is all good. I have often paid £12.50 to Odeon , Vue and Cineworld Cinemas ostensibly for a film but actually for a fitfull drift in and out of consciousness in that luxuriant heavy eyed feeling. Most blockbuster films are a mystery to me in terms of the main plot as I am only awake for the very beginning and the final chaotic few frames, usually involving silhouetted figures and a sunset.

It's an exciting moment when the lights dim and the big screen lights up into action. The quality of the film was fantastic although I may have been secretly disappointed that there were no bromide-brown blobs, dancing string-like blemishes or curses from the projection room over scorched and melting celluloid. I was immediately transported back in time as though at a small town Premiere of It's a Wonderful Life. The lack of legroom to a baby boomer like myself would not have constituted a problem to a post war audience in the UK, what with emaciation from many years of rationing, staple food deficiences and premature curvature of the legs from rickets.

It's a revelation to see the drama unfold on the big screen. Although I have seen the movie at least annually for the last decade or so the super sized images added a completely fresh dimension and it was as though I was seeing it for the first time. In close-up and at 4metres full on,  the facial expressions of James Stewart are even more magnificent and as for the lead actress, Donna Reed, well she's got a very good complexion and skin tone which is not always apparent on my Sony TV at home. There was a warning on the advertising poster of mild violence for the more sensitive in the audience. In the context of the film and it's era it was acceptable, or so it was portrayed, to slap around shop staff, throw stones at houses, verbally abuse primary school teachers, drink drive and make mad and violent love- you know the sort, fully clothed, no actual physical contact and with both feet on the ground to get past the Film Censors.

It's a therapeutic sound to hear a large group of people laugh and weep at alternate moments but generally in unison. I had just about got acclimatised to the seat when the film finished. Where had the time gone? As the audience reluctantly got up to go and in rather harsh lighting it was normal service resumed in human interaction or the lack of it. We all, me included, kept our heads down for fear of showing a weakness in our tear streamed faces. The waste bin at the exit was nearly full of damp Kleenex when I reached it and coaxed out the soggy contents of my left sleeve. A few small family groups lingered and reassured each other in quite a public display of fondness which was both nice and a bit cringey in equal proportions.

It's a funny thing but on the pavement outside, in the minus one degree of a mid December night in a Yorkshire town it felt a bit like the Bedford Falls of the film. It was not so long ago that there had been, like in the film, a run on the bank. There will be many that we know personally who feel trapped in their current lives when in their carefree youth they had magnificent plans to travel and undertake adventures. We all will have felt a degree of despair, anxiety and depression at some time. It is ultimately important , however to remind ourselves that we all contribute in some way to the lives of those around us whether through supporting our families and friends or just through a kind word or deed to a complete stranger.

It's in our power to make it a really wonderful life. Get busy.

James Bond at Christmas

 Back by popular request, I wrote this a few years ago now but in the fictional World of Bond nothing goes out of date.It revolves around a local hotel which has been advertising, amongst its seasonal events what they call a 'James Bond Christmas'. 

Here goes........

Commander Bond lay under the duvet cover. The distant sounding of church bells reminded him that this was indeed Christmas Day.

He had got in at about 9.30pm from yet another of  'M's festive gatherings. It had not been that exciting. He had returned alone. Moneypenny had gone home even earlier, after all she was an old lady and no fun. M's quiche had made him a bit bilious and the dry martini's had not been enough to quell the acidity in his stomach.

He let one go under the heavy winter tog rated bedding and casually wafted it away into the gradually increasing natural light of his flat.

What to do for Christmas Day?

He swung a leg out, feeling for the thick pile of the carpet. Pulling his heavy built form upright he found that his Onesie had ridden up during the night with some constriction of his lower abdomen. It was a legitimate reason for a prolonged scratch and re-arrangement of his undercarriage.

The flat was cold and he cursed not mastering the central heating thermostat in the twenty years and more of his occupation. He had no time for manuals. 'Q' had been kind enough to show him the settings for instantaneous hot water and radiator heating. They had been very similar to the afterburner controls on Little Nelly. A nasty and expensive quarterly gas bill had been the consequence of a degree of confusion on one occasion.

A light, healthy breakfast appealed to him. Those long sessions at the Casino in recent years had ruined his physique .He had contracted and only just recovered from a nasty virus from , he suspected, the sampled contents of a small bowl of mint imperials at the coat-check counter near the toilets in Monte Carlo.

He was disappointed by the contents of the fridge. The orange juice was 'with bits' which he had bought from M&S without checking. He infinitely preferred smooth. No yoghurt, no bran or porridge oats so he settled for a lump of cheese and half a packet of cream crackers. The Onesie successfully captured any fragments of the flaky Lancashire and biscuit crumbs in its thick, luxurious velour giving the faux tiger-skin print the appearance of a dandruff outbreak.

Living the life of a bachelor, out of the normal hours of his regimented and disciplined professional assassin duties, the living room was a tip.

He stumbled over a collection of take-away cartons,pizza boxes and discarded clothing-disappointingly all his. A pint glass full of the discarded shells of pistachio's fell and rolled across the parquet floor gradually decanting its contents. A few well place martial arts kicks cleared the rest of the debris under the DFS corner suite and Ikea wall unit. The DVD's would have to be sorted later from an unruly pile. The movie of 27 Dresses at the top caused him to pause and recall how he had enjoyed the plot and sentiment of such a well structured and acted rom-com.

As Commander Bond dragged the Dyson bagless around the room he made an instinctive check for any signs of intrusion whilst he had been at M's reception. Trip wires and carefully adhered strands of his chest hair were still in situ. It was disappointing not to be the subject of any nefarious intentions during the holiday season. How was he expected to keep his hand in?

The number of Christmas cards on the mantelpiece was well down this year. This was, he mused a combination of how convincing his manufactured death had been earlier in the year resulting in many deletions by Facebook friends and the trend amongst fellow assasins to have to kill each other.

The unsigned, oversized padded card depicting an alpine scene was definitely from that rascal Blofeld. He had a decent sense of humour under that serious visage of world dominating villainy.

The morning passed quickly. Feeling peckish after his exertions of a man's comprehension of cleaning and hoovering he chipped away at the slab of ice which had consumed his freezer compartment and recovered a couple of ready-meals which would do nicely for his Christmas dinner. The combination of Tikka Massala and Hot Pot was novel but palatable. Dessert was a bit more of a challenge but the Angel Delight was soon whisked into a firm peak that briefly and erotically reminded him of past conquests.

The controllers at the 'Licenced to Kill' desk deep in the MI5 building received a message from Bond on the restricted scrambled channel and they duly sent him the TV listings for the rest of the day . He did not expect HM The Queen to expand on their skydiving antics into the Olympic Stadium in her traditional address to the nation. He knew she had enjoyed it on an altogether private level by her whoops and screams and covert and playful cupping of his groin on the descent through the late July sky over London.

Next he knew, it was dark outside the flat. He had dozed off, sprawled across the settee, and with a dribble of spittle running down his chin, a faint essence of butterscotch discernible. Annoyingly he had missed the blockbuster film and no-one had availed him of the operational details of the i-player.

