John Glenn

Until I saw his obituary I hadn’t thought about John Glenn in years but seeing it took me back to February  1962. He was the astronaut on board Friendship 7. I hadn’t long been at college in Loughborough. It had been a very depressing time for the Western space program. This was a time when all the space firsts had been Russian ones. First artificial satellite, first animal in space, first man in space.

I was keenly interested in space travel. I had joined the British Interplanetary Society at 17 or so and been to a lecture given by them in Birmingham. I was very aware I had no formal qualification but that didn’t actually matter, except in my own mind. All that was required was an interest in space travel and paying the subscription. I recall the lecture was about a suitable fuel and the conclusion was helium-3. The reason completely escapes me now but it seemed a logical answer at the time. I don’t remember why I asked a question but I do remember my embarrassment when I didn’t fully aspirate the h at the start of helium.

The BIS was at that time a collection of enthusiasts who were looked upon as cranks. Although it had many serious members and developed plausible plans, for example for a trip to Mars, the environment was only slowly changing. At the time the Apollo moon missions were very much in the future while a UK Astronomer Royal had declared that space travel was bunk not long before.

The Glenn mission was in a Mercury capsule on top of an Atlas missile. The objective was to go briefly into earth orbit for three orbits and then return. This was a very big deal indeed- the first US manned satellite. The whole mission was broadcast live. It was fairly convenient in UK time being in the early evening with launch about 4 and return about 9. I lay on my bed in my student room listening to the broadcast breaking only to go to dinner at 6. Dinner on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays was a formal meal ( this meant collar and tie ) and the timetable was precise, be at the table at 6 or go without.

I was too hungry to go without so I took the interruption in my listening. Otherwise I was locked to the broadcast for the whole time of the flight. I was worried, like many others, that the re-entry phase was very hazardous and this concern under laid the whole flight. A successful launch was gratifying but it wasn’t over until a safe return. America had an unfortunate history of failed launches.

The start of the exploration of space had been supposed to occur in the International Geophysical Year ( actually more like 18 months ) back in 1957-8. Among many ventures ( a UK Antarctic crossing among them ) America had planned the first satellite launch with a specially designed Vanguard rocket. Amid great embarrassment it blew up on the pad and pride was only recovered later when a cobbled together missile based system achieved orbit. By then the publicity had been stolen by a series of Russian “Sputnik” satellites. I can remember watching Sputnik 2 passing overhead. If you were in the dark and the satellite in sunlight it was clearly visible as a rapidly moving star.

The Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gargarin had orbited the earth in 1961. The whole run of Russian space successes had caused great anguish in the West. Not only were there military implications but more broadly education, particularly technical education, was called into question.

Thus the Glenn mission salvaged some Western pride. It wasn’t the first but it was a significant achievement. I was very gratified.

Frances knows my penchant for weak jokes so she collected all her cracker jokes for me

Q Where does Santa go if he is sick

A the elf centre

Q Why did no one bid for Rudolf and Blitzen on eBay

A Because they were two deer.

Q Why is it getting more difficult to buy advent calendars

A Because their days are numbered

This latter reminds me of the great bargain at the Fabric Guild which was an Advent sheet with a day printed twice. It must have some use but I’ve never figured out what.

Morale better

I’m expecting lots of flak after my last post ( what a killjoy I hear you say ). My excuse is that I am labouring under a heavy cold and that has coloured my view.

Later on Christmas Day Frances, Alison and Ellie visited. We exchanged presents and passed on those for the other kids at Birmingham for Christmas  I was reminded yet again how fortunate we are with our children and grandchildren. It would be tedious to recount all their various abilities and achievements perhaps suffice to say how proud we are of them. We derive a lot of interest from hearing about their news.

Perhaps one quiet boast is permissible. Frances had been shortlisted for the University professional of the year. She modestly thinks that the new library building manager is probably more deserving. He is also shortlisted. The move into the new library and merging in some departmental holdings was a big job and it was completed on time and in budget. There were hiccups along the way; .worst being when they had a water leak and damage.

We concluded our Christmas with an orgy of television viewing. “Call the Midwife” in their Christmas edition was even more sentimental than usual; something I would not have thought possible. My cousin was a midwife in the East End in the fifties but she hardly talks of it. Her main point of contact with the programme is that she is also intensely religious. In her case she was much influenced by Billy Graham who was a noted US evangelist of the period. Knowing I’m not at all religious she rarely talks of it with me. Unmarried, she had a taste for venturesome holidays when she was younger.  In our family it is widely accepted she was very much influenced by her aunt, her namesake, whose nursing career she followed.

My Aunt Win, the eldest of mother’s sisters, was famous within our family. Also unmarried ( until very late in life ) she was opinionated and bossy. She was also thoughtful and kind. As a working class girl between the wars she went into domestic service. Always ambitious she was fortunate to work for a doctor who encouraged her to take up nursing. Among other things she drove an ambulance during the Coventry blitz. After the war she went to Canada for a couple of years because retirement was too quiet for her.

It must have been a twist of genetics because her brother and sisters were all rather conventional. My mother’s only mild rebellion was to avoid domestic service and instead become an apprentice milliner. Unfortunately she entered the trade just as it was dying as the fashion for hats was falling sharply. She never worked as a milliner but in shoe shops instead.

I mention my midwife cousin because I suspect she had a major role in my life. Living in Coventry she was evacuated to my parents at the start of WW11. Clearly she was a charming little girl and my parents fell in love .My father, who had been rather diffident about having children, succumbed to mother who wanted a child of her own. I was always told by relatives mother was disappointed I wasn’t a girl although she never gave any hint to me. Anyway I was born in the middle of WW11. My father was 40 and mother 36 so they couldn’t have waited much longer .My mother was great at many crafts, sewing, knitting, rug making, doll making. She must have been disappointed that I was uninterested.

Lowish Christmas spirit

I can’t remember a year that I’ve approached with so much apprehension as 2017. I’m convinced the referendum was a disaster and the US election of Donald Trump beggars belief. Apart from being a thoroughly obnoxious individual his policies, such as we know of them, look thoroughly bad.

On a personal level our Christmas isn’t looking wonderful. Annette is recovering from a virus infection and I’m just starting one. We have resolved to avoid our plans for visiting Frances for the family rendezvous because of the infection risk. Alison has kindly said she and Frances will visit us to collect presents etc. We are holding a pile for kids which we don’t want to chance delivering.

At least I have some festive jokes

The U rated one

Q What do you get if you cross Santa Claus with a duck?

A Christmas Quackers.

The vulgar one ( from the Vicar of Dibley nativity episode! )

Santa Claus has a mince pie stuck up his bottom. He goes to the doctor. The doctor examines him  and says “ no problem, I’ve got cream for that”

Grandchildren at Whitby

We took a week at Whitby partly trying to tie down all the things which need doing and partly to entertain Frances and the kids for a couple of days. Frances came up by train and we met in Scarborough. Martin is on holiday so was able to be with us most days. Lindsey is full of ideas and advice about fulfilling our holiday let ambitions. In fact Lindsey will be our day to day agent .

