Tales of a Morecambe Shrimp - By Carole Bould

We Love Morecambe
Aug 28
43 min read

New Friendship

The tide was out and I was swimming happily with my family in the shallow waters of Morecambe Bay. The sun was shining so the water was warm. But then something quite scary happened to me - I had been captured by a little girl. She had been standing on the beach close to the water's edge with a small fishing net, something that many kids did in the summer. She could only be at most two years old and her daddy was with her. This was the first time she had gone fishing and she squealed with delight when she caught me. She had brought a glass jam jar with her which, optimistically, she had already filled up with sea water. I was terrified. I was poured out of the tiny net into the jam jar and this is where my new life and many adventures began. It was much more interesting than swimming in circles in the sea with my shrimp family all the time!

The little girl, whose name I didn't know, took me in the jam jar back to her home, which was just a short walk across the promenade. There was a long row of big houses, most of which had been turned into flats. I later found out that this area of Morecambe was known as Sandylands. The little girl was excited and wanted to put me into a larger glass bowl so that I had more room to swim in. She also returned from the beach a few days later with some seaweed to put into my bowl so that I would feel more at home. She also managed to persuade her parents to buy some fish food at the pet shop. I had never eaten anything like that before and it took me a while to get used to it, but it grew on me and I grew with it. My bowl was placed on the window sill in her bedroom. Apart from her mummy and daddy there was a little baby in this home, the first of three brothers. When he began to walk and talk he couldn't pronounce his sister's name so he called her Roly, so that is the name I adopted.

Early Days in Morecambe

This was the early 50's and Roly's first few years were spent in the flat in Sandylands. Her father was a huge jazz fan and had opened a record shop in Albert Road, Morecambe, but the collection of records was all jazz music. Anybody who came into the shop wanting the latest pop records was hastily told to leave as he didn't sell that rubbish! The shop was hence a failure. However, he had managed to make contact with several jazz musicians in England during this time and whenever they came to Morecambe to perform, he would meet and greet them and invite them back to the flat after they had performed in one of the theatres. There were popular jazz artists such as Johnny Dankworth (band leader) and his wife, Cleo Laine (singer) and Tubby Hayes (saxophone player). Roly's dad used to show her off to these people by playing jazz records and asking her to tell them who was singing or playing and the name of the song after the first few seconds. Roly always got the answers right. She took on these challenges quite happily and was delighted how proud

Whilst her brother was still in nappies (which were made out of cotton in those days) Roly had a doll with a mouth that could open and close. She would pretend to feed the doll by pushing paper and coal from the fireplace into its mouth and gave it water to drink. I was fascinated and didn't understand it at all. The nappies had to be soaked regularly in hot water and bleach, which her mother took care of every few days. Her mother always took off her wedding ring when she began this chore and placed it on the end of the bath tub. One day however the ring went missing and Roly's mother searched the whole flat in despair. She was terrified of what her husband would say. Fortunately Roly's dad didn't notice the missing ring for a couple of days until she was removing a soiled nappy from Roly's brother and, lo and behold, the ring was right there in the nappy's contents. It became clear that Roly had fed her brother the ring just like she fed her doll! Lucky for her brother too that he hadn't choked on it!

Only two years later Roly's second brother was born. The apartment was full of kids and it became more and more stressful for Roly's mother. By this time her father was working in a cinema (the Empire) as a film projectionist and he would often take at least the two eldest kids to watch films directly from the projection room. They loved the Disney films, such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, Bambi, Dumbo, Lady and the Tramp, etc., although she usually ended up in tears when one of the cartoon characters died!

One film really upset Roly; this was not a Disney cartoon but a film (with real actors) called 'Old Yeller' (1957), where a young farm boy in Texas brought up a stray dog and spent night and day with him. Unfortunately towards the end of the film the dog was attacked by wolves and developed rabies and the boy was forced by his father to shoot the dog and put him out of his misery. Roly cried more than usual, even though there was a happy ending with a litter of puppies, which were obviously Old Yeller's.

Roly would always come home happy and tell me about the films she had seen. On Saturdays she and her brother would also go to the neighbours' flat next door to watch TV, particularly cartoons such as Popeye and series like The Little Rascals. Later, when the kids were old enough, they would go to the Saturday morning club at the Odeon cinema by themselves. Before the cartoons and films began the big screen began with a welcoming song, where all the lyrics were shown on the screen with a bouncing ball jumping from word to word so that all the kids could join in. Roly still remembers the first two lines and the melody of the song: „We come along on Saturday mornings, greeting everybody with a smile, We come along on Saturday mornings, knowing it's well worthwhile”. The kids all sang along. They loved it because there would be a cartoon, then a series such as Flash Gordon or Batman, and finally a full-length film – all for sixpence! Happy days....

There were at least two films Roly saw in the sixties, which had a profound impact on her. The British film industry was beginning to boom in the sixties. The first film Roly remembers was 'Whistle Down the Wind” (1961) starring Hayley Mills and Alan Bates. The film was set in a village in Yorkshire, where Hayley and her two younger siblings lived on a farm. One day they found a man sleeping in the barn and came to the conclusion that this was Jesus (not knowing that he was actually an escaped convict!). They were thrilled and would steal food from home and feed 'Jesus', this was their own special secret! One of Roly's favourite lines in this film was when the kids came across some kittens and each adopted one. The little boy had picked one out and had given him a name, and his elder sister said: 'Yer can't call a cat Spider!' in her very broad Yorkshire accent! The two unknown actors had been chosen from various schools for their roles and were wonderful. It was a beautiful film and yet of course tragic.

The second film was 'Kes' (1969), also filmed in Barnsley, Yorkshire, a working-class, down and out mining town. There were two brothers living with their mother, who was trying to make ends meet with very little money. The elder brother was a teenager who worked in a mine, the younger one was only about 12 and still at school. He was treated badly at school, often got caught for petty theft and lived a fairly solitude life. He was also mistreated by his elder brother. However, once out on one of his solitary walks in the countryside he came across a wounded bird, a kestrel. He decided to help the bird and took it home and cared for it by pepping it up with food and water. Luckily, the bird recuperated and began to fly again. The boy was ecstatic and spent every hour outside of school helping the bird to fly. It was the only relationship he had! There was only one teacher in the school who showed the boy any empathy and understanding, otherwise he was ridiculed. Sadly, the film ended tragically, when the elder brother killed the kestrel...! It was a heartfelt film with focus on the harsh reality of life in a working-class mining community, where the majority of the townsfolk lived in poverty.

