Our house at Longfield Avenue had a front door and a side door. We never used the front door, but on my wedding day I exited via this door with all the neighbours watching me. The wedding was in darkness with a thick fog. We celebrated our diamond wedding in 2021 and got a photo from Queen Elizabeth II congratulating us on our long life together.
When we were first married, we lived at 15 Warnford Road, Cowersley, in a lovely Victorian house that cost £1,000. (Prime Minister Harold Wilson was born just across the road at number ten in 1916). We moved back to Golcar three years later to a brand new bungalow. When I look back now, I wish we hadn’t moved from Warnford Road. Even though there was little modern about the place, it’s how you feel that matters.
Wonderful teenage years with a boyfriend in the band!
At the time of John’s accident, he was playing in a skiffle group called the Rebels with David Bacon, the one who told me that John would like to see me. David was the tea chest bass player in the group. John was in a lot of groups that I can’t keep up with now, from the mid 50s to around 2015. For a short period he played with my brother Peter in a group called Antique Gold.
We had a wonderful time being teenagers in the 1950s. John was in a skiffle group and then a rock and roll group, and we went to all the dance halls he played at, bopping the night away. John played bass guitar in many groups all his life. I would dance with the local lads while John was carefully watching from the stage. I remember one young chap offering to walk me home while we were at Doncaster baths, and instead of saying no but thanks for asking, I was sarky and I said we would have a long walk mate, I’m with the group.
Very few of the dance halls that John’s groups played at, or the coffee bars where I often met with friends, sold alcohol. It wasn’t something we thought of or missed; we were happy to dance or sit with friends and listen to the latest popular records on the juke box.
Notable among John’s early groups were The Phantoms. When the group had become established, they had three bookings per week. At first the group booked a coach with Ward Brothers of Lepton and the local paying fans who travelled with the group paid for the coach. I can remember John’s sister Joyce sitting on Malcolm Ward’s knee while he drove. Later John’s brother Stuart, who had a van, became driver and group manager. The van was a Morris J2 fitted out with bench seats. The passengers sat on the seats while the guitars were stored underneath, with the amps and drums transported down the middle between the passengers.
Snapshots of 1950s womanhood
I left Hirst and Mallinson, as I did not get on well with the owner. He was a big man who liked to pat ladies’ bottoms. Whatever attitude I gave off I don’t know, but he didn’t try and pat mine. However, he didn’t like me, and there was a survey came round asking all the office staff if we could come half a hour later and stay half an hour longer. I said no because I wanted to go off with John and his group on outings, so I got the sack. They said they weren’t going to put up with somebody who would rather go gallivanting. I saw an advert at Brook Motors on St Thomas’ Road, Huddersfield, to be a shorthand typist to Geoff Brook the apprentice boss, and applied for it.
The insurance payout from the accident that had broken John’s leg paid for the deposit on the mortgage, and carpeted and furnished our first house on Warnford Road. We couldn’t have a joint mortgage as I was not 21 years old. Also women at that time couldn’t have a mortgage on their own, nor was a woman’s income counted for a joint mortgage, because they were expected to marry and have children and the mother would be expected to stay at home looking after the family.
Becoming a mum and dad
I stayed at Brook Motors as shorthand typist until I was pregnant with our son Steven. I can remember them finding out I was pregnant; an apprentice was talking about something being “on the inside” and I blushed. It was actually just a passing and entirely innocent comment about an engineering problem, but they looked at me and said “You’re pregnant, aren’t ya?”.
Normally they didn’t let people go back to a job at Brook Motors if they had left the company, but I was leaving because I was pregnant and not because I was fed up with the job, so I was able to return.
I gave birth to my first child Steven 14 months after marriage, which of course meant that I couldn’t accompany John and the group unless we could occasionally get a babysitter. Steven, weighing in at nearly ten pounds, was born on 13 February during the freezing winter of 1963, which was my mother’s birthday. It was the same night as The Phantoms played at Barnsley Baths as warm-up group for the popular Swedish instrumental group The Spotnicks.
My brother Peter accompanied John and the group, as he often did, acting as roadie. On their return home later that night, one had become a father and the other an uncle.
