FIFTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK 4 - 10 MARCH 1974
This week's many stories include the six-month-old baby abandoned at Blackbrook, the glue-sniffing craze in Parr, the streaking craze in Prescot, Snoopy from the Reporter interviews Bill Shankly, the passing of Pickavance's matriarch and Squeak the Sherdley Park penguin survives another narrow squeak.
The lead story in the St Helens Reporter on the 8th was how local government reorganisation would lead to an increase in residents' rates bills by between 42 and 60%. The paper quoted Cllr Len Williams, the chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee who had made the decision, as admitting: "This is a shocking budget", but he explained that they had no alternative.
The Reporter's front page also featured an appeal from two Parr mothers who wanted glue sales banning to anyone aged under sixteen. That was after their sons had experienced hallucinations while sniffing and risked unconsciousness and death. Freda Clarke of Evelyn Avenue and Lilian Haughey of Granville Street wanted to publicise what had happened so that other parents might be able to spot signs of glue sniffing in their own children.
Stephen Clarke and Anthony Haughey had been inhaling glue fumes for five months before their parents discovered what they had been doing after the police had picked them up. They said a group of youngsters would club together to buy tubes of glue, which were emptied into a crisp packet from which they inhaled the fumes. 14-year-old Stephen told the Reporter:
"We sniff glue once or twice a week. It makes you see things, things that aren't there really. Then you get a bit tired." And Anthony added: "It makes you feel like you're dreaming." The boys said that many of their schoolmates and other lads living in the neighbourhood were also glue sniffers. St Helens Police confirmed that the craze was hitting Parr – but a spokesman said: "There is nothing we can do about it. Glue sniffing isn't illegal."
A big news story in this week's paper was the six-month-old baby boy that had been abandoned in Blackbrook. A man had gone into the Blackbrook Community Home for Girls and handed the child to a 16-year-old schoolgirl, saying: "Give him to Sister. You can adopt him." He had then hurriedly walked away, got into his car and drove off. The headmistress, Sister Monica, told the Reporter: "The girl took the baby immediately to another Sister who changed it and made it comfortable. Then police were called and welfare workers took it to a foster home. Some of the girls cried to think a child could be just given away like that."
While the hunt for the man was going on the child's mother had contacted the police. Both parents were now being interviewed but the police had yet to establish what had prompted the father to give his son away. A welfare official said it would likely take a few days before all the circumstances were known. But they said the boy had been well cared for and was comfortably dressed when abandoned. A bottle of milk had even been left with him.
In 1971 the Liverpool Echo profiled Ness (short for Agnes) Shankly, the wife of the legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly. Ness revealed that apart from Bill's fame, the couple lived very ordinary lives, going to Blackpool for their summer holidays and living in a semi-detached house in Liverpool. And there was clearly nothing in the way of security surrounding their home. The club was due to play Arsenal in the FA Cup Final and Ness was then being inundated with fans knocking on her door and telephoning her for tickets.
This week Snoopy from the St Helens Reporter went to Anfield to meet the great man himself armed with a list of questions supplied by his (or was it her?) club members. The Snoopy Club was the Reporter's column for 4 to 11 year olds, which had started in 1970. Bill Shankly was pictured in the paper with his hand stuck up the glove puppet and looking a bit gormless, as you might expect!
I imagine Bill did countless interviews in his time but this was probably the only occasion that he'd been invited to stick his hand up the interviewer! The only two minor surprises from Bill's answers to Snoopy's questions were that despite being a Scot, he was a great lover of English history and in his spare time liked to read the dictionary. Not a lot of plot in that I always think!
The Reporter in 1970 profiled haulier Joe Pickavance. They wrote how in 1938 as a 21-year-old, Joe had borrowed £15 from his mother and with £15 of his own savings had bought a three-ton Bedford tipper lorry. But now based in Sherdley Road he had a fleet of 80 lorries with a turnover of over £1 million (£15m in today's money) and he drove to work in a Rolls Royce.