The Strictly Christmas offering thrilled him for the rest of the evening. He would never be asked to participate on the dance floor because of the intricacies of his professional lifestyle.This was a major regret.  His enjoyment of Downton Abbey had been tempered by his instinctive identification of access and escape routes in the stately home and the best place to set off a diversionary explosion for maximum mayhem amongst the sinister looking below stairs staff, all ex KGB without doubt. Lady Mary was definitely a deep cover operative, for sure.

The latter part of the day was now dragging. The invitations to a 'Christmas At Home' from a selection of gangsters, sociopaths and the criminally insane remained on his antique escritoire, opened but not responded to. A threat of menace and a long monologue about blah, blah, ransom, blah, blah, extortion, blah, blah, gold reserves and the prospect of a scorching of nether regions by a high powered laser was now of some attraction when in the past it had just been part and parcel of the job.

It was a pity that he had not forged better links with those he had collaborated with on his missions. That Felix Leiter was a personable chap but obviously had problems of self image based on his frequently radical changes in appearance and skin colour.

He poured himself a Baileys over ice (chipped flakes from the freezer compartment) and gorged himself to the point of being nauseous on the After Eights, a raffle prize at 'M's with the proceeds going to support the families of disavowed agents.

James Bond contemplated starting a diplomatic incident to alleviate his boredom. A convincing non-nuclear conflagration of the Home Counties was well within his capabilities from just the contents of his lock up garage in Twickenham.  His life story, auctioned to the tabloids would keep him in the style in which the public perceived him to exist.

In reality and out of abject loneliness he found that crying himself to sleep on Christmas night was a form of light and therapeutic relief. 

As always, he firmly believed that it would be so much better next year..........

Queen Elizabeth the Second (to open the Humber Bridge)

 It was, back in the early 1980’s, just a bit of harmless fun. 

If we attempted the same today we would, for certain,be shot on sight. 

Giggling a bit, as excitable 17 year olds are prone to do, a group of us made our way up a steep grassy bank and there in front of us was the splendour of the Humber Suspension Bridge. 

It was a mass of activity on the eve of the formal opening ceremony by Queen Elizabeth II which was to take place on 17^th July 1981. A grand civic event it was to be. 

After all, the structure was the longest single span suspension bridge in the world , a major feat of technical and civil engineering and deserving of accolade and acclaim. 

Work had begun way back in 1972 with the North Tower completed some two years later on the hard chalk bed rock of the Humber Bank. The need to establish the South Tower in a caisson to counter the shifting mud of the river meant it was a further couple of years before the task of spinning the cables to support the box road sections could begin. 

The sections, prefabricated on shore and then floated into position took from the autumn of 1979 until the following summer to be lifted and fixed to allow the road surface to be laid. 

Although the visit of HM The Queen was to be the highlight of the £90 million project the bridge was actually useable by traffic in June 1981 as a test period. The infrastructure features of the visitor car park and Toll Booths were well established and from the former we had started our stunt. 

Only one of us, all still at school, had a driving licence and use of a car at that time and so Dave, his real name, being that person was the natural choice to take centre stage in what we had planned. 

It should also be said that Dave was the only person with access to a formal dinner suit or tuxedo and although this was his fathers it was a reasonable fit. 

In a bid to tidy up for the ceremony the concourse in front of the north tower booths was littered with building materials and stray vehicles of contractors and the Bridge Board but this provided good cover for us. We were also out of the line of vision from the futuristic Control Room Building which was an advantage against detection. 

Like a well oiled machine we all knew our roles. Two of us attached the stringy ends of multi coloured cotton bunting to respective sides of one of the booth lanes and Dave, with his Mother’s best dress making scissors, made a ceremonial incision accompanied by a short speech along the lines of “God Bless the Bridge and all who cross over her”. I was not sure then as now whether a bridge is of the feminine gender. 

The fourth member of our clique took a few photographs as a permanent record of the event. 

Dave does the deed

We must have looked very dodgy and furtive but at no time were we approached or challenged by anyone of authority. This accentuated our feeling of elation and success although in truth we may just have been one of a succession of students with the same prank idea and that the Bridge Staff,  tired of being distracted ahead of the Royal Visit,  just turned a blind eye to our adolescent behaviour. 

The whole thing took just a few minutes but (sadly) forms one of the most satisfying moments of my otherwise very conventional and boring teenage years. 

As far as I know the official ceremony went off well but then again not surprising as our dress rehearsal will have ironed out any potential difficulties that the Queen may have experienced on her and the Bridge’s big day.

Trumping the Queen

It was, back in the early 1980’s, just a bit of harmless fun. 

If we attempted the same today we would, for certain,be shot on sight. 

Giggling a bit, as excitable 17 year olds are prone to do, a group of us made our way up a steep grassy bank and there in front of us was the splendour of the Humber Suspension Bridge. 

It was a mass of activity on the eve of the formal opening ceremony by Queen Elizabeth II which was to take place on 17^th July 1981. A grand civic event it was to be. 

After all, the structure was the longest single span suspension bridge in the world , a major feat of technical and civil engineering and deserving of accolade and acclaim. 

Work had begun way back in 1972 with the North Tower completed some two years later on the hard chalk bed rock of the Humber Bank. The need to establish the South Tower in a caisson to counter the shifting mud of the river meant it was a further couple of years before the task of spinning the cables to support the box road sections could begin. 

The sections, prefabricated on shore and then floated into position took from the autumn of 1979 until the following summer to be lifted and fixed to allow the road surface to be laid. 

Although the visit of HM The Queen was to be the highlight of the £90 million project the bridge was actually useable by traffic in June 1981 as a test period. The infrastructure features of the visitor car park and Toll Booths were well established and from the former we had started our stunt. 

Only one of us, all still at school, had a driving licence and use of a car at that time and so Dave, his real name, being that person was the natural choice to take centre stage in what we had planned. 

It should also be said that Dave was the only person with access to a formal dinner suit or tuxedo and although this was his fathers it was a reasonable fit. 

In a bid to tidy up for the ceremony the concourse in front of the north tower booths was littered with building materials and stray vehicles of contractors and the Bridge Board but this provided good cover for us. We were also out of the line of vision from the futuristic Control Room Building which was an advantage against detection. 

Like a well oiled machine we all knew our roles. Two of us attached the stringy ends of multi coloured cotton bunting to respective sides of one of the booth lanes and Dave, with his Mother’s best dress making scissors, made a ceremonial incision accompanied by a short speech along the lines of “God Bless the Bridge and all who cross over her”. I was not sure then as now whether a bridge is of the feminine gender. 

The fourth member of our clique took a few photographs as a permanent record of the event. 

Dave does the deed

We must have looked very dodgy and furtive but at no time were we approached or challenged by anyone of authority. This accentuated our feeling of elation and success although in truth we may just have been one of a succession of students with the same prank idea and that the Bridge Staff,  tired of being distracted ahead of the Royal Visit,  just turned a blind eye to our adolescent behaviour. 

The whole thing took just a few minutes but (sadly) forms one of the most satisfying moments of my otherwise very conventional and boring teenage years. 

As far as I know the official ceremony went off well but then again not surprising as our dress rehearsal will have ironed out any potential difficulties that the Queen may have experienced on her and the Bridge’s big day.