However, all was not happy at home. Roly's parents argued a lot and there was a lot of shouting, mostly from her mother. Roly never knew what they were arguing about, neither did I. In retrospect Roly finally realised why they were allowed to go to the cinema so often, so as not to be around during these arguments.

At some point the family moved from Sandylands to a house on Balmoral Road, which had belonged to her father's aunt, his only living family member, and who had died leaving her only nephew the house. Roly's father came from Bradford in Yorkshire but lost both parents during the war. By all accounts his father had been a pilot and died during a mission, and consequently his mother had committed suicide thereafter. How much truth there was to this story remained unknown to Roly, but she did remember living in this house for a short time and finding her father one day sitting on the bed in the bedroom in tears. She asked him what was wrong, and he pointed to a note on the pillow. Her mother had left him and had gone to London to visit another jazz musician, Ronnie Scott, who owned a jazz club in London. Although Roly's mother did return some days later this was the beginning of the end!

Eventually things escalated so that her parents separated and her mother left and took the kids with her to her adopted parents' house ('Derrywood'), (this adoption was a fact Roly found out about many years later). Roly used to like going to her grandparents' house for tea sometimes and they were always well fed there. Her grandmother would let the kids watch some TV after tea and would make them take off their shoes and socks so that she could darn the holes in their socks. But it soon became clear that they were staying here for a different reason this time. It was during this stay that Roly's youngest brother Martin was born. She was so disappointed that she had yet another brother and not a sister and she was determined to dislike him. But after her mother returned from hospital with the new baby, who was fast asleep and put into her grandparents' living room, Roly snuck into the living room and immediately fell in love with this new brother. He was so cute and she felt very guilty about her desire to dislike him, it even made her cry..

Then the tension between her mother and her grandparents became more obvious and it caused her mother to move into the flat above her step-father's shop in Albert Road (Aunt Freda had remarried after her first husband Barney had died and her second husband owned an electrical shop selling mostly TVs and radios, etc.). This was a big change for the kids; the boys had had their own bedroom in Derrywood just as Roly had had hers (a lovely little room up in the attic). In this flat however all the kids were in one room with an opening between two tiny rooms. Roly did not like this arrangement at all, particularly because all four kids were sent to bed at the same time despite the difference in age. So in the evenings, out of pure boredom, she would make up ghost stories and try and frighten her brothers. This did not go down well and the noise caused their mother to come and give them all a spanking with a slipper every night. The same thing happened when they were telling jokes and laughing.

Roly remembers one astonishing evening however while they were still living in the flat above the shop. The kids were all asleep and there had been no spanking. On the contrary, her mother came in to the bedroom and woke up Roly and Topher; the other two were fast asleep. They had no idea what this was all about. Their mother took them to the living room, where the TV was on, and told us to sit down for a very special film. It was in fact 'The Thief of Baghdad”, an old film made in the 1930's. The hero of the film was a young Indian teenager, Sabu. It was a magical film and Roly and her brother were completely mesmerised. More astonishingly their mother appeared to be in an unusually good mood and had never woken them up to watch a film on TV! When Roly and Topher returned to the bedroom they had a lot to talk about, so I heard all about the film and it did sound wonderful.

Early Schooldays

Roly started school at West End County Primary School at the age of four and loved it from day one. There were no fears or tears on the first day, unlike her second brother, Paul, who was terrified of going to school.

Roly missed her dad terribly until he and her mother obviously came to some agreement about his visitation rights and finally he was allowed to come and pick up the kids either from school or from kindergarten. Roly was overjoyed. Her dad would take them on long walks on the promenade or to an ice-cream parlour in Poulton Square, where they all sat with a huge long glass of ice cream with syrup and fruit, known back then as a Knickerbocker Glory! It sounds delicious! Sometimes he would pick them up on Saturdays and take them to the ice rink in Blackpool, he always brought friends with him, just as he often did on the long walks. Eventually her dad moved to Chorley, another town not too far away, where he was again running a record shop. The visits became less frequent but did not stop. To Roly's amazement her dad came to visit them one day with a newborn baby, whom he introduced to us as Simon and who had the same birthday as Roly's. He had married a lovely woman, whom the kids had previously met when they were ice skating. She used to be one of the synchronised swimmers at the SSS. Roly couldn't believe that she had yet another brother!

As time passed, Roly's mother began going out with one of the two electricians who worked for the kids' grandparents. Their repair room was directly beneath the flat and above the shop. The kids were never left alone during her mother's dates, there was always a babysitter, one of two equally lovely and long-lasting family friends or their grandparents. One day however their mother announced, during a dinner of fish and chips (a treat), that she and the electrician were getting married. It didn't bother her brothers, but Roly was not amused and sulked all day, not that her mother noticed. Once they were married the tension in the family became greater again. Apparently the new stepfather did not like Roly's dad coming to visit the kids and his attitude sparked off more arguments until Roly's mother asked Roly's dad to stop coming entirely. This decision hurt Roly badly. In the meantime she had another new half-brother, Johnnie, whom she had only seen once as a baby.

One incident that characterized Roly's resentment happened at primary school, when she was about seven years old. When she got to school and opened her satchel with her exercise books she discovered that her mother had changed her surname on all her books and the little savings account book, which most of the kids in class paid into once weekly. Roly's grandmother always gave her sixpence for this. Roly was shocked, her mother had simply crossed out her real surname and replaced it with that of her stepfather's instead. So she crossed out what her mother had written and wrote her real surname on all her books. Her teacher was somewhat confused and spoke to the headmaster, who then contacted Roly's mother, who told him that she had remarried and had had all the kids' names changed. It was the first Roly had heard about this and was then told not to change her name ever again on her books. She knew however with all the wisdom of a seven-year-old that something wasn't right about this and was proved correct some years later, when she found out that mothers could not change their children's names legally without the consent of their father. She knew full well that her father had never consented to this. This knowledge made matters worse as time would tell.