Already she is full of details and is preparing our web site. She now has the experience of a year letting out the cottage attached to their house at Fylingthorpe. This has been quite successful and has whetted their appetite for more. Whitby may be more of a challenge because of the scale of the completion. We have learned that of six flats in our house only one will occupied full time. Four of the others will be holiday lets with us as the fifth. We also met a neighbour in a small cottage( subdivided from a large house ) who is also similar to ourselves occupying sometimes, letting sometimes.

Having Frances , Alice and Ben to stay.did mean we spent some holiday time. Bizzarely Ben knows about “knock, knock” jokes without understanding they need a joke. So he comes out with some quite surreal variants. As Frances says he understands the structure without understanding the joke part. One day they went to the play area in nearby Pannett park and then to watch the new J K Rowling movie. On another we walked to the beach at Robin Hoods Bay and then Frances inspected the much changed house at Fylingthorpe which she hadn’t seen before followed by a fish and chip meal back at our flat.

Ellen came for a sleepover with her cousins. It is easy to see that Ellen will be a handful in later life. Miffed that she had a plastic beaker instead of a glass like Alex she went and swapped on the table. Anticipating protests she then put a reserved notice on her plate. I have to admire her nerve. I’ve always found Ellen, who can be quite charming when she wants to be, very amusing. Although very self confident within the family I’m told she is quiet at school.

Martin and Lindsey are quite knowledgeable about rock pool life and are in a project to assess certain properties. Martin collected samples of rock pool life during our walk on beach at Robin Hoods Bay. These he used to demonstrate to the children the different types, mainly crabs but a couple of small fish and a ragworm. I had never seen a hermit crab before as it tucked itself into a discarded shell it had found.

The beach around this area is famous for jet, fossilised monkey puzzle tree, which is used in jewellery. There must be a dozen shops in Whitby making and selling items made from jet. It is very difficult to spot particularly against the amount of coal and black stones on the beaches. Even side by side it can be difficult to tell them apart.  Jet is quite valuable and much sought after. Jet is a very slightly browner shade of black , takes a fine polish and is less dense. Lindsey is developing an eye for spotting jet and she has some success.

We have found problems with various traffic jams when we have travelled before. This time our journeys were straightforward except for occasional roadworks. These along the Yorkshire A roads were no problem. Past experience has shown that the A64 just beyond York can be a problem. There is a long stretch of single carriage way connecting two stretches of dual carriageway which is very busy with awkward junctions  and can be a severe problem. The A64 York to Scarborough road is strange but we have learned to follow patiently waiting for the patches of dual carriageway.

Information Science

My first job after graduating was in Information Science for Unilever at Port Sunlight on Merseyside. I had a bruising time in my final exams failing the organic practical test. Despite this I got a degree although not as good as I had hoped. My personal tutor grumbled that students who fail exams were not usually awarded degrees and strongly suggested I should be relieved by the outcome.

Nevertheless my confidence was shaken and I resolved to seek a job which did not involve practical work ( not “on the bench” in the jargon of the time ) After some searching I took the job with Unilever. Information Science was very new and the Unilever laboratory was among the leaders in the field. Essentially the job was in two parts- archiving and indexing research reports and current awareness which meant keeping project teams abreast of everything they needed to know.

In a sense this was acting as a super librarian. The difference was that we were expected to become close to the scientists in our particular areas and actively seek out information for them. This was a two way process; we searched the scientific literature for them and they came to us with questions.

There wasn’t much tuition- it was a case of learning on the job. It was a bit easier in that the team of about ten was in transition and four of us were  new. The section manager arranged for all other section managers to individually talk about their current projects which gave us an overview of the laboratory activities. With a total complement of about a thousand and about 250 scientists the activities were many and various. Essentially the laboratory supported the Unilever soap and detergents business so this meant everything from basic surface science to product development and test. There were also active groups supporting engineering, plywood and adhesives and other activities within the interests of a large and diverse company.

I was allocated analysis, engineering and the hard surfaces product development division. This latter covered mainly dishwashing and floor cleaning but as its name suggests any type of hard surface cleaning. This contrasted with personal cleaning and fabric cleaning; the other main product development groups.

The job posed many challenges. The project scientists varied a lot in their attitudes from those keen to be helped through to those who scoffed. What made my life difficult was that essentially I always knew much less about the projects than those working on them- I soon learned to be humble.

The engineering group were easiest. They were company trouble shooters so they had many and varied interests mainly around wear and corrosion. Their job interested me and I relished the compliment their section manager gave to me ( couched in careful language “ quite useful and helpful”.

An event occurred which was to be very significant for my whole career although I didn’t realise it at the time. The Divisional Manager of Hard Surface Cleaning, Bill Bone, decided to get all his staff together and spend a day brain storming possible advances. He asked me to take notes and produce a list of the ideas. My section manager straight away said I would be overwhelmed and suggested I record the whole session and then take notes afterwards.

This is what I did spending a weekend reviewing the tape and producing a summary of the ideas proposed.

Bill Bone obviously at least then knew my name and sometime later suggested it would be good for me to take a secondment to his group for six months to widen my experience; to see life as a consumer rather than a producer of information. My boss agreed. I had severe doubts but I judged it would not be politic to refuse. Bone was big wheel in the organisation and a request from him carried the force of an order.

It turned out to be a turning point. I enjoyed  product development and I was quite effective. I left information science and my secondment grew into a year and then two and then a permanent position.

I was fortunate in my first section manager, Arthur Johnson. It was his first managerial position. He soon said how I did my job was up to me as his role was to set the objective and facilitate my work. I got on very well with him; he was quite free with advice, and this was usually sound, but all the time he emphasised that is my responsibility to meet the objectives as I saw fit.

Too much food

Every year I have a Christmas problem with food. Not the usual seasonal over indulgence. It arises because I have two book club meetings on the same day, the first Monday in the month. In the morning it is Bookworms, the Lichfield U3A bookgroup, and in the evening our village bookgroup. Both have Christmas meals and I want to attend both. So two Christmas meals in one day!

The two bookgroups are quite different in character and our Christmas meals reflect that. Bookworms is all suburban, middle class, well heeled ladies.( except for me ). So they want to choose a posh restaurant a little way out of town. I go along with the choice although I wasn’t impressed last year. Sure enough I’m not impressed this year either. Expensive and pretentious food although they did manage the crunchy Brussels sprouts rather than the usual wishy-washy ones. I’m not a foodie but even I know there has been a revolution in the cooking of this Christmas staple. The trick so I’m told is not to do a cross cut and boil as in the past but to just stir fry whole sprouts.

Apart from this my traditional Christmas meal was very so-so. The pig was in a very fatty blanket, the roast spuds poor and the turkey heavily processed rather than carved from the breast. I punished myself also with traditional Christmas pudding. It was a Nouvelle Cuisine portion ( ie. minute ).

Actually the conversation wasn’t uninteresting. We had the “ I’ve been to so and so, oh yes I’ve been there…”. All very” I’m OK, you’re OK” as I recall from my course years ago .I avoid talking about my foreign travel which has been minimal anyway this year. I had to confess some time ago going to Australasia for our Golden Wedding which aroused more interest than I felt warranted. The other subject is that after an agonising wait one lady has moved into a newly converted flat in the centre of town. She has an awkward daughter “ on the autistic spectrum” who has left the family home to live in another flat in the same complex. I don’t live in Lichfield and much local gossip goes over my head.

