In 1958 we moved to a tiny village on the Essex/Herts borders called Nazeing The home of the world famous Nazeing Glass Works. My Grandfather always wanted to have smallholding raising chickens and having a bit of land to grow vegetables. I loved this place, so idyllic. The bungalow named the Oaks, was situated by the river Lea, one of the rivers that flows into the Thames. There was fishing nearly all year round, and I made sure that I did my share.
It was in this river that I also learnt to swim, me a a few other friends used to go skinny dipping there, then, there were very few people who went there. Now, there are yachting and rowing clubs and doing that, would be seen as not nice and you'd probably be arrested.
During the summer as well as fishing I used to go rowing, the size of my callouses on my hands. After a session of heavy rowing, my grandmother put vineger on them. It worked, they stopped hurting. Granny's and old wives always have a remedy
My late great and favourite uncle Den loved it there, everytime he came, which was most weekends, he would get his rod out and go fishing. My Uncle Den was one of the nicest and kindest men I have met, I would like to believe if I had known my father, he would be like my uncle Dennis. A lot of him is in me. I really miss him, even though he has been dead for over 20 years. He was only 48 when he died.
The big shire horses towing the barges up and down the river, from Hertford to London, carrying wood vegetables and other materials. The horses were magnificent, sometimes there were teams of six horses pulling the barges. But they were sadly replaced by tractors, such is progress.
Unfortunately now is all changed, there is no more Oaks, it has been burnt down, all my neighbours houses have been pulled down, there is nothing there apart from memories, and they will be with me until I die.
I went to school in Nazeing, it was a new and very small school, Pound Close, later known as Hyde Mead, it was about a mile away and so I cycled there. The headteacher was a lady Mrs Laird her name, she was about 6 feet tall and Scotish, we called her giraffe head, as her neck was so long.
There were many good teachers there, one in particular was very influential to me, he introduced me to many exciting books and built up my confidence in reading aloud. One of these books was the Hobbit, written by the great J R R Tolkein and from that day on I never looked back, he also made poetry interesting. What a great teacher, Mr Campbell wherever you are I thank you.
All this time, my one love was a soccer team, it was the team my grandfather supported. Tottenham Hotspur nicknamed the Spurs or Lilywhites. My first game at White Hart Lane (the home ground of Spurs)was around November 1955, I was instantly hooked, and I have supported them ever since. For many years I was a season ticket holder but unfortunately it has become too expensive, but it's the first result I look for.
from left to right John White, known as the ghost, as he always came from nowhere, was tragically killed when struck by lighting. Centre Bobby Smith, a ferocious centre forward, struck a partnership with right, Jimmy Greaves, Spurs greatest scorer, truly a great.
1961, another very important year for me, it was the year I started in a new school, Latton Bush, a wonderful school in Harlow. But that was in September, let's go back a few months, the winter of 1960/61 was very cold the coldest since 1948, the snows started on December 26, and lay on the ground until Easter, school buses couldn't run, and the lakes behind us all froze up. I loved it. myself and a few friends used to go ice biking on the lakes, discovering the islands. It was also the year that Tottenham FC won the 'double' the FA Cup and the League in the same year, a feat not done in the 20th century, other teams have done it since, but 'Super Spurs' were the first, with a far more exacting league program
Well as I have stated earlier, it was time for me to leave the safety of my tiny primary school to the trials and tribulations of a much larger school. But it was at Hyde Mead that I won my first literary prize, this was for poetry. The Harkness Poetry Prize. I won the complete works of William Shakespeare, and I still have this book.
And it was also in that tiny Primary school that I first heard about the Goon Show The Goons for those of you who don't know were initially four ex servicemen who got together in the early 50's and Spike Milligan (you will hear about him later) wrote all the scripts, sometimes he got a little help from Eric Sykes. Michael Bentine, Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe made up the rest of the Goons, although Michael Bentine dropped out and continued to do his own thing with the "Bumblies" and other projects, but here I was with my little 'trannie' listening to the comedy shows like 'The Clitheroe Kid' and 'Around the Horne'. My sense of humour is very 'Goonish' and I think I may be classed as being 'zany'
Latton Bush. This school was going to have a large bearing in my growing up, and to what music I was going to listen to, and play. The 60's was an exciting time musically. The British Musical Revolution to the States, pirate radio, mini skirts and the so called sexual freedom, the pill and the emancipation of women. Unfortunately it never affected me, I never seemed to come in contact with the emancipated woman. Although I think our German teacher may have been emancipated, we boys were always ogling her. I'm sure she never wore a bra. And she made sure that us boys knew it, we always wanted to sit at the front of the class. After the lesson, us boys were always coming out of the classroom with our hands in our pockets, to keep our adolescent erections under control. German was a vey popular lesson with the boys.
I made so many good friends there. I wonder what they're doing now, I wonder what lives they're leading. I wish that I had some of my old school photos.
If only I could remember the name of the teacher who taught music. He was such a good teacher, he would have us playing all types of music, he taught us the origins and theory of music. He didn't just make us research the classics. He also got us researching all types of music. It is because of him, my musical taste is so diverse.
I had a good friend at school who got me interested in more types of music, especially folk and blues. I bought an old cheap bass guitar, there must of been hundreds of us kids buying guitars in the wake of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones it was said that if you didn't like the Beatles you liked the 'Stones'. I liked them both.
I left school during the mid 60's the whole world of music was being shaken in it's boots, Dylan had been around for about 6 years, the Beatles were getting more intricate in their melodies, and there was The Who, my first fave band, we will go on to the rest of the 60's, where a guitarist so infuential was to make a big impact on my life. Eric Clapton
The Who one of the all time greats, Pete Townsend with his great guitar licks, John Entwhistle with his marvellous pounding bass lines, Roger Daltry, one of the all time great rock singers, and last but no means least, Keith Moon drummer extrodinaire his manic drum patterns, one of the few rock drummers with a double bass drum. not the first, we will talk about him later.
More of this later.
