Another Summervalian returns to the fold - David Westmacott

Memories of Summervale Hello Jean, you will remember me from those


wonderful summervale Ilminster days, in the years from

1954 to 1958 which is a year longer than Peter my elder brother who left in

1957 to go and work in Paignton and as you know

Peter has made contact with yourself on the famous JeanJeannie blogg.

After reading the summervale 1944 blogspot.which I have found very

interesting I have put pen to paper to compile my

memories of summervale.

which will follow along in due course.

Consisting of: Friends I would like to contact

Memories and experiences

Mischievious moments

School friends and teachers

First School Magazine from Ditton Street Secondary Modern in

1957

Outside Hobbies and Activities



Love to here from you Jean



Best wishes David Westmacott

More Memories from John Satchell

hi jean,

some newly awakened summervale memories....

peter,

your comments about that "small glassblowing business in west street" reminded me that my dad Jack (cricket team captain for STC - Iilminster!!), and Mr . Kearney, i think he was called Reg,

 (No, Stan was the name)

but always known as "shag") also had a small glassblowing business, only theirs was in Ditton street, in a tiny rented shop, and they called themselves "Kearney and Satchell".

Stan Kearney

Jack Satchell

They made all sorts of stuff, can't remember if anything was subcontracted out from STC(where "shag!!" was the glass shop foreman and dad was the small valve assembly foreman), but they did make dreadfully complicated contraptions that were used at the Horlicks plant for the early artificial insemination experiments on cows, and also lots of little coloured glass ornaments which I'm sure some of you must remember decorating the mantle shelves in the "bungalows".

(Someone, probably your Dad John, made me a 21st. glass key but that was in Paignton.)JJ

I got into stained glass design as a hobby a while back, so maybe this glass thing runs in the family!!

i well remember working for three months with David in the glass shop at STC Paignton (also run by "shag"), when i was passing through there as a student apprentice. David was really good fun to work with, and made a generally miserable time at STC for me a bit of a laugh for a while!!!

Can't think of any link to that other Ilminster glass business, except that maybe "Kearney and Satchell" sold out to them before we all left Ilminster, 'cos fishing, stamp collecting and wood turning took over dad's life when we got to the coast!!

 

Janice,

of course we Satchells used the same formula for home-made sun tan lotion, how could we not when our Mums were first cousins and best friends??

Rose & Jessie

we probably didn't use olive oil in ours though - that would have been too expensive (remember you had to buy it in very small bottles from the chemists?)  for mum to afford way back then - we probably did use chip oil!!! it didn't work though - I just had a run in with a surgeon to remove  a skin cancer that she reckoned started with sun exposure when I I  was a kid!!! mum is always remembering stuff that she and Rose did when they were girls, she really misses her a lot. Did you know that your Mum and Dad were their best man and matron of honour, my godparents, and that your Mum assisted at my brother Tony's birth at home in Summervale??? You can't get any close than that!  They had grown up together in London, gone to school together and right to the end were always friends. Even now just passing your old house in Paignton makes mum very sad.

Jean,

I do appreciate all the hard work you put in on this blog, i used to edit a website myself and know how hard it is to keep coming up with fresh ideas, but you DO just that, and for that I'm sure we are all very grateful!

Take care - John

YOUR FAVOURITE COMICS?

Hello Jean
Seeing some comics in a newsagent's shop recently made me think about the comics we used to devour in Summervale in the 1950s. My brothers and I used to read a lot of comics, though I knew that in some adult circles there was opposition to them ('rot your brain' and all that stuff).  Actually, I think they helped us to improve our literacy. In the early 50s there weren't too many TVs about, so listening to the radio and reading comics all helped raise our awareness of language. As I was a newspaper delivery boy I also read a lot of newspapers too. My relatives were always laughing at me because I had my head in a newspaper!
I probably saw most of the comics of the time because I delivered them. There always seemed to be plenty of comics to read. Some of my favourites were Eagle, Beano, Dandy and Tiger.

In the Eagle my favourite character was the front page hero, Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future. Sci-fi was very popular then (remember "Journey into Space" on the radio?) and we loved it when Dan triumphed in his clashes with The Mekon. Riders of the Range was also good and I liked PC 49 too. Tommy Walls was super-human too, always coming to the rescue as he sprang into action with his famous W sign with his fingers and thumbs! (Was he a plug for Walls ice-cream?)

The Beano was widely loved and we would talk about it on the way to school, and in school. Dennis the Menace, with his red and black jumper and spiky hair was a favourite character, and the Bash Street Kids were unbelievable. Could they really play up teachers like that? Firing paper pellets at teachers; buckets of water suspended over the door, etc. None of this happened at school in Ditton Street, at least not to my knowledge!  We also liked Lord Snooty and Roger the Dodger - if he could get out of something, he would!

We also read The Dandy, a similar comic to Beano. Desperate Dan, with his great strength, performed unimaginable feats of strength ,once he had eaten his favourite cow-pie. And who remembers Keyhole Kate, Hungry Horace and Korky the Cat?  All much-loved characters.
Tiger was a big favourite of mine. To a football mad young teenager the adventures of Roy of the Rovers of Melchester Rovers were out of this world. Roy always seemed to be coming to the rescue of his team. He might arrive at half-time when his side was 0-4 down; then, of course, thanks to the super-heroics of Roy, they would win 5-4 to take the cup. Or something like that!