Best of One Last Soul. Giro D'Italia 1987 (35th Anniversary)

Today sees the final Time Trial stage of the 2022 Giro D'Italia. I thought I would just re-issue this piece from a few years ag. It is hard to appreciate that the events happened 35 years ago. 

The clash between Stephen Roche and Roberto Visentini at the 1987 Giro d’Italia (The Tour of Italy being one of the three major tours including Le Tour de France and The Vuelta Espana) remains one of the most-talked about conflicts at a Grand Tour. What made it more striking however was that they were on the same team.

Roche’s subsequent story is familiar to all cycling fans. It was a momentous year for the Irishman who completed a very rare triple of the Tours of France, Italy and also becoming World Champion. This feat was only achieved by one other, the dominant Eddy Merrckx and arguably in a very different era of the sport.

Behind the history making Roche I have often wondered what became of Roberto Visentini?

It seems that even today, he’s still angry about what happened.

It may be one of the longest held grudges in cycling history.

I was initially under the impression that the handsome and charismatic Visentini was a bit of a poster-boy in his home country. We have all come across similar characters in other sports who just seem to come and go.  However, having read about him more widely he was obviously incredibly talented as a junior rider, winning the Italian championships in 1975 and later that year adding the Junior Worlds title to his Palmares.

Three years on, at the age of just twenty, he turned professional for the Italian Vibor team. Many talented juniors have found the transition to the professional level demanding, but it didn’t appear to have been difficult for the man from Brescia.

He was entered into the Giro in his debut season, and finished in an incredible fifteenth place in addition to winning the best young rider title.

The following years would see him go from strength to strength as he continued to improve on his General Classification  position in the race, as well as winning a number of stages.

He also claimed victories in the major events of the Giro del Trentino and Tirreno-Adriatico, amongst other events.

In 1985 it looked likely he would win the Giro d’Italia, having worn the pink jersey for nine days. However, he had to pull out of the race before the end due to illness. Finally, in 1986, he would win the race overall, beating the likes of Greg LeMond and Francesco Moser.

So, he returned in 1987 as defending champion. But among his team mates on the Carrera team was Stephen Roche, who was in the form of his life. He had just won the Tour of Romandie and amongst an impressive early season had won or placed well in major races.

Visentini had also been at the same events but Roche in his book "My Road to Victory" claimed that the Italian had given no help to him or the team and had not really performed himself. Team management at the 1987 Giro decided they would start with two team leaders but before and during the early stages of the race there were lots of arguments between the two in the battle for supremacy within the team. An Italian on an Italian team and riding on home territory would always be better supported and Roche sensed that Visentini was the golden boy.

In the first week of The Giro, Roche was in the leader's Pink jersey and carried it for a total of 10 days but with no help from the pro-Italian element of the Carrera Team. After a crash, injury and resultant lack of confidence Roche lost the jersey to his Co-Leader and as far as fans and the media were concerned the race was all over.

Roche seized his opportunity to win the race on the fifteenth stage to Sappada. Going against team orders, he attacked early on a descent and was away with two other riders.

The Team Manager (Directeur sportif)  Davide Boifava drove alongside in the team car and  told Roche to stop the attack, but he continued on. Behind, there was the farcical sight of Carrera team chasing their own man. They were quickly exhausted and did a deal with another Italian team to chase Roche down.

It was a gamble that just about paid off for Carrera who recaptured the break but on the final ascent yet more aggressive riding from the Irishman saw Visentini losing over 6 minutes. Roche managed to take over pink by five seconds from Switzerland’s Tony Rominger.

Visentini, his chances of a repeat victory gone was livid afterwards, as were the Italian fans.

Despite receiving extreme abuse from the tifosi over the last few days, and a threat to his lead from Erik Breukink, Roche hung on to win the race overall by nearly four minutes from the Scottish climber Robert Millar.

Roche's main allies were team member Eddy Schepers and his faithful mechanic, Patrick Valke. Their respective roles had been to protect Roche from his own squad or any risk from roadside attack from Visentini sympathisers and to ensure that his bike was not sabotaged. The Italian press called Roche a Judas and with his colleagues being referred to as The Rebel and Satan respectively.

Roche left the Carrera team at the end of the 1987 season. Visentini stayed on but he never won another race. He continued to compete for another three years for a number of smaller Italian teams, but his heart was not in it any more. He retired from the sport in 1990.

The Italian was interviewed a number of years later about his career, and despite the many highlights it seems he still cannot shake off the events of the ’87 Giro.

He admitted it was the biggest disappointment of his career.“Being attacked by opponents was normal, but it was my team mate and I could just not stomach it, I sometimes lost to star riders like Moser and Saronni, but I never complained. Roche’s attack was unacceptable.”

He wasn’t just unhappy with Roche though, but with the team manager Boifava too.

“If the captain is in the lead, the team must help him. Roche, however, attacked me. But the real crime was by the team management; clueless, heartless.

Visentini's reaction to the management was extreme.  “At the end of the race, I went to Davide Boifava with some plastic bags containing the bike which I had sawn into pieces.”

Asked about Roche’s assertion that Visentini had declared before the Giro that he would not go to the Tour de France to help the Irishman, he said it was “All excuses to deflect blame after what had happened.”

In fact, Roche had known early on in the Giro that Visentini had booked his holidays for July and would not therefore be available to offer to help Roche win in France in return for handing over the Giro without any fuss.

Visentini ended up pulling out of the '87 Giro anyway, having broken his wrist on the penultimate stage.

By this time there was some grudging acceptance in the Carrera ranks that Roche was the best rider in the race.

Best of One Last Soul- At the end of the Pier

 Hornsea is a small and genteel seaside town in East Yorkshire. 

In the mid 1800's it had a resident population of just 1685 but a few of its wealthy occupants had great ambitions for the place in terms of promoting growth and prosperity. 

An important starting point was a railway link to the City of Hull and this opened in 1864. Hornsea became the favourite watering hole for the urban masses who came to the coast for leisure and recreation. 

Those holding tracts of land in and around Hornsea saw an opportunity to develop for housing and the amenities that an emerging resort would require to compete with towns further north such as Bridlington, Filey and Scarborough. 

Often referred to as The King of Hornsea, Joseph Armytage Wade was a prominent advocate for change. 

He had been the instigator of the rail link as well as bringing gas and civilised facilities to what was still little more than a small crab fishing town at that time. 

In 1865 Wade had the idea of building a Pier or Pleasure Palace of 1200 feet length into the North Sea and at a provisional budgeted cost of £10000 which is in excess of £800000 in todays money. His vision did not however secure the imagination of the townspeople and it was not until eleven years later that a Pier was again on the horizon. This was through the Hornsea Pier Bill of 1876.

Unfortunately the hype and speculation was not that of Wade but a consortium of out of town developers and speculators headed by the rather grandly titled Pierre Henri Martin du Gillon. His background seems to have been in West Country Ship Building and Repairing but he apparently had a connection with Leeds. He had bought land at South Cliff in Hornsea and had plans drawn up for a large housing estate . Du Gillon and his fellow Promoters of the Hornsea Pier Bill proposed a mixed development including, as well as a pier, a new road and tramway from the railway station to an area of reclaimed land behind an embankment and sea wall. They claimed that the civil engineering works would solve the regular tidal surge flooding of the area and also give an opportunity for fishing boats to land their catches and then utilise the rail link to Hull. This would save sailing time from the fishing grounds to Hull as well as generate jobs and money for Hornsea. Local support came from the Coastguard Chief and fishing boat owners. 

