FIFTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (20th - 26th May 1969)
This week's many stories include a claim that St Helens traffic wardens are "little Hitlers", the "terrified" Reginald Road housewives, a Billinge dispute over a stone wall and the water engineer's "cheeky" letter, a new St Helens mayor, plans for a brass band contest in Rainford, Rainhill Sports Gala and three fires take place on a single day.
We begin on the 20th when the Liverpool Echo reported that the new Eccleston Lane Ends Junior and Infants School in Eccleston Park would be completed by August. Being built at a cost of £77,000 (about £1.3m in today's money), it was replacing the existing school on St Helens Road where staff and pupils had been "struggling against overcrowded conditions".
The Echo also said that women now held key jobs at both Newton-le-Willows' employment exchanges with the appointment of Elsie Parker as Youth Employment Officer. In January Jane Mackintosh had been appointed manager of the Earlestown employment exchange.
About twenty men briefly walked out of Bold Power Station on the 20th to hold a meeting at the gates. It was connected to a dispute over bonus payments for staff employed in their engineering department. A control room inside Bold Power Station – which was situated off Travers Entry – is pictured above.
On the 21st three men ran out of a partly constructed extension to Brook Bridge Garage in Prescot with their clothes on fire. Staff at the garage put out the flames and the men were taken to Whiston Hospital with serious burns. John Middlehurst, the manager of the service station, said the accident was caused by a blowback from ignited petrol fumes, although it wasn't yet known where the fumes came from.
A second fire took place on the same day at Rainford Secondary School that severely damaged a sixth-form motor workshop. And a third blaze occurred on the 21st in Dorothy Street in Thatto Heath and was blamed on children playing with matches. In fact the firemen had to be called out twice during the same afternoon to extinguish fires within wooden sheds.
An 'Any Questions?' session was held at the New Street Methodist Church Hall on the 21st with a panel comprising Anglican and Methodist clergy.
On the following day Tom Wilcock became the town's youngest ever mayor. His predecessor as first citizen, Tom Forshaw, handed the 42-year-old from Moss Bank the chain of office. However the event did not take place in the Mayor's Parlour in the Town Hall as might be expected but at Pilkington's Sheet Works in Grove Street where both men worked.
In the Reporter on the 23rd James Hughes – the manager of Litherland's butcher's shop in the market – claimed that traffic wardens were becoming "little Hitlers". This was after one of his staff was booked for having just one wheel of his vehicle over the yellow lines.
Since the introduction of double yellow lines in St Helens six months earlier the market traders had been allocated special parking areas in a nearby side street. However Mr Hughes said the designated spaces easily got full and he called for a larger car park for traders. The Borough Engineer George James told the Reporter that in the town centre development plan the new market area would have facilities for roof top parking.
This is how the newspaper began their latest instalment of the on-going saga of the Sutton travellers: "Terrified housewives living in fear of reprisals, threats by gipsies to smash windows, thefts and petty pilfering – this is the situation in the Reginald Road area of Sutton, residents claim."
Many of the fifty or so caravans had been occupying a field in Reginald Road since last September and their occupiers were refusing to leave. They had ignored a court order ordering them to go and threats to physically evict them had come to nothing.
There was now a state of limbo and the local residents were far from happy, with some threatening to withhold their rates in protest. Many people who complained to the Reporter wouldn't give their names in case of reprisals, claiming that the travellers had stolen their milk, bicycles, coal and children's toys.
Tom Sparks from no. 299 had had his bike stolen from his shed and was offering a £1 reward for its return. The 70-year-old told the paper: "I want the gipsies cleared out. Where they go is their problem."
There was some support for the travellers and Hilda Kelly from Clovelly Avenue vented her irritation at their supporters: "If those in the Town Hall feel so sorry for them that they don't want to move them, get the gipsies camped on their back garden and see how they feel."
The Reporter also described a dispute over a wall that began when St Helens Corporation decided to build a reservoir off Crank Road in Billinge. A stone wall had to be knocked down while the reservoir was being built and – according to Billinge Council – St Helens Corporation had promised to rebuild it afterwards.
However pieces of the wall had been stolen and so the Corporation decided to erect a wire fence instead. This had incensed the Billinge councillors who sent a strong letter of protest.
The reply from St Helens Corporation's Water Engineer was read out at a recent Billinge Council meeting. Mr E. K. Astin made matters worse by saying the Corporation had a perfect right to enclose the site with any materials that they thought fit. This did not go down well with the Billinge councillors who called the response "cheeky" and "in very bad taste".
The Reporter also stated that a brass band contest would be held in June in Rainford Church Hall and broadcast on Radio Merseyside. Jimmy Blackburn, the retiring Chairman of Rainford Urban District Council, made the draw for the first round.
The competitors were Rainford Boys Band, Prescot Band, Leigh Silver Band, Automatic Telephones Band, Skelmersdale Prize Band, Parr Public Band, Golborne Prize Band and Trinity Girls Silver Band. The unusually named Automatic Telephones Band was the brass band of the Automatic Telephone and Electric Co. of Liverpool.