I feel a complicated relationship with the other members. I write the group blog. They are all nice enough and in some ways quite surprising. We have a former probation officer, a nurse and several teachers. I have to say I’m treated quite well as the token man- I’m usually asked for the male viewpoint in discussion. I have occasionally tried to steer the book  choice to something with some technical or historic meat but this usually fails.

Our village book group is quite different. At present I’m the organiser although hopefully I will relinquish this role in the spring. I had recovered sufficiently by the evening to enjoy my fish and chips and apple pie. I hadn’t deliberately chosen the special offer menu but when a member pointed it out I was happy to pay less than half the luncheon price and for superior food- definitely a success for our village pub. One active member is waiting for a brain tumour operation and hopefully once she has convalesced she will take over the running of the group. Rather than discuss a book each member was asked to present a favourite item of poetry or prose which yielded some surprising choices.

So I finished up rather full but not unpleasantly so and with the feeling I had done my social duty.

Later in the week we went to Dickensian “Penny Reading “ in Tamworth Town Hall. It is possible that Dickens did appear there himself although the firm evidence is lacking. It was delivered by an actor who specialises in these one man shows. Essentially he gave an account of Dickens life as seen by the author himself with interludes of Magwich and the Bill Sykes/Nancy murder. The whole was organised by the LitFest group and, as I’ve now resigned, it was slightly strange to see the event from the outside as it were.

I’ve active in selling tickets even so and it was gratifying that several people from our bookgroup attended. The venue was superb and quite a few wore Victorian Costume.

Visit to Whitby

Martin and family live on the outskirts of Robin Hood’s Bay. Alex and Ellen go to Fylingdales school which happily is very close to their house. Even year Robin Hood’s Bay holds a Victorian weekend around the end of November. The school holds a mini concert to coincide with Victorian weekend.

The concert supplements the traditional nativity play. It is held in St Stephens church which is also the venue for a big display of Christmas trees. After Queen Victoria arrives to open proceedings, there is a ceremonial switching on of the lights. This is supervised by a local radio presenter and broadcast on local radio.

We have been able to attend for the past three years.  Alex has graduated from the cornet to the trumpet. This year he played a short trumpet duet. It appears Alex has some real musical talent. He is also playing with the Esk Valley junior band. This is an ad hoc group tagged onto the full Esk Valley band. We heard a little bit of their rehearsal but unfortunately we will miss the full concert. I was rather surprised at how many amateur musicians there are in the area.

We also went to the Winterfest market. Held in Whitby Pavilion this featured many stalls and was supporting the Air Ambulance. While we were there the local U3A had two bands performing. I was surprised ( and a bit daunted ) that Susan, Lindsey’s mother attends many U3A activities in Leicester including three walking groups.

On our last visit the new TV programme , the Grand Tour, was visiting. This is the new Clarkson/Hammond/May venture for Amazon.  This is a ( sort of ) successor to Top Gear. We watched a stunt which involved someone fished out of the River Esk by the swing bridge in the middle of Whitby. A source of local pride is that Jeremy Clarkson has declared the drive over the moors from Pickering one of the best drives in the country. A part is through bleak but beautiful moorland. I have never seen anywhere like it elsewhere in England.

As our flat is in one of the very old parts of Whitby Annette has been trying without success to find out about its history. More recently  Mariners House, where our flat is situated, was an ARP centre in WW11 with its basement an air raid shelter. Then postwar for some 40 years it was the municipal offices( along with a neighbouring house with connecting door still visible ) before conversion some ten or twelve years ago. There is still evidence of its municipal use in the elaborate fire alarm system.

A museum piece

While I was working for Castrol R&D they decided to establish a museum at the Swindon headquarters of Castrol UK. As a company Castrol is extremely conscious of strong public relations and saw the museum in this light.

An appeal was made for old Castrol artefacts to exhibit. Among those produced were Castrol cans from ( I guess ) the immediately post war era. These cans were quite dirty and my group was given the job of cleaning them up prior to use as exhibits. We set about the job and soon realised that the quickest and easiest method was ultrasonic cleaning. We had taken a keen interest in ultrasonic cleaning although as the tanks were fairly small and often replenished infrequently the commercial sales had been disappointing.

We had a laboratory ultrasonic cleaning tank so we set about the job. It was very nearly a disaster. What we hadn’t reckoned with was the poor quality of the can decoration. Cleaning the can was set to strip it back to bare metal. Fortunately we realised in time to switch off at the stage where the decoration was dulled but not removed.

I was invited to the opening of the museum This was to be done by the person behind the Castrol sponsored land speed record contender Thrust 2, Richard Noble and his driver Andy Green..I see that the successor, Thrust SSC is also Castrol sponsored.

Castrol is good at providing plenty of razzmatazz at this sort of event. So it was to the strains of Tina Turner singing “Simply the best”( on record not live ) that we opened the museum and toured it taking the opportunity to talk to Andy Green.  It is an excellent effort but sadly kept for customers and dignitaries.

Talking of razzmatazz every six months we had a presentation at the R&D centre by the senior Castrol folk. On at least one occasion the event went right over the top and became how I imagine a Nuremburg rally would have been. While these events were I suppose good for morale they could be a bit too much of a good thing. Sometimes they were quite thought provoking as when the CEO of Castrol India spoke. He said while India was a poor country the middle class with some disposable income while a minority in India were still far larger in number than any country in Europe.

Ever keen for publicity group subsidiary, Kerry, had earlier been involved in the “Mary Rose”, Henry V111 flagship restoration. At the time it was suggested that Prince Charles had prevailed upon Kerry to provide an ultrasonic cleaning bath for which Castrol was to provide the cleaning content.

What had not been expected was that the largest artefacts were huge wooden gun carriages which the Mary Rose trust needed cleaning. This necessitated an equally huge ultrasonic tank, the largest I had ever seen, of some two cubic metres capacity. This was vastly expensive.

I was designated to provide the cleaning product. I visited the trust at Portsmouth and soon established it would be ruinously expensive to provide what the trust wanted. Eventually after some fraught time with Kerry I came up with a product broadly acceptable to everyone involved. In this case a more senior man represented Castrol at the commissioning.

My visit to the trust was very interesting but I rather foolishly elected to drive the round trip from Manchester in a day. Five hundred plus miles had me exhausted. I remember taking a break and reflecting that if I had been driving back from Swindon which was a regular trip I would have been home.  Fortunately it was the height of summer so I had a lot of daylight for my journey. I particularly recall a huge cooking pot among the recovered items stored in a large warehouse.. The importance of careful conservation was shown by a comparison of recovered arrows. Those not conserved were unrecognisable twisted sticks.

Vests

It is , I believe , a common experience for socks to go missing. This results in a collection of odd socks in the sock drawer. I’m always reminded of a picture Frances had on her wall as a teenager. It shows a young man gazing soulfully into the distance. Captioned “teenage angst” the thought bubble from the young man says “ I feel like a lost sock in the laundromat of oblivion”.

My cunning solution is to buy socks in roughly identical batches. This drives Annette trying to match after washing to distraction but I  know I can mix without problems. The fact that the toes are different colours doesn’t worry me  (or anyone else ).