Does anyone remember reading The Boy's Own Paper?  We often got this one; I think it was a monthly. It was full of adventure stories about the RAF, colonial explorers, scraps with the Germans, sport, the American West and so on.  There were also lots of helpful hints about scouts, bikes, crystal sets, etc. I particularly liked the puzzles and games.
We used to swap a lot of comics or get given them.  I think it was Mike Smith who used to give us Hotspur and Wizard comics.  These were full of adventure stories, all aimed at boys.  Two other comics I recall were The Topper and Beezer. These were so different because they were larger than the rest. I think they were broadsheet size, like many of the newspapers I delivered. But at the moment I can't remember anything about the contents of these two comics! Can anyone?
Many of these comics I've mentioned were aimed at boys.  Apart from Beano and Dandy, perhaps. So what were the girls reading then?  I know they had their own comics because I remember delivering Girl, which I think was something like Eagle.

(I only remember “Girl” and recognise the logo above. I used to get the annual at Christmas but have no recollection of any stories.

Comics, I think , were a “boy” thing.)JJ

I think I brought a copy home from my newsagent boss one day! Actually, that was another way we got comics. If copies were a few weeks out of date Mr. Bradburn, the newsagent, would give them to me, free, to take home.
To this day I can still recall some lines from one of the cowboy stories I read.  There was a scene at the bottom of the page ,where the hero is hanging from a branch above a cliff edge. He says:  "Hand slipping .... loose bark.....can't hold on...." And then you have to buy the comic next week to see what happened!".How do I remember this?  My brothers and I thought this was so funny that over the years we kept repeating it to each other. So that's how it stuck!
Well, let's hear about your comic favourites and stories, Summervaleans!
Best Wishes
Peter Westmacott in Suffolk

BRYLCREEM OR ?

Hello Jean




Greetings from sunny Suffolk!



I enjoyed Janice's piece about her Mum's home-made sunblock. A mixture of olive oil and vinegar shaken around in an old Heinz salad cream bottle sounds ghastly! However, I don't recall our mother ever using this stuff. In fact, I don't think she ever applied anything to us to prevent sunburn. But she did smear us with calamine lotion after we had had too much sun. This was usually done on those rare occasions when we went to the beach at Weymouth or Lyme Regis. No, I think we just went out and played, and applying any sort of suncream never entered our minds.



One home-made concoction I do remember was that produced for us by our great-grandmother (Alice Tilley). Most summers she would come down from London for a holiday with our grandparents, Ethel and Reg Durham, at no.26. The 1950s were the heyday of the Brycream Boys, and one of our great heroes was the Brylcream Boy himself, Denis Compton the famous England cricketer and footballer. He appeared in lots of adverts at the time. We couldn't often afford a jar of Brylcream - we did get one occasionally - so our great-grandmother would make some for us.



She would collect rose petals from the garden, let them soak in water for a while, them mix them up with lard of all things! Then she would rub the "cream" into our hair. It did the job and it smelt alright. But our mother wasn't too pleased with what it did to our pillowcases!



Does anyone else remember using lard and rose petals for "Brylcream"? Or was our great-grandmother unique?

Memories from Janice

Hope your Summer is going GREAT for you ... Have to ask ...This weekend I had all the kids over for Father's Day and the Girls asked if I had sun block for the kids. I did, and they sprayed them down, I could not stop laughing when they asked what my mum  used on us !!!! I told them Olive Oil mixed with vinegar, Mixed up in a washed out bottle of  Heinz salad cream... Olive Oil so we didn't dry up and vinegar to take the sting out of the sunburn, we smelled like a bag of chips ! Was my mum the only one who did this ? Oh and the sand stuck to us like salt on hot Fries, that was the sun block part I am guessing, still laughing now, and the Girls are still in shock !Have a Lovely Day Jean, Hello to Mike and Emma

Take care Love Jan

 

Well, here is the bottle, I don’t remember the olive oil but I remember the vinegar – yuck.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can’t find a photo of Janice on the beach – she was a baby but here are me, Joan Brown and Gloria.

 

JJ

Peter Westmacott has replied to Rob

Hello Jean




It's some time since I posted something on your wonderful blog. Reading Rob Drayton's comments today, I have to say that I didn't know Rob but certainly knew his brother Derek, who I would often walk through the Rec with on our way to school in Ditton Street. I also knew his Dad Dennis. I particularly remember my brother David working for Dennis in his little glass-blowing business in West Street. Dennis worked at STC like most Summervalians and I assume he worked as a glassblower. I was never quite sure why he had this little business in a cottage in West Street. Had he some knowledge that STC was leaving Ilminster and this was his way of keeping in employment after STC had left? I remember the Draytons stayed in Ilminster and didn't move to Paignton when many did once the factory set up there.



Perhaps Rob can enlighten us about his Dad's glass-blowing business and what happened to it. Incidentally, my brother David did glass-blowing when he first worked at STC in Paignton (1958), so Dennis' training must have helped him!



Best wishes



Peter Westmacott

A message from Rob Drayton

Hi there Jean,


You won't know/remember me as I was a little younger than you, but I

am a Summervalian through and through! I was actually born there -

Robert Drayton (Rob), brother of Derek who has contacted you before

and who was eight years older than me, and there was middle brother

Michael. Our parents were Dennis and Edie - dad died five years ago,

mum is now 88 and lives about 150 yards away from the old Summervale

site, in Orchard Vale.



I was just dropping a short note to see if your Summervale blog is

stll being updated and in use - if so can you send me a new link

please??



I can then add a few details, tell you about myself, about the housing

plan and ask you a few questions about the earliest times at

Summervale.

Will contact you again on the blog ...
best wishes for now
Rob
 
Sorry I have only just seen this Rob as I rarely use the email address.
I will email you direct.
Longing to hear from you
Jean.