Four people were taken to hospital on the 25th after a car hit a wall in Marshalls Cross Road. The injured were John Walker from Seddon Street and his two children and Elsie Pearson from Atherton Street. They were treated for shock and later allowed home.
It was Whit Monday on the 26th and Rainhill Sports Gala was held at the Ex-Servicemen's Club in Warrington Road. The many activities included an army display, trampolines, ski slope, Morris dancing, boxing, judo, wrestling and a tug-of-war competition. Music was provided by Redgate Silver Band and Garston Woodcutters Novelty Band. Admission was 2/6 for adults and a shilling for children.
For six days from the 26th an Italian so-called "sword-and-sandal" film called 'Colossus and the Headhunters' was screened at the Capitol, along with 'Laurel and Hardy in Toyland'. Meanwhile at the ABC Savoy 'Where's Jack?' was shown with Tommy Steele playing the notorious 18th century criminal Jack Sheppard.
To end here are some other stories that were in the national newspapers this week. The Daily Mirror wrote: "Hundreds of GPO telephone girls are rushing to the altar. They just can't be married soon enough because of a naughty rumour about cash."
Women that worked at the exchanges received a "marriage gratuity" upon getting wed and some believed the payment would end on October 1st. That was when the GPO became a corporation, although there was absolutely no truth to the rumour.
Post Office Workers' Union official Fred Binks said: "There really is no need for this mad dive to the altar. We are trying to prevent it." The payment was fixed by length of service with a month's pay given for each year up until the maximum amount of £800 – about £13,000 in today's money. Quite a motivation to get wed!
The Mirror also reported that a woman was to be disciplined after forgetting to lock up a post office at Smethwick, near Birmingham, on a Saturday night. Shoppers found the post office open an hour after all the staff had gone home with about £20,000 in cash and money orders inside.
Adverts in the national papers placed by Reveille magazine said: "This week Reveille continues the exclusive life-story of Simon Dee, the star who found success in five short years." He was also just one short year away from finding failure upon making a disastrous move to London Weekend Television. Before long the 'Dee Time' star would be signing on at the Fulham Labour Exchange and working as a bus driver!
And finally a young woman who used the pseudonym "Waiting in Earnest" (but stated her full address in Kent!) wrote in the Mirror's letters page: "As a teenager, I am extremely concerned and annoyed at the apparent lack of romance in modern day courtship. One aspect in particular is the Proposal of Marriage. Why is it that very few young men today actually ask of their beloved, “Will you marry me?”
"Most young men after going out with a girl for some time seem to take marriage for granted and, instead of courteously popping the question, they “propose” by talking about the furniture for the flat and where to go on honeymoon. This has happened to me no less than six times, and I think it is about time men changed their tactics from supposing to proposing. I, for one, long to hear those four little, but very important words."
Next week's stories will include a "shattering, deafening explosion" in Haresfinch, reports on the Whit Monday church processions, the new Four Acre Lane estate, why smoking can't be banned on St Helens buses, vandalism to church tents, the return of whippet racing to the town and there is a new member of the Golden Helmet Club.
We begin on the 20th when the Liverpool Echo reported that the new Eccleston Lane Ends Junior and Infants School in Eccleston Park would be completed by August. Being built at a cost of £77,000 (about £1.3m in today's money), it was replacing the existing school on St Helens Road where staff and pupils had been "struggling against overcrowded conditions".
The Echo also said that women now held key jobs at both Newton-le-Willows' employment exchanges with the appointment of Elsie Parker as Youth Employment Officer. In January Jane Mackintosh had been appointed manager of the Earlestown employment exchange.
On the 21st three men ran out of a partly constructed extension to Brook Bridge Garage in Prescot with their clothes on fire. Staff at the garage put out the flames and the men were taken to Whiston Hospital with serious burns. John Middlehurst, the manager of the service station, said the accident was caused by a blowback from ignited petrol fumes, although it wasn't yet known where the fumes came from.
A second fire took place on the same day at Rainford Secondary School that severely damaged a sixth-form motor workshop. And a third blaze occurred on the 21st in Dorothy Street in Thatto Heath and was blamed on children playing with matches. In fact the firemen had to be called out twice during the same afternoon to extinguish fires within wooden sheds.
An 'Any Questions?' session was held at the New Street Methodist Church Hall on the 21st with a panel comprising Anglican and Methodist clergy.
On the following day Tom Wilcock became the town's youngest ever mayor. His predecessor as first citizen, Tom Forshaw, handed the 42-year-old from Moss Bank the chain of office. However the event did not take place in the Mayor's Parlour in the Town Hall as might be expected but at Pilkington's Sheet Works in Grove Street where both men worked.
In the Reporter on the 23rd James Hughes – the manager of Litherland's butcher's shop in the market – claimed that traffic wardens were becoming "little Hitlers". This was after one of his staff was booked for having just one wheel of his vehicle over the yellow lines.
Since the introduction of double yellow lines in St Helens six months earlier the market traders had been allocated special parking areas in a nearby side street. However Mr Hughes said the designated spaces easily got full and he called for a larger car park for traders. The Borough Engineer George James told the Reporter that in the town centre development plan the new market area would have facilities for roof top parking.