Roly's grandparents were always kind to the four kids and helped the family out financially. Her grandmother always wanted to send Roly to elocution lessons so that she could learn Queen's English, but Roly always refused. Her grandmother used to say that she would never get far in life with a Lancashire accent! This old-fashioned opinion was typical in those days but changed over the decades so that regional accents were no longer seen as a sign of poverty, thankfully. She was also sent to Ballroom Dancing classes on the Central Pier, which she enjoyed.

When the kids were still quite little they developed all the various illnesses such as measles, chicken-pox, German measles, mumps and whooping cough. As soon as one picked up an illness the others would too. Whooping cough was the worst though and Roly still remembers the horrible noise from the cough. The family doctor had told their mother to take them out for walks in the fresh air as often as possible, but inevitably one of the kids would develop such a severe coughing fit that they all had to go back home. Every year a nurse came around, at least until the end of primary school, to give the kids a TB-Test because a distant aunt on their mother's side of the family had had tuberculosis.

Moving Homes and Further Education

After Roly's mother and stepdad were married the family continued to live in the flat for a short while. Then they moved to her step-dad's mother's house in Bold Street near the Battery, which was oddly enough not far from Sandylands. It was quite a large house where the kids' 'new' grandmother (an elderly lady and overweight) used to take in guests for bed and breakfast in the summer months. This was a disaster! Roly's mother hated her and the atmosphere was always extremely tense. Roly's mother found fault with everything she did and made no bones about it. It was awful! More gloom and doom....!

Consequently, Roly's mum and stepdad decided to buy a house in Sulby Grove in an area of Morecambe called Bare. It was primarily a smart residential area which struck the kids as 'posh'. It also had a small railway station, where you could catch a train to Lancaster. This new house had been neglected for quite some time and needed a lot of work doing. But here Roly had her own bedroom and the boys shared their own larger room.

Shortly after they had moved in Roly had finished primary school, which she loved, and was accepted into Morecambe Grammar School, the same school her mother had attended. This school was not too far away from where they lived and was within walking distance. It was a big change and Roly initially felt overawed. The school was so big! She told me about her first day and how all the new kids were gathered in the big school hall and divided into four classes for the 1^st form, A, B, C and D. She ended up in 1D where she didn't know any of her classmates and quickly learnt that there were a lot of clowns in this class. Most of the teachers wore long black cloaks and appeared very stern. She made friends quickly, just as she had at primary school, but although she wanted to be a good pupil, she let herself be led on by some of the boys who were real comedians and frequently disrupted the lessons, especially when the teachers were still quite young and inexperienced. As a result she had a fairly poor half-term school report with teachers' comments such as 'She could do better if she were not so easily distracted' etc. Her mother's reaction to this was equally scary and Roly was grounded and made to sit in her bedroom every day after school to work hard on her homework. Roly however was determined to do better at school and wanted to be upgraded, since the class 1D had a bad reputation. Her end of year report was excellent and she was indeed upgraded the following school year into 2B. She did have two subjects however where she felt lost, one being Maths and the other Physics and quickly realised that she was way behind and never really caught up. This was in part due to a very weak maths teacher in 1D who could not control his class; he was not the only one!

Roly's favourite subjects in 1D were English language and literature, French, art and history. In 2B there were the first changes with the introduction of new subjects such as Latin, chemistry, biology and music. Despite her weaknesses in maths and physics Roly really enjoyed biology and chemistry. Latin became her new favourite subject along with music and art. She had also started a paper round in the mornings and then additionally in the evenings to earn a bit of pocket money so that she could buy birthday and Christmas presents for her family, and also to avoid spending time in the house, where tensions had begun to arise yet again.

Roly's next challenge at school was learning German, the final foreign language on the school's agenda. This was offered in the 4^th and 5^th form and there was only one teacher. He became Roly's favourite teacher; he had a very dry sense of humour. The class became smaller after the 5^th year as the pupils had already opted for their choice of 'A'-levels for the last two years. One day Roly came across Adolf Hitler's book 'Mein Kampf' in the school library and read it all in German. This was quite an amazing coincidence, this book was banned in Germany after World War II! Much later Roly's German friends couldn't believe that she had read this.

During the 5^th year all the scholars had to fill out forms about their preferences in 'A-Levels' and about their choice for further careers after school and/or university or college. Roly's form teacher handed out these forms and wandered up and down between the desks checking on what each of the kids had written. When he read that Roly had proclaimed that she wanted to be a lion tamer, he got very cross. He thought Roly was trying to take the mickey out of him and tore up her form and handed her another one. Roly wrote exactly the same thing on the second form, she was actually being serious!

German was Roly's favourite language (which didn't go down well with her mother!). French had become more and more boring, mostly due to the fact that their French teacher, an elderly lady, used to fall asleep during lessons. Latin had become more interesting and challenging. She felt quite infatuated with her German teacher and was heartbroken when he announced he was leaving the school and moving to Hamburg with his family. This happened in the Lower 6^th form. Consequently the small class had a new teacher who was quite different but actually very good. Roly had become quite cheeky by this time and used to test her new teacher's patience. She began to use coloured felt tip pens for her homework, firstly just in one colour, then using all the colours for each sentence! This caused her teacher to make a corresponding remark in her book: 'Next time try invisible ink so you make no mistakes!' She thought this was a fitting and humorous response, so she decided to stop the nonsense and eventually became quite fond of him.

During the summer holidays following Roly's final year at grammar school she was working at the SSS. It was late, the pool was closed and she was sweeping up the rubbish in the seating area as usual. She had her head down when she suddenly jumped in shock. Her former German teacher was sitting on one the benches grinning at her. He had come over from Hamburg on a short visit to Morecambe. Roly was amazed that he had turned up at the pool to find her. He suggested that they meet up in the evening at the Broadway for a drink. Roly was thrilled to see him and later met up with him. Oddly enough his successor was there too and Roly felt quite proud of this reunion in front of all her school friends.