In this week's paper they described how Mary Pickavance had passed away at St Helens Hospital at the age of 85 surrounded by most of her seven children. "We thought the world of her", said Joe. "She has always helped and encouraged us through the years. We are a very close family, and we shall miss her very much." Until the age of seventy Mrs Pickavance had run a grocer's shop on the corner of Sherdley Road and Burtonhead Road.
The paper also described how Rainhill Guides were raising money for a new hut, as their present 50-year-old building was not large enough for their needs. Their target was £12,000 and last week they'd held a fundraising dance in Rainhill Village Hall in which "more than 200 guides, brownies and friends danced the night away to the Ray Jones Quartet."
Also out in force had been the Boys Brigade who had performed a variety show at the Theatre Royal. A total of 250 youngsters from troops in St Helens had played to a full house of 700 to mark the 21st anniversary of the St Helens battalion. The 2½-hour show included singing, comedy sketches, a silver band spot, bugle playing and gymnastics. Pimbletts pie and confectionery firm also presented the battalion with a newly-designed flag that the troops could compete for each year.
On the 9th Tony Atherton from Clinkham Wood was seriously injured while playing for Saints 'A' team in a hard-fought game against Leigh in which three players were sent off. The 20-year-old underwent a three-hour emergency operation at Walton Hospital for head injuries and St Helens fullback Steve Tyrer was also taken to Providence Hospital suffering from concussion.
And the first reported case of streaking in the district occurred during the evening of the 9th. Customers of a Warrington Road chippy in Prescot were said to have dashed to the door when two young men ran past the shop completely naked. But one observer was unimpressed, saying: "I think it's ridiculous. I think they must have done it for a bet. We've got loads of jumpers on to keep us warm and they're running about naked."
On the 10th Bernard Wrigley ,"the Bolton bullfrog", appeared at the Golden Lion Folk Club in Rainford along with Cyder Pie. And at the Theatre Royal on the same evening the Rhos Male Voice Choir performed. Meanwhile, at the ABC Savoy, Ryan O’Neal and Tatum O’Neal's 'Paper Moon' began a week's performances with the Capitol cinema screening 'Love Under Seventeen'.
And on the same evening a shocking act of vandalism occurred in Sherdley Park when Squeak the penguin suffered his second brush with hooligans that had attempted to kill him. In 1967 the penguin had been shot in the neck and leg with an air rifle but had recovered. And this week vandals had broken into his compound in Sherdley Park and clubbed Squeak senseless, leaving him for dead.
But once again he had bounced back, unlike ten doves and a goose that had been slaughtered and fourteen guinea pigs and ten rabbits that had been stolen. As a result St Helens Corporation said they would look into whether night security in the town's parks needed to be improved. On the same evening in Victoria Park a duck was decapitated and thrown against the door of a nearby house. And at Taylor Park recently, several ducks had been shot on the boating lake.
Ted Gallagher, the St Helens Director of Parks, said of the Sherdley Park incident: "This was a desecration of the animals and of the park. Children will be heartbroken when they find the animals in their own corner have gone and it wouldn’t be easy or pleasant to explain what had happened to them."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the rebellious householders in Derbyshire Hill Road, the daring robbery and kidnap in Sherdley Road, the sewer blockade in Harrison Street and hopes rise for the Saints player who'd fractured his skull.
The lead story in the St Helens Reporter on the 8th was how local government reorganisation would lead to an increase in residents' rates bills by between 42 and 60%. The paper quoted Cllr Len Williams, the chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee who had made the decision, as admitting: "This is a shocking budget", but he explained that they had no alternative.
The Reporter's front page also featured an appeal from two Parr mothers who wanted glue sales banning to anyone aged under sixteen. That was after their sons had experienced hallucinations while sniffing and risked unconsciousness and death. Freda Clarke of Evelyn Avenue and Lilian Haughey of Granville Street wanted to publicise what had happened so that other parents might be able to spot signs of glue sniffing in their own children.