Now I have a different problem. My stock of vests has dwindled to one. Where all the others have gone is a big puzzle. I know I’m a bit forgetful and disorganised but vests always live in one place. Annette can’t find them either. She is far more organised than me; in fact my usual cry is “I can’t find…” knowing she probably can.

I’m not a terribly disorganised person usually. My first job was in a sense a job of organising scientific information and I think I made a fair fist of it. At any rate good enough to stay in employment although thinking back they did organise a secondment from which I never returned… perhaps they were dropping a gentle hint.

Finding things is a general problem. For me and I guess for many others. I suppose I haven’t helped myself as gardening and outdoor tools are split between garage, garden cabin and shed. I can never remember what is where.

I do have routines for some things like keys. As I smugly say to Annette when she is searching for her keys- “.I always put mine in the same place so I know where they are”. I half recognise this is both irritating and no help.

It brings to mind “Have a go” an early radio quiz show. Compere Wilfred Pickles had a much used question along the lines- “If you could say to your spouse I love you darling, but…. What would the but be?” Answers were usually comical along lines of “ I wish you wouldn’t squeeze the toothpaste tube in the middle”. Mine varies but probably I wish she didn’t  at any time shortly after 9 announce she is tired and going to bed. When I finally retire I usually read for a while. At least she leaves the light on for me.

I wonder if you can get coded vests. Just discreetly coded not like the brash socks with slogans on them like Mr Happy. I suppose the joke message socks are usually desperate Christmas presents. My vest problem is too desperate to wait until Christmas. Anyway who wants vests as a Christmas present?

Another thing – we have probably all become irritated by “words of wisdom” which aren’t really that wise, or at any rate often impossible. You know the sort of thing- If life treats you like a lemon make lemonade.

I’ve come across an amusing take on an Oxfam slogan

Give a man a fish and he eats for a day
Teach a man to fish and he eats for lifetime
Give a man a fire and he is warm for a day
Set a man on fire and he is warm for the rest of his life.

Post truth

It is very sad that post-truth is word of the year in the Oxford English Dictionary. They define it “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping opinion than appeals to emotion or personal belief”. Simplifying that means a lie. There is reason for this entry after the Brexiteer and Trump campaigns which had little resemblance to facts and a whole lot appeals to emotion.

Science fiction writer Philip K Dick said “reality is that which ,when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away”. As a scientist I’m fairly committed to objective fact. I recognise scientists sometimes get it wrong but there is a checking procedure in place. This sometimes doesn’t work quickly but it ensures only the objectively true survives. We have now people in public life who actually think it is OK to lie. To take just one example brexiteers banged on about the £350 million a week the EU cost. As was pointed out frequently this is not true. However it was not withdrawn and ill-informed people might well have thought it was true.

Just to be precise the gross total paid to the EU is £350m a week. However money flowing to Britain from the EU was rather more than £150m so the true figure was rather less than 200m. Did Brexiteers even care about the difference? Is it still going to the NHS?

Part of the problem is that TV, newspapers and particularly social media are increasingly careless of the truth. We have always lived with opinion dressed as fact, a drearily familiar part of election campaigns.  A boundary has been crossed when downright lies are presented as facts. A nauseating example is a Trump campaigner asserting on Facebook that Trump won the popular vote in the US election. He didn’t. The facts are well known and published and one can only presume the person posting was either spectacularly ill-informed or more likely deliberately lying in the knowledge his audience were unlikely to check.

In response to the outcry over this and other lies Facebook have promised, with great reluctance, some sort of action. To be fair to Facebook they are not in any sort of editorial capacity and their defence is that they are just a platform.

It is rather difficult to know where to turn in search of facts. The red top newspapers can be ignored, TV is often dodgy and social media very dubious indeed. The broadsheet newspapers are good in parts. Periodicals are often better taking a more leisurely and measured view. My personal favourite is the Economist which presents a lot of statistical information alongside its articles. I’ve read it for many years and I’m familiar with its biases.

Incidentally I used to read a lot of publications in my local library when I was a young man. I recall talking to my hall sub-warden about this ( I suppose I was quietly boasting how well read I was ). He asked whether I read the Economist, recommended it and I’ve been a fan ever since over 50 years.

The internet is a source to be used very carefully. There is much good stuff and equally a lot of rubbish. I’ve found Wikipedia to be quite good ( not to be confused with Wikileaks which is very biased ). As a source of quick reviews Wikipedia is hard to beat with sometimes its attention to detail rather nerdy.

I long ago worried that every news story I’ve had close personal knowledge about was presented in a somewhat distorted way. The ultimate was “ funny water” identified by a reputable Eastern European scientist. This was thought to be a polymeric form of water.  I was at Unilever’s R&D centre at the time and he was invited for a stay to investigate further. There was a suggestion that the polymer could propagate turning all water into a form which was unsuitable for life. The UK broadsheets picked this up suggesting all life on Earth could be wiped out. Since it was a great struggle to produce it in fine glass capillaries this was never going to happen. In fact it was soon discovered to be an artefact caused by tiny amounts of glass dissolving in the water although that was only reported in the scientific press..

Shades of the Large Hadron Collider producing black holes to swallow the earth.

So be sceptical, try and get your facts from reputable sources and a variety of them.

I fondly reminisce about the days when there were “proper” telly programmes and not all this “How clean is your Big Brother super nanny Get me out of Hells Kitchen Love Island” so called reality TV ( it’s all fixed anyway) . Any resemblance to “reality” is in in the realm of fantasy.

A trip to London

When I was 16 and 17 I was in a group of a half dozen friends; a teenage gang I suppose you could say. For most of this time this was my main social outlet. We mainly met up on a Saturday evening to play cards in one another’s houses. Sometimes  we went to pubs getting particular pleasure from being under age. The only other time I’ve been a pub goer was when I was with a group in Liverpool as a research student.  Essentially we were school friends, all boys, except that Anthony had left to go to a Birmingham Technical College where he met Paddy who was included. Paddy was so-called because he was second generation Irish and our nicknames were not very imaginative.

All of us were too old for family holidays so we resolved to go on a group trip to London I arranged for us to stay in a B&B on Putney Bridge Road where I had earlier stayed with mother. Eventually only  three of us went, Anthony, Paddy and myself.

We travelled down from Birmingham on the new Midland Red express service. This used special express coaches down the then new M1. We were hugely impressed; after careful checking against the mile posts we were cruising at 70 mph. This was then an impressive speed particularly in a coach. It was faster than I had ever travelled on any road. The service was designed to be rather special and not another bus journey. For many years I had the luggage tag on my suitcase.

We were train enthusiasts and our first evening was spent travelling around on the London underground. Provided you never left the system you could travel anywhere for the price of a local ticket. We thought this was magnificent, round the Circle Line at least once and crisscrossing the centre by interchange stations. There was an obscure line which only connected two main stations so we had to sample that. The snag was that to travel the further reaches which were not interchanges you had to exit the station , buy another ticket and board again going the other way.

We came up with a scheme to cheat the system. This was complex involving one buying a complete ticket and the others just buying two local tickets. It didn’t work but flushed with riding around so cheaply anyway we really didn’t mind.

