|
Let Loose ! Beechams and 1967
- 1970 |
Leaving
school at last - and all that new found freedom but no cash. I'd secured a
job at Beechams but that was still two months away. I worked for six weeks
on the building site that was the centre of Burnley and helped build the current
Market Square - not something I'm proud of. With money a' plenty Neville Dutton
and I set off for Yugoslavia - not for the faint hearted. Bus to London, train
to Paris, change, train to Trieste then a 50 mile bus ride to Porec with farm
animals for company! (Everything in Yugoslavia travelled by bus in those days!)
We had an idyllic couple of weeks there as the only Brits (except for a coach
party from Barnsley who mistook us for locals). The holiday was cut short
through necessity - there was only one television in the town and we had watched
from the street outside, peering into some poor souls living room along with
a crowd of locals, as England beat Portugal in the semi final of the World
Cup. On the Wednesday we set off and arrived home on the Saturday just in
time to catch the Final kick-off.
And so a week later I packed my bags and headed out to explore the hitherto
undiscovered region south of London - ie. Worthing and Beecham Research Laboratories.
Here I met up with Barry (forgotten his last name), who shared "digs"
with me opposite Lancing airfield.
Journeys to work were undertaken on the back of a motorbike - nightmares would
be a more accurate description. Picture this - Barry was 4ft. nothing, rode
a 750cc bike, thought his second name was Sheen, and I was perched behind
him - usually crying. I could see where he was going before he could (on the
odd occasion that I opened my eyes) and somehow always seemed to be leaning
horizontally when he was vertical and vice versa! I would arrive at work shaking
uncontrollably and muttering a variety of four-letter words. ("Good Vibrations"
by The Beach Boys was the record of the times and when I hear it I still break
into a cold sweat). For the sake of my health I found alternative accommodation
three months later, somewhere with a sea view and within walking distance
of work and the pub. My nerves recovered.
Sundays were in complete contrast and were spent looking out of the window
of my "digs" on the seafront and counting the wheelchairs passing
by and the odd show-offs with zimmer frames. During this time I was still
in the grip of a school romance with a girl in Burnley, Susan Layfield, so
was commuting north regularly. After eight months of my life lurching
from brown underwear to mind numbing boredom to travel sickness, my system
finally gave up, I left Worthing and took the train north to Burnley for the
last time. I should have known. Susan was my first real girlfriend and, despite
being younger, was more mature than I was (why have things never changed!)
so when she left for teacher training college a few months later, she sensibly
decided to make a clean break. 
It
was something of a shock but c'est la vie!
You will have noticed, therefore, that timing has never been my strong point,
but even I should have known better than to fall for a Worthing girl, Kathryn
Barnard. The next 18 months were spent commuting south to Worthing
at every opportunity! I joined Proctor and Proctor chartered accountants on
Westgate and it was here that I teamed up again with Robert Bichard. Together
we honed our skills at shove ha'penny on the boardroom table of the Padiham
Building Society, ate fish and chips in Haslingdon council chambers, and tried
our best not to audit our clients into bankrupcy! The rest of the time was
routinely boring apart from the notable episode when a lovesick female cornered
me in the vaults of the Marsden Building Society - Happy Days.
Outside
work I met up with Barry Robinson and Fred Gill and together we tried our
hand at folk singing and also took part in the annual Lucas show. There was
Bob Faircloughs 21st party in a pub somewhere in the Yorkshire Dales where
we all drank until 5 in the morning - along with the local policeman, and
the time in a pub in Malham when I took my guitar along, played all night,
and the landlord had to call the police to close the bar. The place was so
full they had to evacuate people through the windows so they could make enough
space to open the pub door!
Barry Robinson, Fred Gill and Kathryn Barnard will also remember the weekend
we spent in a pub in Giggleswick, getting up early to watch the last steam
train "The Oliver Cromwell" make its journey on the Settle - Carlisle
railway. By the way that wasn't the reason we were there - just in case you
thought we were "anoraks".
We even went for an audition for "First timers" at Granada studios
in Manchester. It didn't go well. They stuck the microphone in front of us,
I chirped up "We don't need that" - to which came the curt reply
"then how do you expect us to record you?" This same member of the
panel (well known) was obviously "gay" and, as we left after the
audition, Fred was quietly singing "We're all queers together" to
a well known tune. Political correctness hadn't been invented back in the
60's but despite this we didn't get asked back!
There were other notable moments - like the night we spent with Billy Connolly
in the bar at the Cricket Club, laughing and drinking into the early hours.
He was doing a tour of the folk clubs with "The Humblebums" and
had no gig that night so wandered in for a drink. He was as crazy as he is
now, I guess we should have known he was destined for great things. There
was Tim Hart and Maddie Prior (later of Steeleye Span), Martin Carthy, Dave
Swarbrick (Fairport Convention), Mike Harding (the Rochdale Cowboy), Gerry
Rafferty - the names go on. If only we knew then how famous they would become
- but in those days they were just struggling to make a living around the
folk clubs. Magical moments to look back on, but there was a gathering storm
on the horizon.
Kathryn
Barnard and I were almost engaged in 1969, however that brief ecstatic moment
wasn't to last. I still remember the stress of being grilled by her father,
Norman, about my future prospects! To be honest, at that time, they weren't
awe inspiring. The "Dear John" letter turned up a few weeks later.
(thoughtfully she waited until after my accountancy exams). The event hit
me like a stone wall - and for the next year life was something of a blur.
I took the ring I'd collected the day before back to the jewellers (it was
meant to be a surprise but the surprise was on me) and blew all the money
for the engagement on a shopping spree in Manchester. (When the going gets
tough, the tough go shopping!). I may have been down, but at least I was down
and dressed to kill. I've spent years trying to figure out what went wrong,
maybe she had cold feet at the prospect of living amongst "those dark
satanic mills", more likely it was down to my immaturity at the time.
(Some things never change).
I never saw her again but if you are out there somewhere, Kathryn, I really
do hope you found happiness. Anyway, by 1970 she married and that closed a
chapter on my life. I learned a salutory lesson from the experience and, apart
from the thought of meeting her new boyfriend and shaking him warmly by the
throat, it's that you should never keep your feelings to yourself or give
up something so important without a fight.
To be a teenager in the 60's was a fantastic privelige. They were golden years
and, if I lived them all again, I wouldn't do a thing differently except maybe
one - but that's for me to know. The last event triggered a life-changing
move and the sixties closed with me leaving civilian life for the next decade.
And no, it wasn't the Foreign Legion! (I never could stand having sand between
my toes). So for the third time I was about to make a clean break - or was
I? I never learn!
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