Baby Boomer!
Born in the post-World War II years, a Lancashire Lad, in what was known as the baby boom years. Shortly after, because it’s not always best to live with your grandparents, we moved down to London.
Soon I had a baby brother, but when social services intervened to put us into foster homes, we quickly moved back up north. A short while living with my grandparents before we were rehomed in a back street, literally named ‘Back Simpson Street’ in the town centre, just four terrace houses long, in what is now the City of Preston.
Times were hard, well I would say that, wouldn’t I? My dad did in his time, so I’m damn sure I will in mine. Brought up on a ration book, a very basic one-up bedroomed house (me and my younger brother sleeping on the landing), decorated Ribble Red with an outside shared thunderbox. Lighting by gas mantles, a coal-fired cooking range, and ice on the inside window panes, with liberty bodices, the essential in-fashion things in those days. My infant school years were taught by nuns, and I enjoyed the daily quart of milk and an afternoon sleep in the small school hall on camp beds. My education wasn’t that brilliant, so I needed extra lessons at another school.
We were one of the first families to be offered a brand-new home overlooking fields in the northeast of the town. How wonderful, open fields to romp, farmers to help, and many other young folks to play with. My mother lived there for 66 years.
In my early teens, I was destined to become what was later labelled a sixties child. History tells us it was an era of mods, rockers, drugs, flower power, free love and the Beatles. Like many others, this revolution largely passed me by, and the lasting memory is simply the music from those formative days, which still rings in my ears.
But Sir Tom (Finney) was doing wonders for “The Invincible’s”, “The Lilywhites” or simply Preston North End whichever you want to recall, and kept up everyone’s morale. Ee ba gum they were the good old days!
I was very interested in photography, which I hoped would be my vocation. But alas, the way to success was to have a ‘trade’. For this, it was essential to have an indentured apprenticeship with one of the big four in the area: Goss (printing press works), English Electric (later to become BAe), Leyland Motors (trucks & buses) and the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA), locally known as ukulele.
After selection exams, I was fortunate to be offered an apprenticeship with UKAEA, which would naturally determine my future career direction. Even though I stayed on at school, with quite literally a handful of others, for what was then a novel 6th form, I was still only 15 years old when I started work. My birthday was at the very end of the educational year, which I always felt in my educational development I was always one year behind. I know others may probably think differently and believe more than this!
University at this time was just an Everest except for the very talented, or well-connected, who could secure a fellowship. The traditional further education process required commitment. Several evenings of night school study and, if lucky, as I was, your employer granted you a one-day-a-week release to go to the local technical college. With a full-time apprenticeship of five years and subsequent further work experience in the design office along with further study, it was possible to achieve chartered engineer status.
Alas, after completing all my studies and final exams and much to my disappointment, the goalposts were changed in 1972. One year of full-time study was introduced as a requirement for chartered status, with no grandfather clause for those who had followed the traditional path. Domestic commitments ensured I couldn’t do a full-time educational course to secure an official professional status. Other opportunities would of course present themselves in later life, but this was of no consolation at the time.
At least there was no National Conscription, although even today I feel it’s something lost from our commitment to the country. I did, however, join up with the Royal Observer Corps (now disbanded) during the Cold War years. Weekly evening training, with daytime RAF Camp training sessions too! A short service record, which I have today, gets me membership in some London Clubs.