By way of reaction to the “South East “ accents we exaggerated our “Brummie” accents.  I had only the slightest Midlands accent and it has been an annoyance all my life that wherever I go outside the Midlands people say “ you’re a Brummie aren’t you”. I’m not but I was labelled anyway.

We had limited amounts of money and even then, in 1960, London was expensive. We had one slap up meal once a day, otherwise ( very ) occasional snacks. Our main meal was taken in a workman’s café at the end of Putney Bridge Road. I had Cornish Pasty, new to me, but filling and delicious. I’ve never had another so good since but then hunger helped the taste.

Anthony was in the Young Conservatives not through any political conviction but rather they were known for a good social life.  I suspect his parents had something to do with this.Through the association he arranged for us to visit the houses of Parliament and meet our local MP. We sat in on a debate. I was surprised by the slouching in the seats until I realised it was to be close to the electronic speakers relaying what was said. Trivial but we were impressed by the toilet paper marked House of Parliament. I seem to remember Paddy taking some as a souvenir.

We were impressed by all the little things about metropolitan life for example the massive 6 wheel trolley buses along Putney Bridge Road and the ambulances with their ringing bells.

My involvement wound down quickly when I started to go out with Annette. Another member joined the army and the group came to a natural end when the rest left school.

Sadly both Anthony and Paddy died young in accidents. I have kept in very occasional contact with others in the group.

A trip to California

In the early 90’s I was invited to join a meeting of Castrol Technical staff at Newport Beach California. In America Castrol was growing its Production Engineering business by taking over a number of smallish independent producers, So that a more coherent group business could be built the technical leaders met twice a year. It was the custom that a leader from international Research and Development in the UK would join them and I was the attendee on one occasion.

I already knew that there was some feeling that the central R&D was too powerful and didn’t take account of the know-how in all the small companies. A colleague at the previous meeting met with some Anglophobic attitudes and he was pointedly given a tour of Valley Forge Revolutionary War site.

It was arranged that I would go via Chicago and meet up with some US colleagues at the HQ of Castrol in the US. I met with John C and the technology head John H. It was explained that John C and the lead technical man from a local company recently bought, Dave, and myself would fly on to Los Angeles. We would meet up later in the day with John H who would be joining us for dinner before we all went to the meeting site a little way down the coast.

We flew out with American Airlines with all black hostesses. As the flight progressed these hostesses were obviously having a party time in the adjacent section. They had the passengers doing in seat exercises and were doing some sort of concert party. One hostess wearing a blonde wig was imitating someone I didn’t recognise. I commented to John C and he replied “ they all get wacky as soon as we cross the state line”.

We arrived in late morning and hiring a car, drove to a restaurant at Venice Beach. My main memory is sitting in the balmy outdoors in January. After a brief look at the beach we then drove to La Brea tarpits. Millions of years ago animals including pre historic ones had become trapped in the natural ponds of tar. Their bones had been rescued and were in an exhibition, while the tarpits still existed forming a strange oasis in suburban Los Angeles.

We then drove up the Pacific Coast Highway and around Hollywood. By the road were hawkers selling maps of stars houses but we just drove around using John C’s local knowledge having a relative living in the city. I don’t recall any notable names.

We then went back to Los Angeles International to meet John H’s flight. When he arrived to my astonishment John C embraced him fussing as though he was meeting a long lost friend. They had been together earlier that day.  I was astounded, there was no way I would have treated my boss like that. Don’t worry said Dave he is always like that.

I thought this was the extent of John C’s jokes at his bosses expense but this wasn’t the case. We all went to a restaurant where it amused John C to imagine that John H was irresistible to women.” Look John, they keep looking over to you” he would say of a nearby group of ladies. Now John H, who was just an averagely appearing guy, took all of this in good stead, obviously used to this long standing joke. To me, who saw John H as a very big wheel in the company to be treated with some deference this was absolutely amazing behaviour.

We went on that evening to the meeting hotel at Newport Beach where we started the next day in a lovely meeting room overlooking the beach. There was no time for breakfast in the dining room, instead food was brought to the meeting room and we grazed the buffet as we talked. It was immediately obvious that Curtis was an Anglophobe and resented my presence. Nevertheless the meeting proceed fairly smoothly. In the evening we went out to a Mexican style restaurant except that this expression was avoided and thus we had to say “South Western American” food. Whatever it was called it wasn’t to my taste.

It emerged that Curtis had resented what he found was the arrogant attitude of one of my colleagues. At the end of the meeting he allowed I wasn’t too bad for an Englishman. I felt I had done my bit for international relations.

The First Gulf War was just starting and John H, who bitterly opposed it, was firing off emails of protest. I recall watching some of the CNN coverage in my room. They were reporting from Bagdad showing those fantastic pictures of cruise missiles passing down their street.

After the meeting myself and some others visited the local Castrol plant. It was much like the UK plant at Hyde with which I was familiar with one or two nice touches added. At lunch I commented on the drink that was served. It looked like Coke but I was soon told it was iced tea.  I have always enjoyed this on visits ever since. I took the opportunity to buy a Castrol jacket. I was amused by a cartoon on the wall of the secretary’s office which I copied to take back. It was of a gingerbread man and the caption said ”The ideal man-He’s small, he’s sweet and if he gives you any hassle bite his head off”

A very black day

So the US has elected Donald Trump as President. Not only is he a nauseating man but the old Groper seems to have few policy ideas. Those he does have are racist and he glories in being extremely divisive. The enemies of the free world are gloating. I’m seriously worried about democracy, the appeal to the racist and bigoted in society seems so powerful to some that all rationality is cast aside. This is the second election where bigotry has triumphed over tolerance.

I find it sickening when Trump talks about the “working classes”. His only economic ideas mentioned so far are to start a tariff war and reduce taxes on the wealthy. Any working person who thinks either will help them will soon find the truth.

The most terrifying fact is that such an impetuous and thoughtless man has his finger on the nuclear button. Hilary Clinton summed him up when she commented he can be baited by a tweet

A trip to California

In the early 90’s I was invited to join a meeting of Castrol Technical staff at Newport Beach California. In America Castrol was growing its Production Engineering business by taking over a number of smallish independent producers, So that a more coherent group business could be built the technical leaders met twice a year. It was the custom that a leader from international Research and Development in the UK would join them and I was the attendee on one occasion.

I already knew that there was some feeling that the central R&D was too powerful and didn’t take account of the know-how in all the small companies. A colleague at the previous meeting met with some Anglophobic attitudes and he was pointedly given a tour of Valley Forge Revolutionary War site.

It was arranged that I would go via Chicago and meet up with some US colleagues at the HQ of Castrol in the US. I met with John C and the technology head John H. It was explained that John C and the lead technical man from a local company recently bought, Dave, and myself would fly on to Los Angeles and meet up later in the day with John H who would be joining us for dinner before we all went to the meeting site a little way down the coast.

We flew out with American Airlines with all black hostesses. As the flight progressed these hostesses were obviously having a party time in the adjacent section. They had the passengers doing in seat exercises and were doing some sort of concert party. One hostess wearing a blonde wig was imitating someone I didn’t recognise. I commented to John C and he replied “ they all get wacky as soon as we cross the state line”.

