Pie 'n' Mash and Prefabs

by Norman Jacobs

  Pop and rock now began to play a much more important part in my musical life than Gilbert and Sullivan or Dad’s other classical records. It was also about this time that we bought a new reel-to-reel tape recorder, a Belle, which played at the incredibly slow speed of 1 7/8 ips. But it did mean that I was able to record some of my favourite songs and singers off the wireless and play them at other times. Although I don’t think Dad approved of my newfound musical taste, he nevertheless realised that I was now a teenager and he didn’t interfere with my listening when he wasn’t there, though he did draw the line at actually buying records or having to listen to it himself.

  Sport on television in the early part of the afternoon continued as before, though it was now brought together under the heading of a brand-new programme called Grandstand, presented firstly by Peter Dimmock and then David Coleman. ITV also had its Saturday afternoon programme, World of Sport. This gradually became dominated by professional wrestling, with many of the leading wrestlers, such as Mick McManus, Jackie ‘Mr TV’ Pallo, Bert Royal, Billy Two Rivers, the Great Togo, Les Kellett, Vic Faulkner and George Kidd becoming household names as people tuned in in their millions to see these giants of the ring, cheering on the goodies and booing the baddies.

  As well as on television, they appeared in theatres and halls round the country. Hackney Empire regularly featured wrestling bills, though it always seemed to be the same wrestlers appearing time after time. I lost count of the number of times I saw posters up around Hackney advertising ‘Judo’ Al Hayes v. ‘Rebel’ Ray Hunter. They must have got sick of the sight of each other! Nevertheless, people would flock to see them live whenever they appeared. As it happened, I wasn’t all that keen on it myself but Dad was an avid fan. Of course, he knew that it wasn’t real but for him that was half the fun, watching all the manufactured outrage when a foul went unpunished or the exaggerated staggering around the ring after a light tap and even the occasional assault by an incensed member of the public on the ‘baddie’.

  Dad had always been keen on wrestling since he was a teenager and used to go and see it in the halls around Aldgate. In fact, he loved it so much that for his first-ever date with Mum he thought he’d treat her to an evening of all-in wrestling, especially as the stars that particular night were Norman the Butcher and the Giant Anaconda. He felt this was the idyllic way to start a courtship. Sadly, Mum did not agree and, as soon as the first bout started, she jumped up from her seat and ran out. Dad told me many years later, ‘The delicate art of this cultured sport was entirely lost on her,’ before adding ruefully, ‘It cost me a shilling as well.’ It was just as well that Mum eventually forgave him or I’d never have been born!

  The visits to Chingford also carried on. However, once we arrived at Nan and Grandpa’s, I didn’t stop long as I used to take a walk round to Aunt Julie’s to meet up with my cousins, Wendy, Rita, John and Carol. They were all round about my age, Wendy and Rita just a little bit older, John and Carol a bit younger. Aunt Julie and her family had moved to Chingford from their prefab in Bethnal Green in the early 1950s and were now on the same estate as Nan and Grandpa, just a five-minute walk away.

  This was another opportunity for me to listen to pop records, as Wendy and Rita were not hampered in this regard by their parents in the same way I was. Rita’s favourite singer was Adam Faith and as soon as a new record of his came out she bought it. After staying for an hour or so, I would walk back, sometimes with Wendy and Rita, who would quite often bring a few of their records with them and play them on Nan’s gramophone when we got back. Heaven knows what my grandparents thought of this intrusion on their normal Saturday night entertainment and telly, but they never seemed to object. I’m absolutely certain Dad wasn’t too pleased but what could he say?

  Aunt Clara used to like pop music as well. She was quite a bit younger than her brothers and sisters and in 1960 was only twenty-five years old as opposed to Dad, who was forty-five. Once the records were put on, Aunt Clara took charge and cleared away the chairs to make a space on the floor where we could jive. Not having had much practice at this new dance form, I’m afraid my early attempts weren’t too successful. On one occasion, Grandpa gazed at my feeble efforts and remarked, ‘You look more like a dancer’s labourer than a dancer, Norman.’