Stephen Clarke and Anthony Haughey had been inhaling glue fumes for five months before their parents discovered what they had been doing after the police had picked them up. They said a group of youngsters would club together to buy tubes of glue, which were emptied into a crisp packet from which they inhaled the fumes. 14-year-old Stephen told the Reporter:
"We sniff glue once or twice a week. It makes you see things, things that aren't there really. Then you get a bit tired." And Anthony added: "It makes you feel like you're dreaming." The boys said that many of their schoolmates and other lads living in the neighbourhood were also glue sniffers. St Helens Police confirmed that the craze was hitting Parr – but a spokesman said: "There is nothing we can do about it. Glue sniffing isn't illegal."
A big news story in this week's paper was the six-month-old baby boy that had been abandoned in Blackbrook. A man had gone into the Blackbrook Community Home for Girls and handed the child to a 16-year-old schoolgirl, saying: "Give him to Sister. You can adopt him." He had then hurriedly walked away, got into his car and drove off. The headmistress, Sister Monica, told the Reporter: "The girl took the baby immediately to another Sister who changed it and made it comfortable. Then police were called and welfare workers took it to a foster home. Some of the girls cried to think a child could be just given away like that."
While the hunt for the man was going on the child's mother had contacted the police. Both parents were now being interviewed but the police had yet to establish what had prompted the father to give his son away. A welfare official said it would likely take a few days before all the circumstances were known. But they said the boy had been well cared for and was comfortably dressed when abandoned. A bottle of milk had even been left with him.
In 1971 the Liverpool Echo profiled Ness (short for Agnes) Shankly, the wife of the legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly. Ness revealed that apart from Bill's fame, the couple lived very ordinary lives, going to Blackpool for their summer holidays and living in a semi-detached house in Liverpool. And there was clearly nothing in the way of security surrounding their home. The club was due to play Arsenal in the FA Cup Final and Ness was then being inundated with fans knocking on her door and telephoning her for tickets.
I imagine Bill did countless interviews in his time but this was probably the only occasion that he'd been invited to stick his hand up the interviewer! The only two minor surprises from Bill's answers to Snoopy's questions were that despite being a Scot, he was a great lover of English history and in his spare time liked to read the dictionary. Not a lot of plot in that I always think!
The Reporter in 1970 profiled haulier Joe Pickavance. They wrote how in 1938 as a 21-year-old, Joe had borrowed £15 from his mother and with £15 of his own savings had bought a three-ton Bedford tipper lorry. But now based in Sherdley Road he had a fleet of 80 lorries with a turnover of over £1 million (£15m in today's money) and he drove to work in a Rolls Royce.
In this week's paper they described how Mary Pickavance had passed away at St Helens Hospital at the age of 85 surrounded by most of her seven children. "We thought the world of her", said Joe. "She has always helped and encouraged us through the years. We are a very close family, and we shall miss her very much." Until the age of seventy Mrs Pickavance had run a grocer's shop on the corner of Sherdley Road and Burtonhead Road.
The paper also described how Rainhill Guides were raising money for a new hut, as their present 50-year-old building was not large enough for their needs. Their target was £12,000 and last week they'd held a fundraising dance in Rainhill Village Hall in which "more than 200 guides, brownies and friends danced the night away to the Ray Jones Quartet."
Also out in force had been the Boys Brigade who had performed a variety show at the Theatre Royal. A total of 250 youngsters from troops in St Helens had played to a full house of 700 to mark the 21st anniversary of the St Helens battalion. The 2½-hour show included singing, comedy sketches, a silver band spot, bugle playing and gymnastics. Pimbletts pie and confectionery firm also presented the battalion with a newly-designed flag that the troops could compete for each year.
On the 9th Tony Atherton from Clinkham Wood was seriously injured while playing for Saints 'A' team in a hard-fought game against Leigh in which three players were sent off. The 20-year-old underwent a three-hour emergency operation at Walton Hospital for head injuries and St Helens fullback Steve Tyrer was also taken to Providence Hospital suffering from concussion.