Latin had been her favourite language until she began German, but the teacher began to annoy her. He was a strange man, he always wore his black cloak, even in the summer with sandals and socks! Some of the kids had their suspicions that he was probably gay (or in those days 'queer'!). But the homework had become much more challenging. The class, which now comprised only 9-10 pupils in the 4^th and 5^th form, were set quite lengthy passages from Homer's 'The Iliad' to translate from Latin into English. Roly, always willing to impress her teachers, spent hours on her Latin homework to work out the best translation. But when the translations were finished and marked the teacher and pupils would then discuss these. It became clear that the only boy in the class always received the best reviews, even though other pupils had produced equally good interpretations of the Latin. Roly found this somewhat degrading and finally decided to drop this subject for her 'A'-levels. Many years later she found out that this teacher had been fired from the school once it had become clear that he was having an affair with one of his male pupils. Roly thought this was poetic justice!

School extracurricular activities

I felt really quite happy in this new home since Roly kept me in her own room and was not disturbed by her brothers' antics. She had been given an old tape recorder and a small portable radio at some stage. Apart from reading most evenings she began to listen to a pirate radio station 'Radio Caroline' (set up on a boat in the North Sea in the sixties) to listen to all the new pop music under the bedclothes after 'lights out'. Around this time she also took up singing with the school choir after school and took part in several county choir performances. Later the new music teacher, a wonderful and enthusiastic man, introduced the kids to Gilbert and Sullivan operas and produced at least three of them (Pirates of Penzance, The Mikado, Patience and HMS Pinafore). Roly always had a small solo part in all of them. These operas were always great fun and several teachers took part, which showed certain of them in a totally different light! Roly was also part of the church choir, which kept her out of the house on Sundays, mornings and evenings. The best free-time activity offered by the school was with the Outward Bound Society, where several experienced teachers would offer accompanied long hikes in the Lake District (Old Man, Scafell Pike, Great Gable etc.), sometimes further afield. These hikes were offered to kids of all ages and a bus was hired for these outings. The kids would be away from early morning to late afternoon on Saturdays. All these activities kept her out of trouble and away from the ever-growing tensions within the family.

There were at least two teachers at school who had taught her mother and who constantly reminded Roly what a good pupil her mother had been. Roly felt she was being unfairly compared to her mother and resented this.

Roly had made a lot of new friends from different classes and age groups during these after-school activities. However, her best friends were always boys, probably because she had been brought up with boys; she was a real tomboy. But neither she nor her brothers felt comfortable bringing friends around to the house because their mother's 'moods' were so unpredictable.

During summer holidays in the early days at primary school the kids would be out all day playing with neighbours, sometimes in the back alley behind the flat above their granddad's shop. A very nice lady on the other side of the alley would often come out to say hello. Her teenage son was in a local skiffle band and would sometimes practice and the kids could watch. Quite often this kind lady would bring the kids into her house and feed them porridge, she obviously felt sorry for them; or, she had heard through the grapevine that their mother had sent them to school one day without any breakfast having overslept. Roly never forgot this particular incident, neither did I. Her younger brother of the two had told his teacher he was hungry because he hadn't had any breakfast. Immediately the headmaster was informed and Roly and her other brother were fished out of their respective classes and taken to the staff room, where they were all given toast and warm milk. This not only embarrassed Roly, but more importantly their mother!

One year the kids all got roller-skates for Christmas, with which they expanded their horizon and they would be out all day skating up and down the promenade in the summer holidays.

Later, when Roly and her eldest brother were in their early teens, they would escape to the super swimming stadium every day, come rain or shine, and joined up with a group of boys, two of whom could already dive really well from the top board (10 metres). These kids were from different schools but all became great friends. Roly's brother spent days learning how to dive off the top board like his new buddies; in comparison to them he was quite small and skinny, whereas they were quite muscular. Roly also spent quite some time plucking up the courage to do bombs off the top board. Once she had achieved this, there was no stopping her! She was the only girl in this group and became known as Queen of the bombs. They would also play another game on the springboard in less deeper water, where the aim was to push someone else off the end, King of the springboard. These were such happy days and ones Roly never forgot. I loved listening to a full report when she came home. The SSS became their second home and their rescue from a depressing atmosphere.

Morecambe was still a thriving seaside resort during the sixties with lots of shows and lots of music (even the Stones, The Who and The Small Faces performed here!). At the Winter Gardens, the biggest theatre in Morecambe, there was still a summer season of singers, dancers, comedians, bands, etc. as usual. Quite by chance one of the singers from a male vocalist swing group (I think they were called The Polka Dots) and his family moved into one of the houses in the same road as Roly and her family. Roly was pretty sure that her father knew the singers too, at least by name. There were two daughters and one was about the same age as Roly and they spent a lot of time together in the summer holidays that year. Of course Roly's mum was eager to meet the singer and his wife, after all, they were celebrities! So they would often join up for drinks or go out together. Sadly this ended when the summer season was over and Roly missed her new friend.

Although the kids did not see their father for a while, he knew through friends in Morecambe where they were and how to reach them. So every year he would send them birthday and Christmas cards to the new address, always with some money. This caused more problems because he always addressed the envelopes to each of us with our real surname and Roly knew that this provoked both her mother and stepdad. Nobody ever spoke about these cards or said they were nice and that the money was very generous, it became a sore point for a long time. It always upset Roly but there was nothing she could do.

The kid's teenage years, particularly for Roly and her first brother, were the most trying. Roly's mother had got a job working for Avon as a regional manager and had her own car, a Ford Fiesta I believe, so she was out and about more in the daytime. Apparently she was quite successful in her job. Roly was still very active in after-school activities and her curriculum was changing all the time. Latin had become much more interesting, whereas French had become exceedingly boring. In the1st year, Roly had a lovely French teacher, a woman who had taught her mother, but from the 2^nd year on the class had a different teacher, an elderly lady, who unfortunately often fell asleep in class and whose French accent was mixed with a broad Lancashire accent! However, this lady had always been pro-active in forming a cultural partnership between Morecambe and an arrondissement of Paris and therefore had contact with the mayor at that time. Roly's mother joined their committee and at some point the mayor visited Morecambe and Roly's mother got to meet him. She had always been a top scholar at grammar school, particularly in French, and was expected to attend Oxford or Cambridge. This however did not come to be, since she had already met her first husband and fell pregnant at the age of 17. The rest is history!