  When we didn’t get to play records, usually we watched television and it was one evening in 1963 that I settled down to watch the first episode of a new science-fiction series called Dr Who, starring William Hartnell. Although I found it interesting, I have to say it did not grab my attention immediately and I watched it on and off over the next year or so, but if Rita and Wendy brought their records round they always took precedence.

  One Saturday evening programme that combined the best of both worlds was the BBC’s Juke Box Jury, compered by David Jacobs, as this played new pop releases with a guest panel having to vote on whether it would be a hit or a miss. For some reason, Dad didn’t seem to mind this programme. Maybe it was the competitive element or more likely it was because he was often amused by Nan’s antics. She got right into the programme and if the panel didn’t agree with her view there would be more than a few ‘bloodys’ and ‘buggers’ directed at the television.

  ITV introduced a pop programme in the 1960s called Thank Your Lucky Stars, part of which, the ‘Spin-a-Disc’ section, followed a similar format to Juke Box Jury, where a guest D.J. and three teenagers reviewed three singles. It was here that Janice Nicholls first appeared and became famous for the catchphrase ‘Oi’ll give it foive’ said in her strong Black Country accent.

  Initially, Sundays also followed the normal pattern but this changed somewhat when Dad arrived home from work one evening and proudly announced, ‘I passed my driving test today.’ Mum and I looked at him in astonishment – we didn’t even know he’d been learning to drive. After letting the initial shock sink in, he continued, ‘So this Saturday we’re going to buy a car.’

  Good as his word, the following weekend he took me round to several second-hand car dealers in Hackney to help him look for a car. The one we finally settled on was a 1957 black Ford Anglia. Our first outing in it was to Chingford. As John was also at home, all four of us went. Much to my disappointment, as we got in the car, Dad said, ‘John, you sit in the front, so you can watch and start learning how to drive.’ So, rather grudgingly, I had to sit in the back on our first proper outing in the car. When we arrived at Nan’s, Dad tooted the horn and Nan and Uncle Albert and his family came out to see us. Nan took one look and said, ‘Lord and Lady bloody Muck, we are honoured.’

  The car’s registration plate read 284 KMP, but in keeping with Dad’s penchant for nicknaming everyone and everything he decided to call it ‘Arnold Pentecost’, so that’s how it was known to us all. Although owning a car didn’t significantly change our everyday life, it did make a big difference at weekends and during holidays. For a start, we drove to Chingford every Saturday and, although Mum still visited her parents by bus, we always went to pick her up in the evening. It was because of this that I met my other grandpa for the first time. At this time I still knew nothing about his past and all I saw was a white-haired old man sitting in his armchair, always with the top button of his trousers undone, just watching television and saying nothing. Dad, of course, wouldn’t speak to him and, after some brief pleasantries with Nan, we would be off; we never stayed longer than ten minutes at the most.

  But it was our Sunday routine that was most altered by the arrival of the car as it was pressed into service to go places we would never have attempted to get to by public transport. These varied from beauty spots such as Hatfield Forest to historical places like Audley End, as well as some lesser-known seaside resorts, including Burnham-on-Crouch and Maldon. Our visit to Burnham-on-Crouch resulted in Dad involving us all in breaking the law! We went into a café and ordered some drinks, orange squash for me, tea for Mum and Dad, and ham sandwiches for all of us. The tea and orange came up very quickly but there was no sign of the sandwiches. Dad call
ed the waitress over and asked where our sandwiches were.

  She replied, ‘They’ll be ready soon.’

  More time passed and we tried to hang out the drinks but the tea was getting cold and so, after finishing it and still with no sign of the sandwiches arriving, Dad said, ‘Come on, let’s go. I’m not waiting any longer.’

  So we left the café without paying for the drinks… and still hungry.