And the first reported case of streaking in the district occurred during the evening of the 9th. Customers of a Warrington Road chippy in Prescot were said to have dashed to the door when two young men ran past the shop completely naked. But one observer was unimpressed, saying: "I think it's ridiculous. I think they must have done it for a bet. We've got loads of jumpers on to keep us warm and they're running about naked."
On the 10th Bernard Wrigley ,"the Bolton bullfrog", appeared at the Golden Lion Folk Club in Rainford along with Cyder Pie. And at the Theatre Royal on the same evening the Rhos Male Voice Choir performed. Meanwhile, at the ABC Savoy, Ryan O’Neal and Tatum O’Neal's 'Paper Moon' began a week's performances with the Capitol cinema screening 'Love Under Seventeen'.
And on the same evening a shocking act of vandalism occurred in Sherdley Park when Squeak the penguin suffered his second brush with hooligans that had attempted to kill him. In 1967 the penguin had been shot in the neck and leg with an air rifle but had recovered. And this week vandals had broken into his compound in Sherdley Park and clubbed Squeak senseless, leaving him for dead.
But once again he had bounced back, unlike ten doves and a goose that had been slaughtered and fourteen guinea pigs and ten rabbits that had been stolen. As a result St Helens Corporation said they would look into whether night security in the town's parks needed to be improved. On the same evening in Victoria Park a duck was decapitated and thrown against the door of a nearby house. And at Taylor Park recently, several ducks had been shot on the boating lake.
Ted Gallagher, the St Helens Director of Parks, said of the Sherdley Park incident: "This was a desecration of the animals and of the park. Children will be heartbroken when they find the animals in their own corner have gone and it wouldn’t be easy or pleasant to explain what had happened to them."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the rebellious householders in Derbyshire Hill Road, the daring robbery and kidnap in Sherdley Road, the sewer blockade in Harrison Street and hopes rise for the Saints player who'd fractured his skull.
This week's many stories include the six-month-old baby abandoned at Blackbrook, the glue-sniffing craze in Parr, the streaking craze in Prescot, Snoopy from the Reporter interviews Bill Shankly, the passing of Pickavance's matriarch and Squeak the Sherdley Park penguin survives another narrow squeak.
The lead story in the St Helens Reporter on the 8th was how local government reorganisation would lead to an increase in residents' rates bills by between 42 and 60%.
The paper quoted Cllr Len Williams, the chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee who had made the decision, as admitting: "This is a shocking budget", but he explained that they had no alternative.
The Reporter's front page also featured an appeal from two Parr mothers who wanted glue sales banning to anyone aged under sixteen.
That was after their sons had experienced hallucinations while sniffing and risked unconsciousness and death.
Freda Clarke of Evelyn Avenue and Lilian Haughey of Granville Street wanted to publicise what had happened so that other parents might be able to spot signs of glue sniffing in their own children.
Stephen Clarke and Anthony Haughey had been inhaling glue fumes for five months before their parents discovered what they had been doing after the police had picked them up.
They said a group of youngsters would club together to buy tubes of glue, which were emptied into a crisp packet from which they inhaled the fumes.
14-year-old Stephen told the Reporter: "We sniff glue once or twice a week. It makes you see things, things that aren't there really. Then you get a bit tired." And Anthony added: "It makes you feel like you're dreaming."
The boys said that many of their schoolmates and other lads living in the neighbourhood were also glue sniffers.
St Helens Police confirmed that the craze was hitting Parr – but a spokesman said: "There is nothing we can do about it. Glue sniffing isn't illegal."
A big news story in this week's paper was the six-month-old baby boy that had been abandoned in Blackbrook.
A man had gone into the Blackbrook Community Home for Girls and handed the child to a 16-year-old schoolgirl, saying: "Give him to Sister. You can adopt him." He had then hurriedly walked away, got into his car and drove off.
The headmistress, Sister Monica, told the Reporter: "The girl took the baby immediately to another Sister who changed it and made it comfortable.
"Then police were called and welfare workers took it to a foster home. Some of the girls cried to think a child could be just given away like that."