Being a real Francophile and able to show off her knowledge of the French language, Roly's mother got to know the French mayor very well – maybe too well! She went to visit him at least twice in Paris for long weekends and he would come to Morecambe quite frequently. Roly and her brother suspected there was something going on between them, which was probably true. The mayor was a small, thin, elderly man and not in the least bit attractive – but he was French! Whether it was through this man or through her visits to Paris Roly's mother began to realize what she had missed out on and her desire for change thus began.

By this time Roly's stepdad had independently taken over a new shop in Euston Road in Morecambe, where he was still involved in electrics but had also begun to sell guitars and amplifiers, etc.. More and more local musicians started coming to the shop and hanging out. They would often come round to the house, especially at the weekend after a local gig and chat to Roly's mum and stepdad for hours. It was no longer cups of tea (as it was in the early days in Sandylands), rather beer and whisky! Roly would find all the empty glasses the following morning! On these occasions Roly's mum was always in good spirits, maybe because she was reminded of the many times she and Roly's father always had musicians at their flat in Sandylands. The kids always felt left out because they had met a lot of these musicians but were already stuck in bed!

As time passed her youngest brother had begun to show a great interest in music and started, around the age of 11 or 12, to play saxophone on a fairly old saxophone that his stepdad had acquired. He practised every day for hours after school and at first it was quite annoying! But he was persistent and eventually became a very talented sax player and started playing in pubs with local bands when he was about 17 or 18. He also had a couple of close friends who were avid music aficionados.

Family Relationships

Roly and her brothers used to be taken to Lake Coniston in the Lake District on a frequent basis by their stepdad, usually on Sundays, where they had a small motor-boat, and eventually began to learn how to water-ski. This was always fun and Roly adapted to it quite quickly, but whenever the boys took over the steering of the boat, she knew she was in trouble! They would speed up as fast as possible and then make rapid turns so they could knock her off her skis. She would hang on for dear life because falling into the water at Coniston was no joke. The lake was dark and deep and extremely cold. Fortunately she was a good swimmer so she was in no real danger.

Coniston is one of the many beautiful lakes and Roly loved it there. Her grandparents had often taken her on day outings when she was little. It was also the lake Donald Campbell, a former water speed record holder, chose to practise with his speedboat Bluebird. Unfortunately this also was the place he died. Roly and her family had been to Manchester to see a Morecambe & Wise show in the winter of 1967 as a Christmas treat. After the show the family wandered back to the parking garage and went past a huge Electronics Shop, the shop window full of TV screens. It was here they all saw the tragic death of Donald Campbell live on TV. He was on one of his fast runs when the boat flew up into the air and exploded into the water. We all stood in front of the shop horrified. Later we found out that he had not only died but that his body could not be found. All the professional divers out in the lake only found his mascot, a stuffed teddy bear toy!. This made it all the more scary, we all knew that the lake was very deep, but obviously deeper than we thought.

In general, Roly had a fairly good relationship with her brothers. She was quite close to the eldest one when they were little, but as he got older he would often show a vicious streak. Whenever he was annoyed with his sister he would punch her so hard in the stomach that he winded her severely and she couldn't breathe. Once at one of his birthday parties he sent everybody home because he hadn't won one single party game (he was about five at the time!).

He also played a nasty trick on Roly, when they were still living in the flat above the shop. Their bedroom was tiny and adjoined to a second room, where the other two brothers slept. Roly and her brother shared a bunk-bed and there was an unused fireplace in this room. Roly never had a teddy bear as a small child but she did have a lovely soft toy in the form of a dog. His name was Fido and he had lovely golden colour fur, floppy ears, two bright shiny buttons for eyes, a red felt tongue and a squeak if you pressed his tummy. Roly always took him to bed with her. One day she discovered Fido was missing and searched for him everywhere. The days passed and Fido was nowhere to be found, until weeks later there was a big storm with a very strong wind and the wind blew Fido down and out of the chimney! Unfortunately he was in a very bad way. He was covered in soot and had lost his ears, eyes and tongue. Eventually her brother confessed to this 'crime' but it didn't help Roly. Her grandmother had bought Fido for her and told her not to worry, she would send Fido to the 'animal hospital' and get him fixed, which Roly totally believed. A few weeks later Fido came back from hospital as right as rain!

Another time he had secretly sneaked a mouse into their bedroom in a shoe-box. One night Roly felt something running around on her bunk-bed and thought she was dreaming, until she saw that it was a mouse! She screamed! Her mother came in and told Topher to get rid of it immediately, she wasn't going to touch it. The mouse had probably found it easy to escape the shoe-box and chose to explore its surroundings. But the next day it was gone.

The worst thing Topher ever did though was to severely injure the youngest brother Martin by hurling a stone at him. He had enticed the two younger brothers to go to the beach with him (which was forbidden without the presence of adults) and found an old rusty barrel. He and Paul forced Martin to go and hide behind the barrel and pop up his head from behind when they called him. They would then throw stones at him. Roly remembers her shock and fear when they came home. She was standing at the kitchen sink, which had a bay-window, when she saw an old man carrying Martin with blood pouring all over his face! The other two were straggling behind looking very guilty. Roly called for her mother to come downstairs quickly to call for an ambulance. Fortunately the stone had hit his forehead and not one of his eyes! He was quickly stitched up in hospital and survived this ordeal. They had already practised this game in their bedroom but with darts! Poor little Martin suffered a lot because his two brothers found it annoying that they were supposed to look after him whenever they went out to play.