The scheme would be costly, the wall alone was estimated at £10000 to establish but the Promoters would cover the cost in return for the Compulsory Purchase of the land it required. 

That is where Du Gillon became unstuck. The land was in the ownership of Joseph Wade and a Mr Botts who were naturally opposed to the plans and indeed Wade himself founded and fronted The Hornsea Pier Company in 1877. 

This prompted Du Gillon to propose another scheme, the South Pier, and the small, sleepy town was faced with the prospect of having not just one, but two of these iconic structures on the seafront. 

Wade's was the first of the projects to commence but only to the extent of sinking ten piles which the locals referred to as The Ten Virgins. 

As for Du Gillon and his grand vision the burden of financing and legalities soon brought about bankruptcy and they were quickly out of the running. 

Wade and The Hornsea Pier Company recommenced work in 1878 on a 2 year build on the 327 metre (1072 feet) structure but from the start they became bogged down in costly disputes. Actions were brought against Wade's Company by Engineers, Contractors and there is also reference to the Paris Skating Rink Company on the grounds of non-payment and with counter-suing for poor workmanship and performance of contracts. 

These legal setbacks were settled or resolved but in the Great Storm in October 1880 a distressed sailing brig, Earl Derby, was thrown onto the Pier destroying some 91 metres (300 feet) of the newly built structure. 

The Pier did open for the Hornsea Regatta in 1881 with pricing for public use at One Penny or for a Day Ticket at Tuppence. However, costs continued to rise and in 1882 strengthening and repairing works whittled away at any prospective income stream. The day trippers and holiday makers were not evidently prepared to fork out for what was a disappointing attempt at a Pier and debt began to mount up. 

Advertisements and promotions tried to drum up business. 

In 1892 Tenders were invited for renting and use of the pier. Concerts and Performances were held but again not to the level of public participation expected by the Pier Company. A report of 1896 described a scene of semi dereliction and abandonment with dangling gas lamps resembling the hat of a drunken man. 

There was no option available to the  Directors than to place the company into voluntary liquidation in 1897.

Although the failure had been anticipated after the long years of struggle it must have caused considerable stress and anxiety to Joseph Wade. It is not too much to speculate that the chain of events may have contributed to his death in 1896 albeit at the good age of 79 years old. 

The appointed Official Receiver did offer to sell the pier to Hornsea Town Council for £300 but the holders of the public purse did not feel it appropriate to purchase. 

The inevitable point was reached and the pier was broken up for scrap in the same year after only 16 fitful seasons. A building associated with the pier did survive in use as a cake shop until 1912 but otherwise only memories remained. 

The idea of a pier seems to have been merely slumbering in Hornsea and in 2018 there was talk of a project featuring a wind turbine as the virtual "end of the pier" feature for the 21st Century. 

Best of One Last Soul. You have not been watching.......

 

Elizabeth Mainwaring (pronounced Mannering) was the wife of George, the Captain of the fictional Home Guard of Walmington on Sea as depicted in the comedy classic- Dad’s Army. 

For all of the long running and still repeated episodes Elizabeth remained as an unseen character at the end of a phone conversation, heard moving about upstairs at her home, at best as a vague shadow or in the bulging shape of someone on the top bunk in the bomb shelter. 

Her influence over her husband and as a consequence his subsequent moods, attitudes and behaviour in relation to the members of the Platoon was nevertheless tangible and an important undercurrent to the adventures and antics of the principle characters. 

The writers, Perry and Croft did invent a back story for Elizabeth to give her depth and as an explanation for some of her later unconventional or illogical outbursts and acts. 

These regularly ran within the main scripted dialogues. For example, Captain Mainwaring surprised everyone in his ability to play the bagpipes which he attributed to spending his honeymoon on a remote Scottish Island where there was nothing else to do. 

In conversation with the haughty Sergeant Wilson Mainwaring tells him about his wife’s fondness for silent movies but only because she was so shocked to hear a character on a film speak a line that she refused to return to any cinema. 

Her regular criticism of George is attributed to a privileged fictional upbringing as the daughter of a Suffragan Bishop and that she and her family believe that she married below her own social standing.

George is very hard done by as he has attained the heady heights for a provincial town of Bank Manager through working hard at his education and banking exams. He does have her best interests at heart however and strives to provide goods and services even though these sometimes go against his own morals and sense of citizenship, especially in wartime. 

This is particularly evident in his turning a blind eye to contraband from the black marketeer spiv Private Walker or gifts such as an extra portion of sausages or offal from the good natured Corporal Jones, the town butcher. 

He is also protective of Elizabeth in saying that she had led a sheltered life in not even trying tomato sauce before she met him and a fondness shows through in his referring to her as the little woman and alluding to a blissful married life. 

His selflessness is to be admired as Elizabeth’s reclusive nature will have impeded any upward mobility that George may have hoped for within the hierarchy of the Bank at a time when socialising and hospitality were an essential part of getting ahead in commerce. The actuality of his domestic situation will have been behind his complete lack of hesitation in putting himself forward, uncharacteristically pushily, as leader of the Local Defence Volunteers, or as they became known, the Home Guard. 

Mrs Mainwaring’s persona is achieved, in her very obvious absence, by clever writing by which we assume that she is a larger than life woman ( described as being a bit bigger in physical dimensions that the effervescent Mrs Fox- a friend of Jonesy), a bit handy with her fists with George suffering a black eye in a hushed up domestic incident and always making an excuse on the grounds of health or fear of being bombed so as not to participate in the social functions of the platoon family. One visualisation, conjured up in my mind, of the mysterious Elizabeth is of her in a siren suit, a sort of one piece flight or boiler suit so much trademark attire of Winston Churchill when out and about visiting his blitz affected countrymen and women. Unfortunately this produces the startling image of a character part Michelin Man and part Gas Engineer so hardly flattering.

Jokes at her expense are regularly inserted into the dialogue such as her not having left the house “since Munich” or when George, excited at having obtained some scarce cheese rang Elizabeth to say that he might have a surprise for her that evening. This double entendre meant that he ended up eating the delicacy with Sergeant Wilson in the Vicar’s Office. 

Gradually we come to the realisation that she is always to be an elusive figure but then are shocked, as is George,  by revelations such as her playing the role of Lady Godiva on horseback riding through Walmington to raise funds for a Spitfire fighter plane. 

It is not all one way traffic in terms of who obviously wears the trousers in the Mainwaring household as in one series episode George has a platonic tea room and station platform liaison with one of the new female recruits to the platoon but is mindful of his married status and upholding his position of responsibility in the bank and town. 

There is an underlying melancholy to the relationship between George and Elizabeth but it works so very well in the cleverly woven story lines and characterisations that have made Dad’s Army such a loved bit of British television. 

Best of One last Soul- The King of Hornsea

 I like a bit of a challenging trail when putting together a bit of writing.

Today's starts from a brief reference that I came across in the pages of an account of a 2014 Archaeological dig at a site on St Lawrence Street, York.