This is how the newspaper began their latest instalment of the on-going saga of the Sutton travellers: "Terrified housewives living in fear of reprisals, threats by gipsies to smash windows, thefts and petty pilfering – this is the situation in the Reginald Road area of Sutton, residents claim."
Many of the fifty or so caravans had been occupying a field in Reginald Road since last September and their occupiers were refusing to leave. They had ignored a court order ordering them to go and threats to physically evict them had come to nothing.
There was now a state of limbo and the local residents were far from happy, with some threatening to withhold their rates in protest. Many people who complained to the Reporter wouldn't give their names in case of reprisals, claiming that the travellers had stolen their milk, bicycles, coal and children's toys.
Tom Sparks from no. 299 had had his bike stolen from his shed and was offering a £1 reward for its return. The 70-year-old told the paper: "I want the gipsies cleared out. Where they go is their problem."
There was some support for the travellers and Hilda Kelly from Clovelly Avenue vented her irritation at their supporters: "If those in the Town Hall feel so sorry for them that they don't want to move them, get the gipsies camped on their back garden and see how they feel."
The Reporter also described a dispute over a wall that began when St Helens Corporation decided to build a reservoir off Crank Road in Billinge. A stone wall had to be knocked down while the reservoir was being built and – according to Billinge Council – St Helens Corporation had promised to rebuild it afterwards.
However pieces of the wall had been stolen and so the Corporation decided to erect a wire fence instead. This had incensed the Billinge councillors who sent a strong letter of protest.
The reply from St Helens Corporation's Water Engineer was read out at a recent Billinge Council meeting. Mr E. K. Astin made matters worse by saying the Corporation had a perfect right to enclose the site with any materials that they thought fit. This did not go down well with the Billinge councillors who called the response "cheeky" and "in very bad taste".
The Reporter also stated that a brass band contest would be held in June in Rainford Church Hall and broadcast on Radio Merseyside. Jimmy Blackburn, the retiring Chairman of Rainford Urban District Council, made the draw for the first round.
The competitors were Rainford Boys Band, Prescot Band, Leigh Silver Band, Automatic Telephones Band, Skelmersdale Prize Band, Parr Public Band, Golborne Prize Band and Trinity Girls Silver Band. The unusually named Automatic Telephones Band was the brass band of the Automatic Telephone and Electric Co. of Liverpool.
Four people were taken to hospital on the 25th after a car hit a wall in Marshalls Cross Road. The injured were John Walker from Seddon Street and his two children and Elsie Pearson from Atherton Street. They were treated for shock and later allowed home.
It was Whit Monday on the 26th and Rainhill Sports Gala was held at the Ex-Servicemen's Club in Warrington Road. The many activities included an army display, trampolines, ski slope, Morris dancing, boxing, judo, wrestling and a tug-of-war competition. Music was provided by Redgate Silver Band and Garston Woodcutters Novelty Band. Admission was 2/6 for adults and a shilling for children.
For six days from the 26th an Italian so-called "sword-and-sandal" film called 'Colossus and the Headhunters' was screened at the Capitol, along with 'Laurel and Hardy in Toyland'. Meanwhile at the ABC Savoy 'Where's Jack?' was shown with Tommy Steele playing the notorious 18th century criminal Jack Sheppard.
To end here are some other stories that were in the national newspapers this week. The Daily Mirror wrote: "Hundreds of GPO telephone girls are rushing to the altar. They just can't be married soon enough because of a naughty rumour about cash."
Women that worked at the exchanges received a "marriage gratuity" upon getting wed and some believed the payment would end on October 1st. That was when the GPO became a corporation, although there was absolutely no truth to the rumour.
Post Office Workers' Union official Fred Binks said: "There really is no need for this mad dive to the altar. We are trying to prevent it." The payment was fixed by length of service with a month's pay given for each year up until the maximum amount of £800 – about £13,000 in today's money. Quite a motivation to get wed!
The Mirror also reported that a woman was to be disciplined after forgetting to lock up a post office at Smethwick, near Birmingham, on a Saturday night. Shoppers found the post office open an hour after all the staff had gone home with about £20,000 in cash and money orders inside.
And finally a young woman who used the pseudonym "Waiting in Earnest" (but stated her full address in Kent!) wrote in the Mirror's letters page: "As a teenager, I am extremely concerned and annoyed at the apparent lack of romance in modern day courtship. One aspect in particular is the Proposal of Marriage. Why is it that very few young men today actually ask of their beloved, “Will you marry me?”
"Most young men after going out with a girl for some time seem to take marriage for granted and, instead of courteously popping the question, they “propose” by talking about the furniture for the flat and where to go on honeymoon. This has happened to me no less than six times, and I think it is about time men changed their tactics from supposing to proposing. I, for one, long to hear those four little, but very important words."
Next week's stories will include a "shattering, deafening explosion" in Haresfinch, reports on the Whit Monday church processions, the new Four Acre Lane estate, why smoking can't be banned on St Helens buses, vandalism to church tents, the return of whippet racing to the town and there is a new member of the Golden Helmet Club.