The middle brother Paul was quite shy when he was young, he was also their mother's favourite, probably because he was the only one with blue eyes, which reminded her of her own mother. He was so shy that he was too embarrassed to tell anyone on long walks on the promenade that he needed to go to the toilet and would come home with his pants full of number two! All the kids found it extremely funny, he obviously didn't! He also had a problem chewing meat, whatever kind, and at mealtimes would finish the meal with all the meat stuck in his cheeks and he looked like a hamster! As he got older he became much more outgoing and used to come up with silly jokes, which would cheer their mother up when she was in a bad mood. One day at primary school after the lunch-break Roly's teacher asked where her brother was as he hadn't shown up in class after lunch. She had no idea so the headmaster informed their mother. Some time later she and their stepdad were searching the little lad in their van in all the streets surrounding the school. He hadn't gone far when they found him and when asked where he was going he told them he was running away to Coniston! He was deadly serious but nobody knew why.

Paul unfortunately developed severe diabetes at the age of 17 and had to administer injections of insulin every day. A few years later he also developed coeliac disease, which meant that his whole diet and lifestyle changed. He was dealt a bad stack of cards. Later on in his life he became emotionally quite unstable. He used to call Roly and – as later determined – also his brother Martin late at night and he would make physical threats for no apparent reason. Roly would often not answer the phone but that did not prevent Paul from leaving endless aggressive messages on her answering machine. He and his wife eventually divorced and the two children stayed with their mother. Paul decided to move to London at some point where he was working for a security systems firm.

Roly's youngest brother Martin was a happy child and could spend hours playing alone with his little soldier or cowboy figures when he was little. He hadn't really got to know his real dad apart from occasional visits, so he accepted his stepdad much more than the others. Martin hence became the easiest to handle and more loyal to his stepdad. Martin married a girl from Horwich, another small town in Lancashire, and due to lack of funds eventually left Morecambe and moved to Rotterdam, where they had a son, Adam.

Roly's dad had never hit her or her two brothers in the early days, but he did teach them manners. At Sunday dinners their father would always remind them to take their elbows off the table and there was no talking! This was because he listened to the Goon Shows on BBC radio and the kids were not allowed to speak. The humour of this show was a little bit over the kids' heads but they did learn to love the silly voices the three comedians made (Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and Harry Secombe, whose radio show ran on BBC from 1951 to 1961).

On Saturday mornings the kids in turn listened to Children's Hour on BBC Radio, which was a wonderful show with an introduction to classical music amongst other things, e. g. 'Peter and the Wolf“. Roly was mesmerised by this kind of music and how all the musical instruments took turns playing and were named individually so that kids could recognise them in the future. It was quite an educational programme back then.

All the kids were somewhat different but they did share a feeling of loyalty when things were bad at home and were all determined to complete whatever venture they had set out to accomplish.

Jobs and Broken Romances

During Roly's paper rounds she would often see other friends from school doing the same work for different newsagents. When she was about 14 she would frequently see the same boy, who was in the year above her at school, and they became quite pally. At some point he asked her if she would like to go the cinema with him. This was a situation Roly was dreading because she knew she would have to tell her mother, who said that she wanted to meet the boy first. This was of course an uncomfortable situation, the poor boy was quizzed about all and sundry, and Roly decided not to take this further. In fact, she avoided any further dates for quite a long time. She did not want anybody to have to go through the Spanish Inquisition ever again!

Some time later she was asked out by another boy, whom she had met at the local coffee bar/disco in town, The Sportsman, where soul and reggae music, the main genre, was played and which Roly frequented only once in a while. He went to a different school and so she didn't run into him very much. Roly bit the bullet and told her mother, who demanded to meet him first. This encounter went particularly well for him, but not for Roly. He was very attractive and Roly's mother spent the whole conversation flirting with him. So that particular date never happened. However, much later in the year, they bumped into each other again and he invited Roly to go to the New Year's Party at the Central Pier. When she asked her mother if she could go, the answer was surprisingly positive, however with one major hitch: Roly had to be back home at 11 p.m.! Roly didn't have the nerve to tell the boy until they were actually at the party. She felt such a fool, especially as he had given her a present, a gold necklace! When she left to catch the bus home she missed it, and so she had to use a public phone to call home. Her stepdad answered and said he would pick her up by car. When she got home all hell broke loose, her mother was furious. So that ended a wonderful night and her expectations of any further dates!

The following summer Roly was still at school but on nice days would go directly after school to the swimming pool. She met a very charming young man, who was friendly and polite. He was there almost every day and eventually began to walk her home along the promenade. Roly felt uncomfortable though because she was wearing her school uniform, which she had to wear until the end of the 5^th year (in the final two years after that the dress code became less formal). Roly felt comfortable with him and he hadn't confronted her with any romantic moves. They talked a lot about music and films and had quite a lot of things in common. On one occasion they went out for a ride on Roly's little Honda bike (50 cc) up to Heysham and sat on the cliff overlooking the bay. It was all quite harmless. She had got the Honda for her 16^th birthday, although she would have preferred a bigger bike or a scooter.

After several weeks they decided to go and see a movie together. By this time school had finished for the summer holidays. Roly told her mother, who went through the same old ritual of making sure she met him first. Roly was a little more cunning by planning their date immediately after this encounter with her mother, so that when he arrived to pick her up, the inquisition was cut short! This did however not prevent what was to follow.

When the two came back from the cinema they stood on the pavement outside the house and her friend kissed Roly, who was unaware that she was being watched. Her mother was standing at the window in the living room. Then she opened the window and asked if they would like to come in for a cup of tea: 'I'm sure you could both do with one!“ in a very sarcastic tone. Roly knew this would not end well. So the two went into the house by the back door, where her mother and stepdad were waiting in the kitchen. It felt like a moment in hell! Roly's mother was so rude to her friend and accused him of having an ulterior motive, that he was way too old for Roly and that she reminded him of someone else she knew (she was obviously referring to Roly's dad!). She worked herself up into a state of rage and anger and Roly was just waiting for a hole to appear in the kitchen floor that would swallow her up! Her stepfather didn't say a word. Her mother had made a comment about someone seeing them together in Heysham, from which Roly concluded that they had been followed. It must have been her stepfather in his van. In the end Roly's friend left and she went straight up to her room and wanted to die.

After this drama Roly did not go to the swimming pool for quite a while and when she finally did, she saw her friend but was too ashamed to talk to him. He obviously did not want to cause her any more harm and let her be.