I am often stationary at the traffic lights right at that point which is a major junction just outside the defensive walls. There has been fairly frantic construction activity over the last 12 to 18 months  and the site is now under a large student accommodation block . The standard (for historic York) excavation process prior to the development unearthed a great and diverse range of items, mainly ceramicware from the Roman occupation of the city through the Anglo-Scandinavian era (Vikings), the Middle Ages and the following :

"Twelve sherds of unusual form were present, these clearly all originated from objects of a single design, but despite the number of sherds no single original object could be reconstructed. The sherds were from flat fish-scale shaped tiles stamped Wade & Cherrys Patent Hornsea on one site and are widely known as ‘acorn tiles’. 

The tiles are roofing tiles which were known as fish scale or acorn tiles, and they have a raised rim on the top half of the uppermost side of each tile which overlaps with a rim on the lower half of the adjacent tile. The design was aimed at reducing the area of overlapped tiles on the roof, and the rims were designed to hold the tiles firm on the roof"

The fragments for a product dating from the 1860's from the small East Yorkshire coast town of Hornsea were found in very auspicious company in the York excavations.

I was intrigued about the use of the descriptive terms as "unusual", "fish scale"and "acorn tiles" and this led me to recall that I had recently been working opposite a house in Hornsea which seemed to have all of the attributes of an unusual appearance and yes, the external walls were clad in what seemed like the scales of a fish.

The house occupies a prominent corner position overlooking the town Memorial Gardens, an ideal location to showcase its unique elevations.

Wade and Cherry's Tiles were an association of John Cherry, a brickmaker and who appears to have been the more flamboyant of the pairing, Joseph Armytage Wade referred to by the title of a book about him as "The King of Hornsea". This alludes to his championing of the town which included his support for the arrival of the railway line and various entrepreneurial enterprises.

Interestingly Wade and Cherry also appear in the records of the United States Patents Office for engineering inventions mainly it seems, pumping equipment which they needed to remove groundwater from their clay pits which were at the end of Marlborough Avenue, subsequently the location for the iconic Hornsea Pottery and now a shopping Freeport complex.

The York Archaeologists referred to the  sherds (fragments) as roofing tiles but in fact the clever design, each shaped something like the ace of spades, so that their form renders the amount of lap smaller than in ordinary tiles, were equally suited to vertical hanging on external walls.

Now to the science and technology of the design:

 "A flange, or raised rim, of dovetailed or under-cut section is formed on the top half of the uppermost side of each tile and on the lower half of the undermost side.This interlocks with two neighbours from the course above, and on the opposite face, again slightly chamfered or dovetailed, is a flange to fit with the lower course. This holds them firm, excludes wind and rain and makes render pointing unnecessary."

The Hornsea clays are a heavy boulder type originating, I believe, from the retreat of the glaciers at the end of the last Ice Age. Hornsea itself spreads our over a series of low hillocks or Moraines from this time in prehistory. The clay is well suited to both commercial products and fancy ceramics.

The York discovery suggests that Wade and Cherry distributed their distinctive tiles regionally if not wider afield. Urban regeneration, wartime damage and yet more demolition and clearance will have relegated many of the buildings clad or roofed in the wonderful acorn tiles to, at worst hardcore rubble and at best a corner of a reclamation yard.

These tiles are very much sought after today, and the best example thought to remain is situated at the corner of New Road and Westbourne Road, Hornsea.

I stop at giving an accurate address or infringing copyright and privacy with a photo. You have the clues as to what to look for and where, so just go.

Just as additional background. The aforementioned Joseph Armytage Wade also ventured into property development and in the 1860's, perhaps the height of his wealth and influence he bought land on both sides of New Road. He will have sold off the plots to individual purchasers and a Legal Conveyance dated 8 January 1879 made between (1) Joseph Armytage Wade and (2) Alfred Maw it seems, afforded an opportunity for Wade to sell off a good stock of the acorn tiles for the construction of the property in question.

Although not strictly specified in the small print there is a strong suggestion that any villa or house shall be built of good white or stock bricks or such other material as shall be mutually agreed on between the said Joseph Armytage Wade his heirs or assigns and the said Alfred Maw his heirs or assigns and which may be deemed by the said Joseph Armytage Wade not to be a disfigurement ".

He may have been the professed King of Hornsea but that Wade was quite a shrewd cookie as well.

Pevsner's book on The Buildings of York does refer to a 12th Century converted church, Old St Oswalds in Fulford as having a Wade and Cherry Acorn Tile roof and this would be worth a drive out some time. If anyone has any other sightings of the distinctive fish scale tiles I would be grateful. Perhaps there is a case for a geeky tile spotting movement.

Best of One Last Soul- Great railway journeys

 

Great Railway Journeys

Amongst the great railway journeys in the world one of my favourites does not really figure in say, the top ten thousand.

There are no dramatic mountain peaks hovering vertically overhead, no sheer drops into a raging torrent in the bottom of the valley, no risk of rock falls or landslide in a constant battle against the forces of nature, no need to carve a snaking route through a harsh environment with dynamite or to provide an armed on board presence to discourage attack and insurrection.

My journey starts at a typical red brick railway station in the west of Hull commuter town of Hessle.

The old ticket office sits at street level in a leafy suburb and looking onto large late Victorian properties originally built as superior residences for the well to do of the East Riding but now either split into flats or operating in the Health and Social Care sectors.

In terms of progress in the latter part of the 19th Century having a railway station at your front door would be quite an attraction, a modern amenity. The platform for trains to Hull is set at a lower level following the topography of a narrow plateau between Hessle Cliff and a further, shallower slope down to the Humber Foreshore.

For those venturing westwards and served by the far platform it is a case of using a large metal gantry bridge with the accompanying whistle of a prevailing wind as it hugs the contours. The Station, once employing perhaps upwards of a dozen employees is now unmannned and only frequented by the distant voice of the announcer over the tannoy. As the sound system suddenly bursts into life with someone playing a xylophone those waiting can be seen to be startled or grimacing in equal numbers.

The early morning trains are the short local ones, two sections, bench seats, no frills, deserted apart from a few shop workers and early bird shoppers. I am excited as we move off. There is some deep rooted emotion about being conveyed by a train. I have tried to fight it by refusing to stand on a bridge to await the arrival of a specific named or numbered engine with binoculars, camera and anorak.

As part of my self imposed therapy I stare out of the window. On the north side of the line to Hull leaving Hessle stands a large area of post war built housing infilling between the grand Victorian Villas and a small terrace of railway workers cottages. Once isolated and well out of the town the neat engineering brick faced  properties are now hemmed in and squeezed by industry. The train rattles over a bridge where it crosses Hessle Haven although in land drain guise before it widens at the estuary mouth. I recall many a ship launch sideways into the tidal outlet of the same watercourse just out of sight.

As business and commerce has followed the trend over the last decade or so to vacate the old central city areas it has relocated to the floodplain between Hessle and West Hull. There are acre upon acre of sheds, multi purpose with the same basic pattern and style being adapted for either office, showroom, factory or recreational use. The out of town retailers have followed with large Sainsbury and Aldi stores. The new Park and Ride has also become established and always, when overlooked from the competing train, seems to be well patronised.