While the hunt for the man was going on the child's mother had contacted the police.
Both parents were now being interviewed but the police had yet to establish what had prompted the father to give his son away.
A welfare official said it would likely take a few days before all the circumstances were known.
But they said the boy had been well cared for and was comfortably dressed when abandoned. A bottle of milk had even been left with him.
In 1971 the Liverpool Echo profiled Ness (short for Agnes) Shankly, the wife of the legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly.
Ness revealed that apart from Bill's fame, the couple lived very ordinary lives, going to Blackpool for their summer holidays and living in a semi-detached house in Liverpool. And there was clearly nothing in the way of security surrounding their home.
The club was due to play Arsenal in the FA Cup Final and Ness was then being inundated with fans knocking on her door and telephoning her for tickets.
This week Snoopy from the St Helens Reporter went to Anfield to meet the great man himself armed with a list of questions supplied by his (or was it her?) club members.
The Snoopy Club was the Reporter's column for 4 to 11 year olds, which had started in 1970.
Bill Shankly was pictured in the paper with his hand stuck up the glove puppet and looking a bit gormless, as you might expect!
I imagine Bill did countless interviews in his time but this was probably the only occasion that he'd been invited to stick his hand up the interviewer!
The only two minor surprises from Bill's answers to Snoopy's questions were that despite being a Scot, he was a great lover of English history and in his spare time liked to read the dictionary. Not a lot of plot in that I always think!
The Reporter in 1970 profiled haulier Joe Pickavance. They wrote how in 1938 as a 21-year-old, Joe had borrowed £15 from his mother and with £15 of his own savings had bought a three-ton Bedford tipper lorry.
But now based in Sherdley Road he had a fleet of 80 lorries with a turnover of over £1 million (£15m in today's money) and he drove to work in a Rolls Royce.
In this week's paper they described how Mary Pickavance had passed away at St Helens Hospital at the age of 85 surrounded by most of her seven children.
"We thought the world of her", said Joe. "She has always helped and encouraged us through the years. We are a very close family, and we shall miss her very much."
Until the age of seventy Mrs Pickavance had run a grocer's shop on the corner of Sherdley Road and Burtonhead Road.
The paper also described how Rainhill Guides were raising money for a new hut, as their present 50-year-old building was not large enough for their needs.
Their target was £12,000 and last week they'd held a fundraising dance in Rainhill Village Hall in which "more than 200 guides, brownies and friends danced the night away to the Ray Jones Quartet."
Also out in force had been the Boys Brigade who had performed a variety show at the Theatre Royal.
A total of 250 youngsters from troops in St Helens had played to a full house of 700 to mark the 21st anniversary of the St Helens battalion.
The 2½-hour show included singing, comedy sketches, a silver band spot, bugle playing and gymnastics.
Pimbletts pie and confectionery firm also presented the battalion with a newly-designed flag that the troops could compete for each year.
On the 9th Tony Atherton from Clinkham Wood was seriously injured while playing for Saints 'A' team in a hard-fought game against Leigh in which three players were sent off.
The 20-year-old underwent a three-hour emergency operation at Walton Hospital for head injuries and St Helens fullback Steve Tyrer was also taken to Providence Hospital suffering from concussion.
And the first reported case of streaking in the district occurred during the evening of the 9th.
Customers of a Warrington Road chippy in Prescot were said to have dashed to the door when two young men ran past the shop completely naked.
But one observer was unimpressed, saying: "I think it's ridiculous. I think they must have done it for a bet. We've got loads of jumpers on to keep us warm and they're running about naked."
On the 10th Bernard Wrigley ,"the Bolton bullfrog", appeared at the Golden Lion Folk Club in Rainford along with Cyder Pie.
And at the Theatre Royal on the same evening the Rhos Male Voice Choir performed.
Meanwhile, at the ABC Savoy, Ryan O’Neal and Tatum O’Neal's 'Paper Moon' began a week's performances with the Capitol cinema screening 'Love Under Seventeen'.