When Roly was 17 she had her first summer job as a lifeguard at the SSS. She had taken all the necessary life-saving courses at the indoor pool in Lancaster. She already knew quite a few of the lifeguards in the SSS and there was one in particular, with whom she formed a long-time friendship over many years and which was purely platonic. This friend, Jeff, was a well-known artist who lived in Lancaster. He also organized a club for teenagers and was the first person in the North to put on a light show, which was a huge success. Everybody used to call him Jesus because he had long hair and a beard. He and Roly used to talk about everything under the sun when they were at work. She also met his wife and kids, who were lovely people too.

One evening however Roly was in the kitchen helping her mother, who was, as usual, not very talkative, with the dishes. So Roly tried to make some kind of conversation with her by telling her all about her friend at the pool. Her mother reacted by firing the question whether Roly was having an affair with him. Roly was not only shocked but hurt and took the plunge by saying to her mother: 'Just because you're like that doesn't mean that I am'. Her mother instantly slapped Roly across the face, just as her little brother Martin walked into the kitchen. He was horrified! Roly was surprised at herself and yet quite proud to have confronted her mother!

Trials and Tribulations

Roly and her eldest brother, both in their teens, were at home one Sunday afternoon, while the two younger brothers had gone to Coniston with their stepdad. Their mother was catching up on paperwork for her job with Avon. Both kids were in their bedrooms when the doorbell rang. They peered out of their windows and saw their dad standing at the front door. They hadn't seen him for years and didn't know what to do, particularly since their mother was in a foul mood. Roly's brother said he was getting out of there and snuck off out of the back door and quickly disappeared on his Vespa. Roly was left upstairs alone, unbeknown to her mother.

This was a nightmare for Roly. Her mother finally opened the front door, greeting her ex-husband with several foul expletives. He of course was calm and polite. They went into the living room and sat down, Roly could hear everything from her room. Her father said he was visiting friends in Morecambe and just wanted to see how the kids were. This just set her mother off into a tirade of obscenities, complaining, in short, that she had had enough of the kids and he could have them if he wanted. Roly couldn't believe what she was hearing and could not stop crying. Her father remained incredibly calm throughout this long conversation. Unfortunately, her brother, thinking that a good hour had passed and that it was safe to come home, suddenly entered the house by the back door. His mother heard him come in and called him to the living room. She asked him where his sister was and he said Roly was in her room. There was a moment of shock, especially because her mother realized that Roly must have heard everything. Her brother spoke briefly to his dad and left the house. Roly's mother then called her downstairs, but Roly was in no state to talk to anybody. Eventually her dad called her and she finally plucked up the courage to go downstairs. It was a terrible situation. When her father told her she could come to live with him in London, she instantly wanted to say yes, but a thousand thoughts had already gone through her head. She didn't want to leave her school at this stage or her friends. So, very unwillingly, she had to say she wanted to stay in Morecambe.

After her father had gone Roly's mother was full of apologies. Roly couldn't stop crying and couldn't really say what she was feeling, so her mother, not really sure what to do, gave her a glass of brandy to calm her down. Roly returned to her room at odds with herself and spent the rest of the day and the night crying. I felt so sad for her and am sure that the water level in my tank rose that day from all the tears I shed too. I felt sure that had this experience happened earlier during the previous altercations with her mother, then Roly would most likely have left home and gone to London.

Prelude to university life

Roly was now in the Lower Sixth year at school and had already applied to six universities and was waiting for acceptance. She had chosen her final subjects for her A-levels. Her mother had only ever let her go out once a week, mostly on Saturdays, but she always had to be home by 10 o'clock. So Roly barely went out (or 'out out' as Micky Flanagan would say!). All her friends used to meet up in the Broadway (the biggest hotel on the promenade with a large bar, very close to the grammar school). Having to leave before 10 o'clock seemed pointless to Roly.

However, the situation at home suddenly reached a huge climax. Roly's stepdad had been 'spying' on Roly for quite a long time. He would follow her upstairs and hang around her bedroom door or the bathroom door and would kneel down and try to see what she was doing. Worst of all, when her mother was out somewhere, he would come into her bedroom at night with a torch and pull up the bedclothes at the end of the bed. She caught him a few times and screamed loudly at him so that he ran out like a scared cat. It was most frightening and disgusting and perverse. I was unable to do anything and felt equally helpless. After a while Roly confided in her two elder brothers and they did not believe it and thought Roly was imagining it all, until her stepfather began to do the same thing to them. They both reacted the same way and screamed at him. The youngest brother remained unscathed from all this perversity. So Roly finally decided to confide in her mother, which was a mistake. She approached her mother one evening in the kitchen and tried to explain to her what had been happening. To Roly's dismay her mother reacted in anger and threw Roly out of the house! Eventually her stepfather came running after her and brought her back inside. Whatever happened then and however they discussed this matter remains a mystery. Roly had run straight upstairs to her room and her mother never talked about it again.

One thing was clear, something was definitely wrong with her mother. The kids had heard their mother in her bed at night screaming and shouting for years. They never knew whether she was screaming at their stepdad or whether she was having nightmares. Sometimes she would spend whole days in bed and refuse to speak to anybody, even when the family had visitors. Eventually her mother ended up in the psychiatric hospital in Lancaster. The kids never did find out whether she had gone there on doctor's orders or voluntarily, nor did they ever find out what her diagnosis was. This all changed the family's life forever. (Many years later Roly tried to find her mother's medical files but this search was futile. The psychiatric hospital, which had closed down years before, had burnt down and all the archives were ruined).

Roly's mother stayed in hospital for about three months and refused any visitors including all the kids and their stepdad. It was during this time that Roly's eldest brother decided to go to London and seek out his dad in the hope of finding work there. He left and her brother Paul already had a girlfriend and spent most of his free time with her. Both he and Martin were still at grammar school and Roly had to take over mealtimes, shopping, cleaning, washing etc. and waking her brothers for school. Their stepdad just moped around and talked about their mother to Roly, who had to listen to his tales of woe and misery; he obviously didn't understand the situation at all.