The low rise business district contrasts sharply with the large and tall edifice of a Hotel with coffee shop franchise and Health Club but even this yellow stone monument is dominated by the powder blue stanchions of the Arco Warehouse. The span and tension in the metalwork creates a huge clear working space for the storage and distribution of every manner of safety equipment. At 6pm every evening a fleet of parcel carriers leave the premises, straining on their axles to meet the 24 hour delivery promise for steel capped work boots or padded ear defenders and so much more. The articulated trucks complete a 12 hour cycle of peak activity on the industrial estate which started with the vans and lorries going to and from the wholesale fruit and flower market at its eastern end.

Having run quite close and paralell to the river and business district the railway line turns inland, north easterly at about the position of Cod Farm, a promontory, man made into the river where lines of filleted fish were hung out to air dry in the halcyon days of the trawling industry. Large mounds of gravel and salt can be seen in the marshalling yards where in the 1970's the sections of the Humber Suspension Bridge were assembled and gathered before being floated up river and lifted into position.

There is another estate of factories including a large manufacturer of Yorkshire Puddings but of older and now rather dated buildings. I avert my gaze from an area of open ground where, to the open mouthed amazement of the occupants of a train from London to Hull, a man was seen having sexual relations with a tethered goat.

The older terraced housing  on the outer approaches to the city made way in the 1960's for bland modern council houses . Current demolition and clearance has led to some striking town houses in deep glazed brick panels with gable balconies and neat wrought iron fenced in forecourts. Nice but probably only good and sustainable for about 50 years whereas the former housing had survived over 100 including wartime bombing.

A series of level crossings frustrate the busy city traffic but a vast improvement from the 1950's when constant rail freight traffic to and from the thriving docks meant that the crossing gates on the main arterial roads of Hull were closed for a cumulative total of 15 hours a day. My window flashes in and out of light and shade as the train passes under the Anlaby Road Flyover, one of the civil engineering remedies to bypass the physical severance of the road by the rail lines.

Houses close to the course of the railway have metal tie bars in their brickwork to counter the rattling and wobbling effect that a procession of diesel engines, and steam engines before can exact on an already fairly unstable foundation on a shrinkable clay.

The Infirmary is a large sprawl of old and very modern buildings, mostly in the shadow of the now very dated multi storey tower of Hull Royal. The train is slowing now, tic-tac sounding across points where the main lines into Hull Station converge. I laugh aloud at a piece of humorous graffitti on the underside of a road bridge and depair at the rest of the indiscriminate and illiterate offerings on walls, obsolete signal boxes and on every other accessible available surface.

The vast arched profile of Paragon Station is in view, a magnificent example of functional and beautiful architecture, much featured in film and television. It will have been marvelled at by the 2.2 million immigrants awaiting transit from Hull to Liverpool and beyond at a turbulent time in their own lives and world history over 100 years ago. Their onward journey will have been of epic and dramatic proportions. My own, about 6 miles and 7 minutes.

The Best of One Last Soul- The Infamous Pot Noodle

 The recent demise of the train robber Ronnie Biggs brought to mind the transition that often occurs from arch villain/blaggard/right nasty piece of work to just "a bit of a loveable rogue".

I am in sympathy with those individuals and families directly and indirectly affected by the aforementioned rail heist and other heinous crimes. The passage of time may have permitted them to arrive at a place of forgiveness in order to achieve some form of closure even if it is still not reasonable in any universe to expect  acceptance of the perpetrators as modern day Robin Hood characters.

There have always been heroes and villains and the moral position between them can often be vague and ill defined. Take Nelson Mandela. In the eyes of his comrade campaigners against the injustice to humanity that was Apartheid he was a freedom fighter. To the white supremacists holding desperately onto any recognisable sovereign power he was a terrorist. Many dictators have, before falling to moral corruption and their own God Complexes, been held as saviours of their nations.

On a not dissimilar theme the Pot Noodle was voted, in 2004, the most hated of all branded foods.

It took some time to attain that position of vilification from the consumer nation of ours. The origins of the quick snack were in the days of post war shortages and austerity in Japan and its first incarnations fulfilled a desperate requirement for a simple filler for empty stomachs.

The introduction of the more recognisable rebranded versions of Pot Noodle to the wider world and in particular the UK came in the mid to late 1970's. It was a logical addition to a freeze-dried line-up of cuppa soups and Vesta meals which represented the pinnacle of the industry in dehydrated foodstuffs.

I recall my first exposure to a Pot Noodle as a teenager.

Peer pressure was at play to try this new fangled lifestyle and aspirational product.

I was afraid to be caught sneaking back home before family tea-time with dry powder on my face or the unmistakable odour of chicken flavouring on my breath. In my year at school we all partook to one degree or another. Some became addicted to the infusion, the huge infusion of salt, preservatives and MSG and a little bit stupid on the highly charged sauce sachets.

I swear that I never inhaled. It was banned from packed lunches and had to be locked away if found in duffle or kits bags on the bus on the way to a Scout Camp.

It was the height of sophistication to treat the opposite sex to a beef and tomato Pot Noodle.

Unfortunately, the product was soon to fall from the high standing in which it had been launched through misinformation of its composition and not a little ridicule in popular humour. Doubt was cast on the nutritional benefits of the compact meal and rumours were rife as to what actually formed the ingredients. There were the usual, highly hilarious but ultimately upsetting jibes of "Not Poodle" and so on.

The product was however good enough in commercial performance to entice the massive Unilever Corporation to purchase the rights and intellectual property of Pot Noodle from Golden Wonder in 1995. A factory in Wales churned out 155 million of them a year as an endorsement of their popularity, albeit very much clandestine, underground and closeted.

The undercurrent of hatred never really waned through the 1990's and beyond. It was not helped by controversial marketing campaigns playing on the venomous attitudes of a noisy minority hell bent on driving Pot Noodle out of existence. It was as if they were personally offended by a dehydrated mix of noodles. "Slag of all snacks" was a strapline in the succession of negative reinforcement from slick marketing and advertising companies.

The accusers persisted in their criticism of Pot Noodle as low quality when in fact it was a cloaked attack on the main perceived consumer market of the lazy and the poor.

Pot Noodles have never been marketed openly to the Middle Classes although the newest Piri Piri Chicken may appeal to those spying it on the shelves in the petrol station shop or large bulk sale supermarkets. It may even become a matter of inverted snobbery like matt black and de-chromed motor vehicles.

Pot Noodle has been the perfect excuse for an "us and them " situation.

Wars, throughout history have started on similar pretences.

I have today attempted a personal crusade to act as an intermediary between the Noodlers and the Abstainers. My position has been strengthened by the recessionary conditions afflicting our nation which have inevitably led to an increase in Pot Noodle consumption out of necessity for a good proportion of the population to meet minimum nutritional needs.

I have, for my lunch today, consumed a Piri Piri and after a brief lie down and recuperation from the overall experience am ready and fully prepared to rally forth my troops for a long and bitter campaign towards the full and unconditional acceptance of the Pot Noodle as a National Pleasure.

Best of One Last Soul- In the footsteps of Richard the Third

 It felt like the beginning of a great expedition.

It was a thursday, but if you think about it, at least one in every seven of the great adventures of the world must have started on a thursday.

Christopher Columbus may have had a lie in on a wednesday and then it was too late to set off, etc, etc so thursday was best to begin the stumbling upon the Americas, ditto James Cook-  late delivery of ships biscuits on a wednesday night so best to set sail thursday, Cortez had a late swordsmans lesson mid week therefore making thursday the only possible diarised date to begin the exploitation of the native South American peoples.

