Horse & carts

As I write, more and more memories come to mind, as though it was yesterday.

During that particular time, British Rail used to have flat horse drawn carts which used to carry large crates full of pottery packed in straw around the city. One such regular run was from Newhall Pottery in Hanley (now Tesco’s) up to Ridgeway Pottery at Cobridge via Windermere Street and Derwent Street. We used to jump onto the back of the cart and ride to the top of Derwent Street. The driver of the cart was a kindly old gent who always took great care and would shout if he saw us at the back of the cart. He would stop for a short time to rest the horse and would allow us to feed the horse with a crust of bread, making sure we held the bread flat on our hands so as not to get bitten by the horse.
The old man was the typical granddad type with grey moustache, twinkling eyes, pipe-smoking, peaked railway cap and uniform. It is with regret that happy memories like these cannot remain with us as more than thoughts in today’s troubled world.

It has to be seen to be believed the amount of effort that went into the presentation of the goods, in particular of the horses and carts that travelled the streets. Today of course the services of a professional window dresser are called upon. The one window display that was always a credit to the owner was that of Mr. Cartlidge the greengrocer. The balance of colour and variety was second to none: Cox’s Russets, Granny Smith’s apples, Jaffa oranges, Fyffes bananas, grapes, tangerines, and dates were all to be seen. Sadly some years later Len Cartlidge, son of the founder of the shop, retired with his family to North Wales, so another chapter came to a close.

Community spirit

building an Anderson Shelter

On reflection, although there was very little money about, the wealth of community spirit made up for any financial shortcomings. Another area in which the community spirit showed itself was the care and attention that was paid by the residents in each street in looking after the communal air raid shelters. In many cases they had chairs and some type of floor covering. These were of course supplied by the residents. The children were allowed to play in them on wet days, but woe betide any of them if they did not behave. Any such digression was met with a smart clip around the ear which in my opinion is sadly missing from today’s society.

Vandalism was almost none existent. If a house had its own garden, it was more than likely to have its own air raid shelter called the “Anderson” shelter. These were often buried in the ground to afford a little more protection for the residents, of course these were only designed to protect against shrapnel, and blast shock wave. They would not protect against a direct hit. More often than not, they would end up as a garden shed, and what a job to get them out of the ground. They usually had a concrete or brick floor, as the months went by they filled nicely to about a foot or 18 inches of muddy water. People tried to disguise the hump in the garden as a rockery.

Children's games

Leisure activities were simple and mostly home made. “Top and Whip” was a game where children got as many lashes to the legs as they gave to the top to keep it spinning. A favourite kerbside activity was to get some chalks and colour the mushroom shaped wooden top so that all the bright colours merged into one as it was spinning.

The whip was a section of garden cane with a piece of string that had a knot tied at the end. The string was wound around the stem of the top : and with a deft flick of the wrist the top went flying through the air to land on the small metal stub at the base of the stem. It continued spinning by lashing it with the whip to maintain its momentum. It very often went into a grid (storm drain) which cause much frustration and not least some mind bending ideas on how to retrieve it.  

Children playing Hop Scotch

“Hop Scotch” was also a pavement game. Squares were drawn on the ground with a piece of broken pottery mould made of chalk. These were found in abundance on one of the local “shard-rucks”, which were tips of waste material from the pottery factories of which there were many. 

Nearly all of the games we played were simple and caused no real aggravation to the neighbours with perhaps the exception of “Rosy Apple” which was played by knocking at the door or ringing the door bells and promptly running away to hide around the nearest corner, laughing at the frustrated resident.

Another annoying trick was to get a drawing pin, a long length of black cotton and a button. The drawing pin was pushed partly home at the top of the window frame. The button was tied onto the end of the thread and the thread looped over the drawing pin. We unwound the thread and disappeared. The cotton was gently pulled from the safety of our around-the-corner hideout. This game was played in the hours of darkness so that the cotton could not be seen. The owner of the house was unable to see exactly what was happening as the button tapped on the window. We had hours of wicked amusement and hysterical laughter.

One of the more foolhardy practices was to take a copper halfpenny, exactly one inch across, place it on a railway line and let the train pass over it. This enlarged the coin to the size of a penny which was half as big again as the original coin. This practice was only carried out on the train that carried coal to and from Deep Pit , to Shelton Bar, and moved very slowly, it could be seen and heard and so did not present any danger.

As children we thought that because the coin had been enlarged in our simple minds to the size of a penny, made slot machines the prime target, it was the weight of the coin that worked the slot machines and not the size of the coin, this of course was unknown to us. The coin was rejected; to say we were disappointed would be an understatement. We were dejected as well as rejected.

It was possible to earn a copper or two as a look out to give warning of approaching "Bobbies". Many a game came to an abrupt end when the police were observed. Whoever was quick enough to snatch up the "kitty" (money) usually ended up with more than they started with. Playing cards for money in those days was almost regarded as a major crime.