We arrived in late morning and hiring a car, drove to a restaurant at Venice Beach. My main memory is sitting in the balmy outdoors in January. After a brief look at the beach we then drove to La Brea tar pits. Millions of years ago animals including pre historic ones had become trapped in the natural ponds of tar. Their bones had been rescued and were in an exhibition, while the tar pits still existed forming a strange oasis in suburban Los Angeles.

We then drove up the Pacific Coast Highway and around Hollywood. By the road were hawkers selling maps of stars houses but we just drove around using John C’s local knowledge having a relative living in the city. I don’t recall any notable names.

We then went back to Los Angeles International to meet John H’s flight. When he arrived to my astonishment John C embraced him fussing as though he was meeting a long lost friend. They had been together earlier that day. I was astounded, there was no way I would have treated my boss like that. Don’t worry said Dave he is always like that.

I thought this was the extent of John C’s jokes at his bosses expense but this wasn’t the case. We all went to a restaurant where it amused John C to imagine that John H was irresistible to women.” Look John, they keep looking over to you” he would say of a nearby group of ladies. Now John H who was just an averagely appearing guy took all of this in good stead, obviously used to this long standing joke. To me, who saw John H as a very big wheel in the company to be treated with some deference, this was absolutely amazing behaviour.

We went on that evening to the meeting hotel at Newport Beach where we started the next day in a lovely meeting room overlooking the beach. There was no time for breakfast in the dining room, instead food was brought to the meeting room and we grazed the buffet as we talked. It was immediately obvious that Curtis was an Anglophobe and resented my presence. Nevertheless the meeting proceed fairly smoothly. In the evening we went out to a Mexican style restaurant except that this expression was avoided and thus we had to say “South Western American” food. Whatever it was called it wasn’t to my taste.

It emerged that Curtis had resented what he found was the arrogant attitude of one of my colleagues. At the end of the meeting he allowed I wasn’t too bad for an Englishman. I felt I had done my bit for international relations.

The First Gulf War was just starting and John H, who bitterly opposed it, was firing off emails of protest. I recall watching some of the CNN coverage in my room. They were reporting from Bagdad showing those fantastic pictures of cruise missiles passing down their street.

After the meeting myself and some others visited the local Castrol plant. It was much like the UK plant at Hyde with which I was familiar but with one or two nice touches added. At lunch I commented on the drink that was served. It looked like Coke but I was soon told it was iced tea.  I have always enjoyed this on visits ever since.I took the opportunity to buy a Castrol jacket. I was amused by a cartoon on the wall of the secretary’s office which I copied to take back. It was of a gingerbread man and the caption said ”The ideal man-He’s small, he’s sweet and if he gives you any hassle bite his head off”

My boyhood home

I lived in the middle of the countryside about a half mile from the nearest village. We were not cut off in that three buses a day passed the door. My house was one of three adjacent, two semis and a bungalow. The owner of the bungalow had the semi’s built for rent as part of his investment.

The house he had built in early 20’s was dire. It was constructed to the lowest possible standards and completely lacked any amenities. No electricity or gas, no sewer and even until the late 30’s no mains water. It fooled the passer by looking quite modern. When my best friends mother first saw it she exclaimed” I thought you lived in a cottage “.

Even the minimum standards were shoddily performed. I can remember a crack in my bedroom wall you could see daylight through.

Heating was by coal fires. Always a fire in the living room, occasionally, on a Sunday, a fire in the front, best room and only in the bedroom if I was ill Lighting was by a paraffin lamp suspended from the ceiling.in the living room otherwise candles and later cycle lamps. The paraffin lamp was subject to a massive taboo: on no account was I to touch it. This was a sensible way of ensuring no accidental fire but it meant I was quite frightened of it.

Mains cold water had arrived by the time I was born. Even so the original hand pump was by the sink and the well was in the garden. Although the well had a big concrete top I was always hesitant about stepping on it.

I said I was in the middle of the countryside; quite literally so with fields all around. These became my playground. Until I was 7 or 8 I had a companion in the boy next door. He was about a year younger than me so consequently it was mostly at my suggestion in choosing  activities. After he left I suppose I was quite solitary. I had little contact with village children although I knew my contemporaries quite well as I went to school in the village. The school was I suppose fairly typical of a small village school. It was tiny at about 50 pupils. When I started in 1947 it catered for children up to the then leaving age of 14. With the introduction of secondary education for all the following year the school went back to 5-11 year olds.

When I first started I was taken every day by mother but by about 7 I was walking on my own. This was subject to strict rules; face the oncoming traffic, never accept lifts, if ever accosted pretend my father was just behind the neatest hedge. I was so obedient that I caused some embarrassment by refusing a lift from someone I should have known but didn’t. My stalwart for lifts was Mr Jackson from another nearby village. He was an insurance agent so quite often setting off on his first call as I was walking.

Although the first part of the route to school was along our lane about half way I had a choice of a short cut or continuing along the road. The short cut was always intriguing, diagonally across a field with regular undulations and through a churchyard to come out by the school. I always found the undulations puzzling until years later I discovered they were probably from generations of strip farming long ago. The church yard, certainly its elaborate lich-gate, was effectively part of the school playground. The playground proper was a triangle of land in front of the churchyard and a smaller are at one side with a  small .tree commemorating the coronation of King George.

The short cut field sometimes had cattle grazing, sometimes a bull. Although frightened I often crossed taking care to circle round any livestock. Looking back I don’t know why I took this risk which would have appalled my parents had they known.

Around the house I came to know the fields rather well. The field opposite my house had a stream flowing round part of it and then away underneath a low bridge connecting the two parts of the next field. The arable fields behind my house mostly had drainage ponds at their corners. These filled in the winter and dried completely in the summer. One field had a pit which was used as refuse dump. I spent ages foraging through this without ever finding anything much.

I must be looking older than I feel. In Sainsbury’s I asked a cheery middle aged assistant where the firelighters were. She looked at me using a walking stick, and kindly asked if she could fetch a pack for me. I was quite shocked she thought it would be too much effort for me

My favourite poet is Wendy Cope. She is jealous about her modest earnings relative to prose writers. She feels that folk readily quote a poem but never buy her books. Her partner jokes her epitaph will be “all rights reserved”. I have bought the book in which  Another Christmas Poem appears so I feel justified ( hope that’s OK Wendy )

Bloody Christmas ,here again.
Let us raise a loving cup:
Peace on earth, goodwill to men
And make them do the washing up.

The cricket game

A gaggle of boys walked down the road from the nearby village carrying a small amount of cricket gear; a couple of bats, a tennis ball and sticks for stumps. Led by Alf Weston they were a motley group, several Weston brothers, my distant relative David Simons, and an assortment of other boys aged mainly 11 or 12 ranging up to Alf who was 14.

In this summer afternoon of 1954 I realised immediately their objective. They were visiting me but far more important they were looking for a pitch for a game of cricket. As I was the boy down the lane I was recognised as an authority on the options near my house. I soon picked the field opposite my house. This had latterly been used for cattle grazing but was now empty. Climbing over the gate we set about locating a suitable spot. This was not as easy as it sounds. Apart from avoiding new cowpats we also had to select somewhere without the tussocks where luxuriant coarse growth had occurred at the site of old cowpats.