  Every Friday evening, Dad would have his tea and then say to me, ‘Get the bucket filled up then.’ This was the start of our weekly ritual of cleaning the car. Although he didn’t take quite as much pride in our car as Old Daddy Flat Cap did in his, he nevertheless wanted it to be a credit to the Jacobs household, so off we went, carrying buckets of water up and down the path to clean all the London grime off before giving it a good polish. It might have been a labour of love for him, but I can’t say I saw it in quite the same way myself.

  Our local garage, Eleanor Motors, was on the corner of Chatsworth Road and Lea Bridge Road. This is where we always bought our petrol. There was no self-service then so the tank was filled up by the attendant. We always asked for ‘four and four shots’, which meant four gallons of petrol and four shots of Redex. I was never sure what the point of the Redex was, though I understood it had something to do with making the car run better, but I think it was more accepted folklore than really beneficial. It was supplied from a big dispenser next to the pumps.

  Because the car was filled up by an attendant, Dad would always give him a tip. However, I was unaware of this fact and one day I went with John just after he’d passed his driving test to get some petrol. Dad gave me £1 1s to pay for it. The price of a gallon of petrol was four shillings and eleven pence, which meant that four and four shots came to exactly £1, which is what the attendant asked for. So I gave him the £1 note and kept the coins. When we got home, I gave Dad back the shilling and he said, ‘What’s this? Why are you giving me back a shilling?’

  Before I could answer, John put in, ‘Norman didn’t feel like giving him a tip.’

  Why John couldn’t have told me at the garage what the extra shilling was for, I don’t know.

  After having Arnold Pentecost for a few years, we sold him and bought a second-hand Ford Popular with the licence plate YGB 203. Somewhat predictably, it was nicknamed ‘Yogi Bear’ by Dad.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE COLDEST WINTER, GREEN SHIELD STAMPS AND DOUBLE DIAMOND

  As we moved towards the end of the 1950s and through the 1960s, with all food now off rationing and the days of austerity inflicted by the War receding fast, a general increase in prosperity and living standards led to a tangible upturn in the ease and comfort with which most people in our position lived. For us, it meant we saw a number of changes to our prefab and the way we lived our everyday lives. The most important were the ones that helped Mum and saved her from some of the hardest parts of her job as a housewife.

  Probably the first major labour-saving device we bought was a washing machine. Dad had seen an advert in the newspaper for the new Rolls-Razor washing machine and had sent off the coupon asking for more information. But it wasn’t just information he got, as a couple of days later a salesman arrived, complete with a new twin tub washer drier, which he set up in the kitchen for us. It was something like half the price of the nearest equivalent Hotpoint or Hoover machine. The salesman told us they were able to do this as they sold direct to the public and not through shops. We could have it on hire purchase if we wanted, he added.

  He was in and out of the house in less than half an hour and we had a new washing machine, bought for cash, as Dad didn’t believe in hire purchase. Like a lot of people of his generation, he believed you should only buy something when you could afford it and not put yourself into debt. When the salesman had gone, Dad shook his head and said, ‘I didn’t think I could fall for sales patter like that.’ He was very concerned that he had been taken in by the speed of it all and began to regret buying it.

  On the other hand, Mum was delighted. ‘It’s just what I wanted,’ she said. ‘It looks ideal to me.’

  Dad needn’t have worried as the washing machine worked perfectly until we left the prefab several years later. At a stroke, the new washing machine made the copper and the mangle redundant and made things much easier for Mum.

  The other big job she had was cleaning out the coal fire every morning in winter and getting it ready for the evening. This was dealt with when we bought a new electric fire to place in the hearth. No more raking out the ashes, no more polishing and blacking the grate, no more getting the bucket of coal in from the shed. It was just a matter of flicking the switch now.

  Along with the labour-saving devices, some of our rising prosperity was spent acquiring goods for our leisure activities. We got a new 21” television, a new, much smaller radio and separate record player to take the place of the monster radiogram, giving us more space with no loss of quality (in fact, better quality) and the brand-new reel-to-reel tape recorder, mentioned earlier, which not only recorded off the radio but also allowed you to speak into it and then play your own voice back. Amazing!