As I headed away from the Hull urban area it was bright but quite cold out of the direct sun.

There was snow in the fields and hedgerows on the higher ground above Pocklington but not a cloud in the powder blue sky. I felt that it was going to be a good day for exploring and actually acheiving the circumnavigation of York along its magnificent walls.

The walls are the longest and best preserved in England at nearly three miles long.

Their origins are clouded by their substantial reconstruction and renovations in the comparatively modern times since the 19th Century but for authenticity there remains intact a whole stretch of Roman walls including two towers. As with a good proportion of the well planned and executed civil works by the Romans these formed the structural basis for many of the later attempts to form fortifications and monuments by the more civilised and lasting rulers of the country such as the later Norman invaders. Most of the renovated walling is early medieval from around 1250 AD.

My quest was to be clockwise starting from Lendal Bridge, one of the important crossing points of the River Ouse. On this particular thursday the river was manageable and well contained within its banks rather than marauding through the pubs and houses on the embankment which it often does even with modern flood defences in place.

The integrity of the wall beyond Lendal Tower was surely tested in the early to mid 1800's when it was permitted for it to be punched through in the interests of the progression of the steam railway. That George Hudson, the self proclaimed Railway King must have had superb powers of persuasion, significant economic clout or some very incriminating facts about the City elders who had strongly resisted any such travesties in the heritage of York.

The walls had served the City well over the centuries against pillagers and worse and in 1645 a Civil War siege.

Micklegate Bar is first mentioned in the12th Century. A strikingly functional and intimidating building over four storeys in gritstone and magnesian limestone with some nice carved embellishments. The walkway has escaped health and safety measures and the steep drop to the inner bank makes the meeting of those undertaking their own adventure but in an anti-clockwise direction a bit scary particularly if the whole oncoming family insist on walking 5 or 6 abreast.

The Victorian housing in the lee of the wall is in the warm and mellow brick characteristic to York. Certainly some of the most expensive two bedroomed real estate in the City. There is a clump of grassy bank as the wall turns east which is the former Motte of a castle and then it is down the slippery stepped courses off the wall where it ends just behind the warehousing and posh apartments built along the western bank of the river.

I crossed the Skeldergate Bridge which was still busy with tourists although obviously lost and confused by the temporary disppearance of the wall. The consultation by this representation of the United Nations of visitors of their guide maps allows another photo opportunity to be taken.

Along Fishergate the housing just inside the wall is mainly of rather plain and corporate looking flats and  low rise housing. The main road in from Hull along which I had driven earlier in the day halts at a busy traffic light controlled junction in front of the Walmgate Bar. This is well preserved with its 14th Century Barbican now part of the extensive cycle routes around York. On the inner side is a residence dating from the 1580's and must be one of the best and coolest places to live albeit possibly a bit cramped, noisy and draughty. Even following a battering in the Civil War the gateway was carefully restored along with its portcullis.

The wall is lower along this section with a short but steep embankment onto the inner ring road.

Perhaps this was the most vulnerable flank although give that nourishment and longevity were still very poor in the warring years the fortifications would present a formidable obstacle to the sickly, bandy-legged and quite short of stature armed forces of even the most determined and resolute attackers.

As the wall again disappears at the Red Tower, a squat very Romanesque looking citadel but from 1490 there is nothing in sight apart from Waitrose, Morrisons and a Wine Warehouse. There is quite an extensive gap on this eastern edge of the old part of York but to some extent the defences are in the form of a former fishpond now part of a canal waterway. This part of the wall walk is quite demoralising alongside crawling or stationary traffic and with a strange stagnant odour from the grubby canal.

It is good to ascend back up onto the all for the best section by far which takes in Layerthorpe Tower and exposed Roman walling.

Monk Bar is, at four storeys in limestone, a great landmark and many visitors cannot resist the museum to Richard III the infamous hunchback and villanous monarch who was a local lad.

Now travelling broadly north there are good views of York Minster and the gardens and grounds of grand mansions and town houses including the Treasurers House. The steep outer bank here also shows a deep defensive ditch.

Bootham Bar is the next vantage point and occupies the site of the Roman Legionary Fortress but is mainly of 12th century and later construction.  The end of my journey is soon in sight as I again approach Lendal Tower.

It has been a tremendous adventure, I accept probably never more than a few hundred metres from a Starbucks and with no significant danger apart from a temporarily loose shoe lace at one stage on a section of wall with no safety rail.

I did dodge a bit across the gaps in the ramparts to avoid imaginary arrows and projectiles and go through, word for word the dialogue of the French Kerniggets from Monty Python and The Holy Grail but only when I was out of sight and earshot of other visitors.

The circumnavigation provides a good but brief insight into the broad and varied history of York and does serve to get the vascular and respiratory system into operation after quite a long and lazy winter and early spring.

Best of One Last Soul- loitering at the Whitby Smoke House

I might not ever say those same words in the same order ever again. 

It is a quite unique combination of words perhaps muttered by mere mortals on a very rare occasion. 

They were the most apt and explanatory words for what I had to do but nevertheless caused quite a stir amongst my co-workers upon announcing them as the reason for leaving the office this morning. 

“I have to go and deliver some Kippers”. 

I was not being euphemistic, ambiguous or double-entendre-ing  (not sure if that is a real word).

My late Father had his own phrase about “going to see a man about a dog” which gradually sank in amongst the rest of the family as meaning that he had to leave and do some errand but with no predetermined timescale. 

I had no intention of developing my own euphemism but “I have to go and deliver some kippers” is as good as any and could cover all manner of trips, jaunts and absences from the office or home. 

In fact I was trying to help out my wife’s Australian cousin, who with his wife is on a visit to the UK after some seven or so years of last being here. 

On his wish list for the 3 week vacation was the purchase of some Kippers- surely everyone knows what these are- wood smoke cured herring. 

There is a good choice of these on any ice packed fish counter at a supermarket and even in the ordinary seafood display down the delicatessen aisle. It is even possible to buy a rather bland and unappetising boil in the bag version. 

However, the best ever kippers are from a specific source in a magical place. 

I am talking about Fortunes in the North Yorkshire coast town of Whitby. 

I had not actually heard of them before but as far away as Australia they were held with some reverence. They regularly featured on those regional food programmes on TV channels where celebrity chefs or just plain celebrities go in search of good, authentic, honest and artisan products. You know the sort of broadcasts where the presenter wears a safari suit, fancy hat and drives around in a classic motor vehicle decrying the globalisation and anonymity of food production. 

There has been a huge emphasis in the media on provenance of food especially after the controversy and public outcry about horse flesh in lasagne and the re-emergence in the food supply chain of previously condemned and supposedly confiscated meat, fruit and vegetables. 

You cannot get any more authentic and pure than a Fortunes Kipper- no, not a slick marketing slogan from a top-notch advertising agency but my own endorsement having been to the Whitby headquarters just yesterday. 

The use of the term HQ is as far from reality as you can get. 

Fortunes premises comprise of a shack of a shop about 5 metres by 3 metres and leaning against the back of it the smokehouse, another shack. 