Roly found out very late in life that her mother had 'escaped” from this hospital and got on a train to Wolverhampton, where she called her friends there to pick her up from the station. She asked them to call the hospital to let them know where she was. She also asked her friends to lie whenever the hospital called and say that she was sleeping. When she was finally discharged after about three months she refused to come home and instead stayed with the kids' grandparents. She still didn't want to see her kids.

Roly was busy studying for her 'A'-levels at grammar school. On Fridays or Saturdays she also began to join her friends in the Broadway without the usual restrictions, she had also started dating someone from school, who was a year older and had gone to a college in Leeds. Her youngest brother was always practising on his saxophone and becoming very good at it. Life continued relatively normally, all things considered.

Roly's boyfriend invited her to a college ball in Leeds in the summer. She had no idea what to wear nor did she have anything suitable, but her stepdad's sister kindly offered to make her a long dress and set about choosing a style and the corresponding material. The result was marvellous. But somehow Roly's mother heard about this and was furious. She hated her husband's sister, who had returned a couple of years earlier with her family from New Zealand, where she had lived for years. For some reason Roly's mother disliked her from the very beginning and was always very rude to her. Roly thought her mother's reaction to the dress-making was uncalled for, especially since her mother still refused to see the kids, nor had she shown any interest in Roly's school and/or university career. Roly was left alone with all the planning after she had decided to accept a place at Leeds University. She could not count on her stepdad, he was not academically inclined at all.

Whilst Roly's mother was still living with her step-parents she had obviously decided to go to evening college and continue with her 'A'-levels. This in turn led to her final decision to apply for university and eventually was accepted as a mature student at Liverpool University. She had returned home in the meantime but her stay there was not very long. Both Roly and her eldest brother were no longer living there and the two younger brothers did not really know how to deal with her, they had their own lives now. Paul was already engaged and spent most of the time at his fiancé's house. Martin was still at school and more interested in his music than anything else. All this and her lack of interest in her husband obviously frustrated her and in the end she left and moved to Liverpool.

Freedom, Fun and Happiness

Roly had been accepted at four universities and had initially decided on Liverpool, but then changed her mind and went to Leeds, mainly because this university was famed for the social life, in particular for its concerts, where most of the best bands in the country appeared. She had arranged to live in a flat on campus and had been lucky to receive a grant to pay for all her fees and accommodation as she was the eldest of four children. Sadly, this financial assistance came to an end many years ago.

The initial week at university was more or less an introduction to the various departments and to the campus in general. Here she met her co-students in the German department and formed her first long-lasting friendship with three of them, two of them oddly both called Steve and the other Mark. The other students in the German department seemed rather boring!

The women's house of flats, Ellerslie Hall, was directly on campus and only a short walk away from the Languages' building and even closer to the Students' Union, where all the concerts were held. Roly shared a flat with two other girls, who turned out to be quite nice. I was given a place on Roly's desk and was looking forward to this new adventure. Roly had chosen German language and literature as her main language and Spanish as her second language. Unfortunately the grammar school had not offered Spanish as a subject, so the first year was basically a crash course. The German and Spanish departments were on the same floor. One of the two Steve's also chose Spanish so Roly had at least one friend on the same course; most of the others had chosen French. It was a lot of work but Roly loved the language and took to it instantly. She also had to choose a third subject in the first year and she chose Greek history and philosophy, which was interesting and was only a one-year course, thankfully!

Roly adapted very quickly to student life and made lots of friends, also from other faculties. Most Saturdays she went to the Students' Union, where there was a disco upstairs and a huge bar downstairs. The concerts were held in the refectory, which was a huge hall. It was always easy to meet new friends here. She always went to the concerts by herself and was lucky to see bands like Led Zeppelin, The Who, Deep Purple, Humble Pie and Traffic, just to name a few. While she was still at school her favourite music was soul and reggae, having started off with the Beatles, the Animals and the Rolling Stones (this was the era of the 'British Invasion', when all these rock bands became huge in the USA) and then of course firstly Bob Dylan and finally Jimi Hendrix! During her time in Leeds she became acquainted with other students who were listening to different types of music with American bands such as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Carole King, etc. But the music became more and more interesting with jazz/rock fusion and Roly went to more and more concerts, where she saw incredible bands such as Colosseum, Nucleus, Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke. Roly was also an avid reader of the Melody Maker, a newspaper for and about musicians and their fans, which came out weekly, so she was always well informed about the current music scene.

Leeds was a great place to be. Yorkshire, like Lancashire, was a very friendly part of Britain with beautiful countryside all around. The city centre, which was very close to the university, was full of impressive architecture. Roly loved the huge market and would often go there on Saturday afternoons before it closed, when the market stalls were almost giving away their wares for a few pence....... (anyone interested in reading the whole story, feel free to contact me via Facebook).

Nowadays, Roly still lives in Berlin with her 18-year-old cat and me – God knows how old I am now! We all live in a small flat in a fairly nice part of Berlin, not too far from the centre of West Berlin, and are happily growing old together. Having lived with other previous cats in earlier years I am no longer scared of them. Roly had never been able to realize her dream of becoming a lion tamer, but she always had cats, mostly in pairs, most of whom I met over the years. Roly's current male cat spends most of the time sleeping and doesn't bother me at all, on the contrary, it's all very harmonious. Roly is still quite active at the gym but nonetheless finally enjoying retirement after working for an extra seven years for two psychiatrists after regular retirement. She finally quit this private arrangement at the end of 2024, mainly due in part to a couple of minor health issues, but also because she found she had less and less free time because of the huge workload.

Hopefully Roly can go over to Morecambe sometime again in the near future, but certainly not to live. Nothing is the same. But true friends never change and Roly will continue to maintain contact with them all as long as possible. But I sense that she is no longer in the mood for further adventures too far away from home – nor am I!

In summary:: The sun going down over Morecambe is the stuff memories are made of.

The End

Dedication

In loving memory of Martin Lee Normington (born Bould)

24^th February 1957 - 23^rd May 2024.

In loving memory of Dorothy Mills

1932-2025

If anyone is interested in reading more of Carole's Autobiography she can be contacted via Facebook Messenger