 On this beautiful summers day I have been out and lain on my back watching a distant skylark with its wonderful song.. My mother always said this was her favourite bird because of its elegant song.

After some discussion a pitch in this large field close up to the road with back to the hedge was selected. It was set up with wicket at one end only, the other end just marked with a stick.

We did pick sides although this was almost immaterial as everyone had a turn batting, bowling and fielding as it was individual performance which counted. The picking of sides followed the usual practice: two captains were chosen and they then chose in turn from the players. Usually I was among the last to be picked as my uselessness at sports was well known. However in acknowledgement that it was “my pitch, my rules” I was declared a team captain. Unhesitatingly my first choice was Alf, who not only was the eldest, but also my well established friend.

Playing commenced; underarm bowling of course with a wicket keeper whose main job was to stop the ball going into the hedge behind him. There were no bails for him to whip off. The batter faced the interior of the field which gave plenty of scope for big hits. There was no boundary as such with fours or sixes awarded by general acclamation. In fact a four was difficult because of the pockmarked tussocks in the field. Skying the ball was easier for the inexperienced batters and made for more exciting fielding.

Our bats were a rather weird miscellany. Mine, probably inherited from my cousin, for some strange reason had a hole about an inch wide in the middle. Rather than tapering towards the handle it had a constant cross section below the handle. I’m not otherwise left handed except as a batsman- it just felt more natural that way.

Without an umpire close decisions were the subject of some good natured wrangling. As I said positions rotated. Because there were only maybe ten or a dozen players anyone not batting, bowling ( or wicket keeping who was effectively a fielder ) was in the field. It was expected that fielders did their best regardless of whether it was their side batting or not. Because everyone was really looking to their individual performance this worked

After a couple of hours in the sun energies wilted. I don’t recall that any decision on the winning team was ever made; we had all played for the enjoyment of playing. We then sat on the grassy verge outside my house while I got drinks. This was orange juice. Well it was orange in colour at least, made up from water added to a spoonful of crystals. Whatever the taste it satisfied young thirsts. They all set off to walk home while I went in to tea.

The cricket game

A gaggle of boys walked down the road from the nearby village carrying a small amount of cricket gear; a couple of bats, a tennis ball and sticks for stumps. Led by Alf Weston they were a motley group, several Weston brothers, my distant relative David Simons, and an assortment of other boys aged mainly 11 or 12 ranging up to Alf who was 14.

In this summer afternoon of 1954 I realised immediately their objective. They were visiting me but far more important they were looking for a pitch for a game of cricket. As I was the boy down the lane I was recognised as an authority on the options near my house. I soon picked the field opposite my house. This had latterly been used for cattle grazing but was now empty. Climbing over the gate we set about locating a suitable spot. This was not as easy as it sounds. Apart from avoiding new cowpats we also had to select somewhere without the tussocks where luxuriant coarse growth had occurred at the site of old cowpats.

 On this beautiful summers day I have been out and lain on my back watching a distant skylark with its wonderful song.. My mother always said this was her favourite bird because of its elegant song.

After some discussion a pitch in this large field close up to the road with back to the hedge was selected. It was set up with wicket at one end only, the other end just marked with a stick.

We did pick sides although this was almost immaterial as everyone had a turn batting, bowling and fielding as it was individual performance which counted. The picking of sides followed the usual practice: two captains were chosen and they then chose in turn from the players. Usually I was among the last to be picked as my uselessness at sports was well known. However in acknowledgement that it was “my pitch, my rules” I was declared a team captain. Unhesitatingly my first choice was Alf, who not only was the eldest, but also my well established friend.

Playing commenced; underarm bowling of course with a wicket keeper whose main job was to stop the ball going into the hedge behind him. There were no bails for him to whip off. The batter faced the interior of the field which gave plenty of scope for big hits. There was no boundary as such with fours or sixes awarded by general acclamation. In fact a four was difficult because of the pockmarked tussocks in the field. Skying the ball was easier for the inexperienced batters and made for more exciting fielding.

Our bats were a rather weird miscellany. Mine, probably inherited from my cousin, for some strange reason had a hole about an inch wide in the middle. Rather than tapering towards the handle it had a constant cross section below the handle. I’m not otherwise left handed except as a batsman- it just felt more natural that way.

Without an umpire close decisions were the subject of some good natured wrangling. As I said positions rotated. Because there were only maybe ten or a dozen players anyone not batting, bowling ( or wicket keeping who was effectively a fielder ) was in the field. It was expected that fielders did their best regardless of whether it was their side batting or not. Because everyone was really looking to their individual performance this worked

After a couple of hours in the sun energies wilted. I don’t recall that any decision on the winning team was ever made; we had all played for the enjoyment of playing. We then sat on the grassy verge outside my house while I got drinks. This was orange juice. Well it was orange in colour at least, made up from water added to a spoonful of crystals. Whatever the taste it satisfied young thirsts. They all set off to walk home while I went in to tea.

Hard or soft?

There has been much discussion recently in the press about hard or soft Brexit so it is worth examining what these mean. There is no precise definition but roughly a hard Brexit means leaving the EU with no trade deal and soft means leaving with some access to the single market. The business at stake is simply described by the fact that about a half of UK exports go to the EU.

A hard Brexit means that we trade with the EU on the same minimum terms as any other country. A whole lot of service sector trade would effectively be closed. A soft Brexit would preserve some access to the single market although it is unclear what that access would be. At its best it could be pretty similar to the current situation.

The essential problem with Brexit is clear; the single market access demands free worker movement and accepting EU regulations. EU regulation will apply irrespective for any trade with EU countries whether in the single market or not. Hard Brexit with border control and limits on migrants means no single market access. An unfortunate Brexiteer illusion is that migrant limits will be acceptable to the rest of the EU which seems very unlikely.

Brexiteers have been boasting of success, which is keeping up the delusions they harboured in the referendum. Inconvenient facts such as the plunge in the value of the pound are ignored while the fact that the UK economy hasn’t fallen off a cliff is trumpeted. Again the fact  this is before Brexit is implemented is ignored.

The much boasted  trade deals haven’t yet arrived and it would be wholly unreasonable to expect them so soon. Discussions on a trade deal with Australia are underway although a deal with the most anglophile country in the world, and a small market at that, isn’t the grounds for post Brexit success. The TV talk of a Chinese deal amounted to a doubling of airline routes and some sweet talk.

One of the great ironies of the post Brexit world is that far from sweeping away bureaucracy a whole new machine has to be created employing thousands to deal with changes.

The brutal fact is that anti-EU fanatics don’t care about the economy. To them the single market is something to be shunned. Business doesn’t agree, loss of single market access could be a huge blow. The problem is that the slow slide in the economy won’t be apparent until it is too late. A very unpleasant straw in the wind is the likely closure of the Yeovil helicopter plant. The Italian owners faced with scaling back as the market has decreased make no bones about their political decision to refocus in Italy although there is no particular economic reason. The issue now is that with no UK helicopter manufacture in the UK there is no possibility of selling anywhere no matter what trade deal is concluded.