We could smell the wonderful aroma of the curing smoke from the bottom of the steep 199 steps that snake up the cliffside from Whitby Town to the ruins of the Abbey. The odour reminds me always of the open log and coal fires of rented cottages during a winter weekend or early springbreak along that part of the Yorkshire coastline, Robin Hoods Bay and Staithes in particular which are not far off equidistant from Whitby to the south and north respectively. 

Yesterday was a beautiful late September one after some very mixed and unpredictable weather over the preceding summer months. The town, for a Tuesday and out of season was as busy as ever with the main pedestrian flow being along the narrow harbourside streets and up the ladder-like steps. 

We veered off from the pack following with our noses the smoky air, just visible as a light cloud between the parallel terraced houses of Henrietta Street perched high above the convergence of the River Esk and the North Sea. 

We could not yet see the source of the enticing sight and smell but were pretty close as successive cottages were named along a Kipper theme amongst the usual tributes to Captain Cook and nautical terms. 

A rather weatherbeaten sign on the side of a low single storey building could just be seen bearing the Fortunes name and pedigree of time served Kipper smoking. 

A hand written piece of paper in the squat window said that they were not open until 1.30pm that day, a tantalising 40 minutes ahead. We were not alone on that street. A few touristy types like ourselves were simply hanging around in anticipation of the start of business.

A white smoke, a sort of Papal vote hue, was wisping around the top of a hefty door on the outbuilding and was fine enough to squeeze its way seemingly through the roof and every knot hole, nook and cranny of the timber and brick walls. 

Time dragged by even with the purchase of an ice cream and a welcome sit down on a precariously angled timber bench in a warm sunny spot just around the corner. 

At last we retraced our steps along the well worn cobbles where you are never far away from the spirits and lost souls of the historic fishing and whaling community from centuries past. 

As a treat the doors to the smoke house were wide open having been emptied of the tarry racks of aromatic Kippers which now stood on a counter in the shack shop. The floor of the smoke house was strewn with part combusted woodchips and its walls caked in a treacle-like residue from over 140 years of production. 

We were first in a slowly forming queue, a bit like kiddies in a sweet shop and for £3.95 we could have a pair of mellow toned, fine boned Kippers of our very own. 

Six pairs were bought from a recited list of family members to whom had been promised a proper Kipper over the previous few days by our Australian guests.

I would be roped into the delivery service in due course.

Wrapped up by, I presume by the Mr Fortune, we whisked them away back down the narrow street and held them close as though freshly found treasure. 

Best of One Last Soul- The Return of the three legged dog

 This is a favourite piece of writing from a couple of years ago.

It may be a bit of an Angler's tall tale but there used to be a three legged dog that hung around the shoreline of a local freshwater lake.

It was friendly enough but to those sat quietly, fishing those well stocked waters, it seemed a bit anxious as though looking for something. It was from this that the narrative arose that the dog had been swimming in the weedy shallows when a large Pike, a notorious predator fish, had bitten off one of its hind legs, decisively and clinically.

That sort of story, whether in fact true or a yarn, fable, rumour or outright fabrication has given to the Pike an enthralling reputation. It is fearsome and to be feared.

It's latin name, Esox Lucius, roughly translates to devil fish, which alludes to the myth,legend and also the factual and real life of this species.

I have had some personal experience of the creature.

In my early teenage years I was a keen but rather chaotic angler. It was actually a genetic thing inherited in a much diluted form from my maternal Grandfather, Dick. After he died I took on some of his beloved fishing rods and tackle and found out for myself about the joy and peacefulness of sitting on a riverbank for hour upon hour.

It was not really that important to catch anything, rather just to gather your thoughts, drink pop, eat sandwiches, play with warm, bran covered maggots and watch the world flow by on a slow current.

I started to buy the Angling Times to give some credibility to my bungling, amateur status as a freshwater fisher and in those pages I built up a startling image of the Pike. Grainy photos of successful catches loomed out of the pages of that publication. The Pike weighing down the two arms of beefy angler types were all huge.

I became obsessed with finding out more about this natural predator in typical schoolboy fervour following on from a similar all encompassing thirst for facts on the Bermuda Triangle, UFO's, the assassination of JFK and how to become an Astronaut.

You would not expect narrow, fairly shallow and typically slow flowing English rivers to be able to sustain, yet contain, a fish of the voracity of appetite of the Pike.

It has the appearance of a prehistoric origin, a crocodilian head, pits in the flesh of the skull acting as a sounding board to detect its prey, large pear- shaped amber and black centred eyes to scour the depths, an intriguing dappled olive skin with golden dots and dashes to provide clever camouflage in the weeds and yet mimicking the effect of sunlight on the water, a multiple array of teeth with an inward slant to ensure that snagged prey, once impaled, had little chance of wriggling free, fins mounted towards its hind quarters to give powerful rear engined thrust for a short burst from hiding place to target and all of these attributes in a long, efficient and sleek, shiny body.

Amongst the rather, by comparison, feeble and comical fish such as Ruff, Gudgeon, Roach, Rudd, Bream, Carp and even the Eel it is a totally unexpected resident in Northern European waters. It has undoubtedly thrived with a life expectancy of up to 25 years and with recorded sizes up to a whopping seventy pounds.

It's technique for hunting is aggressive but clever and patient. It secretes itself in the weeds and just sits and waits until an unwitting prey swims past. In a powering up of the fins and a lighting fast strike it ensures a regular diet of smaller fish but is also known to take ducks and of course 25% of a dog's appendages.

Some individual Pike have been more ambitious and fearless.

Anglers have recounted tales of being bitten as a consequence of a Pike attempting to steal away the catch at the end of the line. Divers working on bridge piers report being head-butted by large Pike in a sort of territorial stance. There have also been tales of mules and cattle taking water in a river and being attacked.

In history the species were prized by Monarchs and the Landed Classes as food and many Castles and Manor Houses had Pike or Stew Ponds as they were called as a source of what was regarded as a delicacy. The rather earthy, small bone latticed meat was quite an acquired taste.

In my youth, a friend caught a Pike and decided to take it home for his Mum to cook. He had struggled to land it as Pike are strong game fish but then knocked it on the head before placing it length-ways, head down in his backpack. On the cycle ride back to his house the fish regained consciousness and a panicked lad had to go through the process again on the busy roadside. He didn't say anything about eating it after that.

A Pike could be caught at any time in the freshwater season but pursuit of the species in the cold, damp winter months was the best of activities.

Armed with brightly coloured spoon or small fish shaped spinning lures we would cover many miles along the river bank in search of the creatures.

Alternatively we would buy a pound weight of Sprats from the fishmongers and carefully attach them as dead bait to the biggest hooks we could manage.

Unfortunately, if enthusiastically cast the slim, silvery fish would often detach themselves and on a river bank bordering onto private house gardens the residents will often have found, mystifyingly, several Sprattus sprattus on their lawns and patios.

My enduring recollection and image of the Pike is having to sit astride a nine-pounder whilst my fellow teenage angler used the hinged gag and long discorger to remove the lure to allow the monster fish to be returned, unharmed but mightily disgruntled to its natural domain.

In that moment of restraining the pent up power of that fish I had felt as though I was astride a dolphin, a bit like the picture below but in my case, wearing a thick Parka coat, balaclava and walking boots.