1953

1953

"Last night I dreamed  I was back at..".........well, not Manderley, exactly; but through the swirling mists of memory, I saw myself back in the  Summer of 1953, which, in retrospect, appears as a watershed year of  my life.

I was ten and a half years old, and life was cosy and  seemingly secure. I lived in a small  detached house  at the end of a small cul de sac in Bridlington. With a brand new fountain pen, I had painstakingly inscribed  on the first page of my favourite book , my name and address:
                                     Christopher  John  Holliday
                                     10 St Anthhony's Road
                                      Bridlington
                                     East Yorkshire
                                     England
                                      Europe
                                     The World
                                     The Unyverse
There was a wooden gate that led up to the front door where a second path branched round to the side of the house  and led to the back door and the garden that edged the other three sides of the house. On the backside of the garden, there was a high wooden fence, on the other side of which,  (and I could only see this from upstairs through the bathroom window) lay the cemetary and , farther away, the square tower of Bridlington Priory Church.
When I entered the house by the backdoor - the front door was only used  to welcome visitors - I found myself in the narrow kitchen with its pantry. Next to the kitchen was the  dark back room with its coal fire. This was the room we used all the time. The window looked onto the widest part of the garden where one glorious Guy Fawkes Night, when the rain was pouring down, Cliff braved the elements (while Joan and Molly and I watched through the window) to let off the fireworks we had bought the previous week. He set off the first  and we oohed. He set off the second and we ahhed. But then, he accidently dropped a lighted match onto the tray of fireworks and , with  a flash, they were all alive, banging and shooting off in all directions; it was the best firework display I ever saw, and Joan and I cheered Cliff as he returned, soaking and bedraggled, to the back room, whilst Molly barked her approval that the noise was over.

Molly was an Irish Red Setter, highly strung and full of wet sloppy licks. She was, Joan said, "as  daft as a brush" and was  a  present for me from Great Aunt Kate, a formidable Methodist  Aunt of  Cliff,  who had visited us from Oxford one Christmas. She had travelled  up to Bridligton by rail, changing trains at York, and pausing only long enough to telephone Joan to tell her what time she would arrive at Bridlington Station, so that Cliff could pick her up in the car. Just before putting down the receiver, she asked Joan, commandingly,
 "Would Christopher like a dog for Christmas?"
"Well," Joan began hestitatingly, "I expect he might...."
"Because I have brought one for him"
Later, Joan used to wonder exactly for whom Molly was brought. As she said, she was the one who walked Molly, fed Molly, brushed Molly, cleaned up after Molly.
But I loved Molly.

We had a front room. From its windows , you could see the whole of St Anthony's Road, as far as its junction with the Main Road. No cars were present in the road; but every day, the milk cart, pulled by a horse would turn in to deliver bottles to every door, and the coal dray pulled by a   strong horse would come often, and the rag and bone man, once a month would appear with his horse and cart. Once these tradesmen and their beasts had left the road, one could see neighbours, sneaking out of their houses, armed with  a pan and brush, to collect the horses' droppings for their roses. It was in this road, where I first practised riding my two wheeler bike - with strict instructions not to go beyond the junction. Unsurprisingly, I disobeyed, skidded on the gravel at the junction, fell off the bike, grazed my legs, burst into howling tears, was brought home by a kindly onlooker, sat on Joan's knee, in the kitchen, while she bathed my wounds and declared  that I was never going  on a bicycle again, and she told me that " that is what happens when you disobey instructions".

The front room had a fireplace with a ceramic surround : the fire was rarely lit.The floor had a  lush green carpet on which sat a  rather ugly three piece suite and a pouffeAlong one wall was a low set of bookshelves.  I used to sneak in there, and lie on the floor, reading one of  the books that Cliff brought back for me when he returned from his day's travels as a salesman for a pharmaceutical company. It was a bright room, often sun filled. However, the front room was there only for when we had visitors : "for best", as people used to say.
And, in 1953, it was in the front room that we placed the television.

Television arrived in our area, of course, in time for the Coronation.  Ours was bulky, square, and had a 9 inch screen. Only one other family in St Anthony's Road had one: they lived  at the other end, on the right hand corner of the junction. Their garden looked onto the Secondary school for children who did not go to the local Grammar or High School. They had a rather flashy car. Joan thought they were a bit common, an opinion she later thought completely justified when they were the first people in the area to get ITV.

The Coronation was an  enormous event: a new monarch, and a woman, and a woman named Elizabeth. All kinds of comparisons were being made with the first Queen of England of that name. For me, it was  special because   there was no school that day and a lot more jolly than the day off that  we had when King George VI had died  - I rmember that on the radio there was only  "solemn music", and all the newspapers had  their pages edged in black. There was no communal party in our street, but the fmily  at the end of the road did have a rather raucus party. Joan and Cliff invited our immediate neighbours to come and watch the ceremonies on the television. I was dressed very smartly, Joan wore a a cocktail dress. Cliff wore a suit, and we all sat in the front room in a very earnest and dignified manner. When the National Anthem played, we all stood up, at attention, That was, I assumed, what the new Queen would expect. I remember that she looked so small, like a child, sitting on that throne, with the stone of Scone beneath her (Miss Senior  and Mrs Ingle at school had drilled all the facts into my head) The heavy crown and the cloak seemed to weigh on her and I wondered how she could support the orb and the sceptre for so long.It was all clearly very important: something had ended, and something new was about to start. I looked around at the grown ups in our front room. They seemed so solemn, so unified. Cliff  handed out the  sherry and they all raised their glasses. The lady from next door had a tear on her cheek. And they all looked so expectant.

And I was expectant too. Not for the Queen, but for myself.