It is often said that the UK is good at selling services but bad at selling manufactured goods. However it is precisely those export services which would be hit outside the single market. For example UK financial sector at present under so called “passporting” can sell any product approved in the UK to any other EU member. If passporting is lost then each country would need to approve individually, not to mention the tariff barrier imposed.

Theresa May is sending out rather mixed signals which have been interpreted as veering towards hard Brexit- certainly not very business friendly. This is the reason why the pound has slumped even more. Inflation in the UK seems certain to rise although my feeling everything else but Brexit will be blamed. The increase in fuel prices has been shrugged off.

Uncle Bill

My Uncle Bill was killed in 1917 during WW1. He had joined the Leicestershire Regiment under age at 17 as did so many others in the big 1916 recruiting push. Then in 1917 came the dreaded telegram to announce his death, something which hung over his family for the rest of their lives. His brother, my Uncle George, was also in the army but such were the fortunes of war that he served in India and later after the war’s end in Ireland. I don’t think he was ever called upon to fire a shot in anger.

My mother, the youngest of the girls in the family, was at the opposite end of the age scale to Bill who was the eldest. Her main memory was being teased by Bill. She kept his cap badge all her life and it is an enduring regret that it was lost when her house was sold. George, who was close in age to Bill, felt his loss keenly. He named his son Bill in memory of his dead brother. It was his lasting regret that as Bill had no known grave so he couldn’t visit it and mourn.

There the matter rested. We knew only that Bill had been killed, presumably by a shell, while on a mission as battalion runner. Battlefield communication was difficult in WW1. Radio was primitive and cumbersome. Telephone had its wires cut with great frequency. The common method was to use a messenger which was the role Bill was in when killed.

I was shown Bill’s name on the Coalville war memorial but as with the rest of the family I thought this was the nearest we would come. In the nineties basing ourselves at some friends in Castrol France who lived in the Somme valley we spent several days touring the battlefield. In France Castrol was based at Peronne which is on the Somme. There a castle has been converted into a museum of the war. Locally it is called the historial. Their presentation takes exaggerated care to treat German, French and British alike

The cemeteries are immaculately kept. All British and Commonwealth have a simple headstone noting name, rank and unit with a small section for families to add anything they wish. Most moving are the headstones where the identity is unknown. Rudyard Kipling composed the simple inscription “Known unto God”. It is a slightly eerie experience on a calm summers day to pass along a track by fields of waving wheat to come across a small walled cemetery of war dead.

Even now many dud shells and other ordnance are being found. These are dumped at the roadside for bomb disposal teams to remove and blow up. At various places mementoes are sold. I bought a shell cap and Annette the rusted remains of a rifle for use at school for drawing practice. I declined an itinerant selling a pair of “genuine” German binoculars as I doubted their provenance.

During our tour we visited Thiepval where the gigantic memorial to all the soldiers with no known grave is situated. To my surprise Bill Baker wasn’t listed in the many thousands of names. On my return to Britain I mentioned this to my cousin. He has the original War Office telegram and this gave Bill’s army number. Armed with this I approached the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. They quickly not only answered the puzzle but located Bill’s grave. He had been reburied after the war and the cemetery where he had been originally, closed. My family had lost track during this move. He is buried near Lens. The cemetery is less picturesque than the Somme valley being located in a former coal mining area where pit mounds are all around. I thought this was grimly appropriate for a boy from Coalville.

We visited on a grey day and I took photos for my cousins while reflecting it was a desolate place to end up. I also thought what a pity it was that Uncle George had never managed the small consolation of a visit.

Whitby town

Although this feels like writing a travelogue I promise it is largely my observations. Whitby is surprisingly small with a population just over 13 thousand. This must be getting on for doubled by visitors. Tourism is the main business and one which we hope to benefit from by letting our flat in the future. Daughter-in-law Lindsay, who feels their existing holiday let is successful, is keen to manage it for us.

Bisected by the river Esk the land rises steeply away from the river. The river is tidal and there is some fishing activity and one surviving boat builder. Although this looks fairly sophisticated with floating dock and covered construction yard I would think they are building quite small vessels, hundreds rather than thousands of tons. Most of the river activity is recreational. There is no marina as such but I would guess several hundred small vessels moored at various parts.

The river is crossed in town by a swing bridge and roughly half of the town is on either side. It is rather a strange mixture. There is a very small ( thankfully ) area devoted to slot machines and arcades but much of the towns many shops are individual with few of the national chains.

Particularly on the south side many of these shops are selling jewellery made from jet, a hard black mineral which polishes well. Jet is found on the beach locally and is subject of much secrecy on good locations. Some of the shops are quirky capitalising on the town’s connection with Dracula.( the novel by Bram Stoker )

One feature is the many small cafes and plenty of fish and chip shops. As this is my favourite meal I’m well pleased..

The main local son is James Cook who is coupled in the museum with the name of William Scoresby another seafarer who I had never heard of before. The rather nice museum north of the river devotes quite a bit of space to these two. Generally the north is the rather more genteel side with many fine Georgian and Victorian houses while the south tends more to smaller terraced housing.

Parking is a major issue. While I was working on Teeside thirty years ago I remember visiting, drove around, couldn’t find anywhere to park, and on a wet day, left. Particularly in the centre streets are narrow

At low tide Whitby has a large beach on the north side which is completely covered when the tide is in. The beach is backed by a very steep banks so that the promenade is at least a hundred feet above beach level.. On its landward side are some fine large houses some arranged in a crescent. At the end of the promenade are whale bones in an arch plus a large statue of James Cook. When I was in Sydney last year I went aboard a replica of Endeavour, Cooks ship. I was surprised how small and cramped it was. Some areas below decks were less than five feet tall.

There hasn’t been much modern development in Whitby. All modern housing has to be built on the moors side of the town. The national park extends to the town boundary and planning constraints are severe.

The big local news is a large new potash mine planned south of Whitby. There is already some potash mining but this new mine has much increased land values in the area inland of Robin Hood’s Bay. This is to my son’s disgust as he originally planned to buy a goodish area of land which has increased in value by nearly a quarter of a million pounds. He narrowly missed it. The increase is such that land now tends to be sold without mineral rights.

The moors inland from Whitby are spectacular with some vast areas of heather covered land. Amid this is a strange pyramid structure which is the ballistic missile early warning radar at Fylingdales. I well remember the furore aroused when it was first installed in the early sixties. Back then the radars were in three giant spheres. There was a lot of comment about the four minute warning. However it was all part of the deterrent system which kept the peace. One has to be fearful now with Putin ever more threatening and a dangerous Donald Trump as serious American presidential candidate. The only consolation is that Ronald Reagan sounded belligerent but actually oversaw the end of the Cold War. I’m afraid Trump is far worse with a slippery grasp of reality.

Generally Whitby is surprisingly good on transport links for somewhere many miles from anywhere of note. There is a rail terminus with its main claim to fame that it is shared between national railways and the North York Moors Railway. This latter is a heritage railway which runs south to Pickering. The NYMR has some fine loco’s including the famous A4 “Sir Nigel Gresley”. Both Martin and Alex are volunteers on the railway which runs for some twenty miles across the moors. Every NYMR hold a “1940’s” weekend. We went last year and hope to again this.