And on the same evening a shocking act of vandalism occurred in Sherdley Park when Squeak the penguin suffered his second brush with hooligans that had attempted to kill him.
In 1967 the penguin had been shot in the neck and leg with an air rifle but had recovered.
And this week vandals had broken into his compound in Sherdley Park and clubbed Squeak senseless, leaving him for dead.
But once again he had bounced back, unlike ten doves and a goose that had been slaughtered and fourteen guinea pigs and ten rabbits that had been stolen.
As a result St Helens Corporation said they would look into whether night security in the town's parks needed to be improved.
On the same evening in Victoria Park a duck was decapitated and thrown against the door of a nearby house. And at Taylor Park recently, several ducks had been shot on the boating lake.
Ted Gallagher, the St Helens Director of Parks, said of the Sherdley Park incident:
"This was a desecration of the animals and of the park. Children will be heartbroken when they find the animals in their own corner have gone and it wouldn’t be easy or pleasant to explain what had happened to them."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the rebellious householders in Derbyshire Hill Road, the daring robbery and kidnap in Sherdley Road, the sewer blockade in Harrison Street and hopes rise for the Saints player who'd fractured his skull.
The lead story in the St Helens Reporter on the 8th was how local government reorganisation would lead to an increase in residents' rates bills by between 42 and 60%.
The paper quoted Cllr Len Williams, the chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee who had made the decision, as admitting: "This is a shocking budget", but he explained that they had no alternative.
The Reporter's front page also featured an appeal from two Parr mothers who wanted glue sales banning to anyone aged under sixteen.
That was after their sons had experienced hallucinations while sniffing and risked unconsciousness and death.
Freda Clarke of Evelyn Avenue and Lilian Haughey of Granville Street wanted to publicise what had happened so that other parents might be able to spot signs of glue sniffing in their own children.
Stephen Clarke and Anthony Haughey had been inhaling glue fumes for five months before their parents discovered what they had been doing after the police had picked them up.
They said a group of youngsters would club together to buy tubes of glue, which were emptied into a crisp packet from which they inhaled the fumes.
14-year-old Stephen told the Reporter: "We sniff glue once or twice a week. It makes you see things, things that aren't there really. Then you get a bit tired." And Anthony added: "It makes you feel like you're dreaming."
The boys said that many of their schoolmates and other lads living in the neighbourhood were also glue sniffers.
St Helens Police confirmed that the craze was hitting Parr – but a spokesman said: "There is nothing we can do about it. Glue sniffing isn't illegal."
A big news story in this week's paper was the six-month-old baby boy that had been abandoned in Blackbrook.
A man had gone into the Blackbrook Community Home for Girls and handed the child to a 16-year-old schoolgirl, saying: "Give him to Sister. You can adopt him." He had then hurriedly walked away, got into his car and drove off.
The headmistress, Sister Monica, told the Reporter: "The girl took the baby immediately to another Sister who changed it and made it comfortable.
"Then police were called and welfare workers took it to a foster home. Some of the girls cried to think a child could be just given away like that."
While the hunt for the man was going on the child's mother had contacted the police.
Both parents were now being interviewed but the police had yet to establish what had prompted the father to give his son away.
A welfare official said it would likely take a few days before all the circumstances were known.
But they said the boy had been well cared for and was comfortably dressed when abandoned. A bottle of milk had even been left with him.
In 1971 the Liverpool Echo profiled Ness (short for Agnes) Shankly, the wife of the legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly.
Ness revealed that apart from Bill's fame, the couple lived very ordinary lives, going to Blackpool for their summer holidays and living in a semi-detached house in Liverpool. And there was clearly nothing in the way of security surrounding their home.
The club was due to play Arsenal in the FA Cup Final and Ness was then being inundated with fans knocking on her door and telephoning her for tickets.
The Snoopy Club was the Reporter's column for 4 to 11 year olds, which had started in 1970.
Bill Shankly was pictured in the paper with his hand stuck up the glove puppet and looking a bit gormless, as you might expect!