  But not everything made our lives easier. One Sunday morning, towards the end of December 1962, I got up out of bed to see everything outside completely covered in white. The snow had started just before I went to bed and was still coming down when I got up. And, judging by the depth, it hadn’t stopped all night. Now inches thick, it was still falling.

  ‘Talk about “Rupert looked out on the dismal scene,”’ said Dad, referring to the line from my old Rupert Bear annuals we still frequently quoted.

  There was hardly any let up during the day, and the following morning, which was a Monday, Dad shook me awake early on and said, ‘Come on, we’ll have to get that path clear.’

  Although I was on school holiday, Mum and Dad were both due to go into work. Fortunately, it had stopped snowing at last and Dad and I got kitted up with warm clothes and wellies, got the garden spade and rake out of the shed and shovelled away the snow onto the grass. All along our row of prefabs, the other occupants were doing the same while across the road there was a similar scene. It seemed that everyone was out clearing the snow away. The road itself was covered in snow and I said to Dad, ‘How are you going to get to work?’

  ‘I’ll have to drive, won’t I?’ he replied stoically. ‘Come on, help me clear the snow and ice off the car.’

  The car itself was under so much snow you could hardly make out the shape but we cleared enough off for Dad to be able to see out the windows. After shovelling a bit of snow away from in front of the wheels, he got in, pulled the choke out and turned the key in the ignition. Amazingly, it roared into life first time of asking. He put it into gear and slowly drove off down the road, sliding and skidding as he went. I thought he was never going to make it and I was a bit worried about what would happen but he continued driving until I saw him turn the slight corner into Powerscroft Road and then he was gone from sight.

  Not long after he went, Mum got all her winter clothes on and trundled off up Chatsworth Road to the toy factory just as it started to snow again.

  Little did we know then that all this shovelling, sliding, skidding, winter clothes and going to work in the snow was to become our way of life for more than two months as our new electric fire was tested to its limits. From December 1962 to March 1963, Great Britain suffered the coldest and most prolonged winter since the seventeenth century. The bad winter had in fact begun early in December when thick smog descended on London. As it turned out this was the last of the pea-soupers to affect the city before the results of the Clean Air Act finally kicked in.

  A few days later, there were a couple of days of snow, but the big freeze itself began on 22 December. Although bitterly cold, the snow did not start falling until late on Boxing Day, followed by a blizzard of Arctic proportions on the nights of 29 and 30 December. From that point on, there was a continual covering of snow on the ground for over two months and yet,
throughout it all, with plenty more heavy snowfalls and thick snow and ice lying on the ground, we managed to carry on. I don’t think I missed school once during that period, though I was late on several occasions and we were sent home at lunchtime a number of times. As I wore my wellies to school every day, I had to take my shoes with me in my satchel.

  Meanwhile, Mum and Dad continued to struggle into work every day, though there were a couple of times when Dad came home very late and said he’d had to abandon the car somewhere along the route as the snow was too deep. Which meant not only had he had to walk home in a blizzard but also he’d have to walk out in the snow the next day to find the car and hope it was all right.

  We still managed to get to Chingford and London Bridge at the weekends. Most days I was still able to go out and see my friends or they were able to come to me. A lot of effort was put into keeping the roads clear, both by the authorities and by people themselves. We continued to get up and out early every morning to shovel the latest ice and snow from the path, as did all our neighbours. Nowadays, a few hours of snow, never mind months, seems to land the whole country in crisis.

  The main thing that did suffer nationally was the football programme. Some clubs were unable to play any matches for over two months. It was during this period that the football pools companies introduced the Pools Panel to adjudicate on what the result would have been had the match been played. Rugby union, rugby league and horse racing all suffered in the same way.

  It wasn’t until 6 March 1963 that the overnight temperature rose above freezing for the first time, the snow began to thaw and within a few days it was all gone. Life returned to normal.