I imagine Bill did countless interviews in his time but this was probably the only occasion that he'd been invited to stick his hand up the interviewer!
The only two minor surprises from Bill's answers to Snoopy's questions were that despite being a Scot, he was a great lover of English history and in his spare time liked to read the dictionary. Not a lot of plot in that I always think!
The Reporter in 1970 profiled haulier Joe Pickavance. They wrote how in 1938 as a 21-year-old, Joe had borrowed £15 from his mother and with £15 of his own savings had bought a three-ton Bedford tipper lorry.
But now based in Sherdley Road he had a fleet of 80 lorries with a turnover of over £1 million (£15m in today's money) and he drove to work in a Rolls Royce.
In this week's paper they described how Mary Pickavance had passed away at St Helens Hospital at the age of 85 surrounded by most of her seven children.
"We thought the world of her", said Joe. "She has always helped and encouraged us through the years. We are a very close family, and we shall miss her very much."
Until the age of seventy Mrs Pickavance had run a grocer's shop on the corner of Sherdley Road and Burtonhead Road.
The paper also described how Rainhill Guides were raising money for a new hut, as their present 50-year-old building was not large enough for their needs.
Their target was £12,000 and last week they'd held a fundraising dance in Rainhill Village Hall in which "more than 200 guides, brownies and friends danced the night away to the Ray Jones Quartet."
Also out in force had been the Boys Brigade who had performed a variety show at the Theatre Royal.
A total of 250 youngsters from troops in St Helens had played to a full house of 700 to mark the 21st anniversary of the St Helens battalion.
The 2½-hour show included singing, comedy sketches, a silver band spot, bugle playing and gymnastics.
Pimbletts pie and confectionery firm also presented the battalion with a newly-designed flag that the troops could compete for each year.
On the 9th Tony Atherton from Clinkham Wood was seriously injured while playing for Saints 'A' team in a hard-fought game against Leigh in which three players were sent off.
The 20-year-old underwent a three-hour emergency operation at Walton Hospital for head injuries and St Helens fullback Steve Tyrer was also taken to Providence Hospital suffering from concussion.
And the first reported case of streaking in the district occurred during the evening of the 9th.
Customers of a Warrington Road chippy in Prescot were said to have dashed to the door when two young men ran past the shop completely naked.
But one observer was unimpressed, saying: "I think it's ridiculous. I think they must have done it for a bet. We've got loads of jumpers on to keep us warm and they're running about naked."
On the 10th Bernard Wrigley ,"the Bolton bullfrog", appeared at the Golden Lion Folk Club in Rainford along with Cyder Pie.
And at the Theatre Royal on the same evening the Rhos Male Voice Choir performed.
Meanwhile, at the ABC Savoy, Ryan O’Neal and Tatum O’Neal's 'Paper Moon' began a week's performances with the Capitol cinema screening 'Love Under Seventeen'.
And on the same evening a shocking act of vandalism occurred in Sherdley Park when Squeak the penguin suffered his second brush with hooligans that had attempted to kill him.
In 1967 the penguin had been shot in the neck and leg with an air rifle but had recovered.
And this week vandals had broken into his compound in Sherdley Park and clubbed Squeak senseless, leaving him for dead.
But once again he had bounced back, unlike ten doves and a goose that had been slaughtered and fourteen guinea pigs and ten rabbits that had been stolen.
As a result St Helens Corporation said they would look into whether night security in the town's parks needed to be improved.
On the same evening in Victoria Park a duck was decapitated and thrown against the door of a nearby house. And at Taylor Park recently, several ducks had been shot on the boating lake.
Ted Gallagher, the St Helens Director of Parks, said of the Sherdley Park incident:
"This was a desecration of the animals and of the park. Children will be heartbroken when they find the animals in their own corner have gone and it wouldn’t be easy or pleasant to explain what had happened to them."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the rebellious householders in Derbyshire Hill Road, the daring robbery and kidnap in Sherdley Road, the sewer blockade in Harrison Street and hopes rise for the Saints player who'd fractured his skull.