Bob’s Pics

The remarkable thing, I think, is that we had a car at all in those days. With six kids, six school uniforms, six pairs of shoes every few months, and only one income, life was hard. We didn’t own our house, it was rented off the printing works where my dad worked. Somehow there was always food on the table, an annual holiday (usually to Butlins, or a self-catering house/flat), and a lot of home-made clothes.

The sweater I’m wearing in the photo above was probably home made. Dunstable Downs was one of the standard destinations for our Sunday drives. We’d just go up there, park on the grass, and either go for a walk, or sit and watch the gliders at the London Gliding Club, or (later, in colour, not black and white) the hang-gliders landing clumsily in the bushes. Some Sundays my dad would just drive, not stopping, and I’d be sitting in the back (often right in the back, in the boot of the Morris Traveller with my sister) feeling sick.

When the older kids stopped coming along, I could sit on an actual seat, no seat belts of course, with the window pulled across (in the Traveller it slid across, didn’t wind down) and my head sticking out of the window into the fresh air.

Other Sunday destinations included Ashridge and Woburn. The picture above was taken on my dad’s old square-format camera on Dunstable Downs. The occasion was Orange Rolling Day, which was a tradition associated with Easter (I think). The mayor was at the top of the hill, bowling oranges at a crush/crowd/mob below, who would try to catch them. I was too young to be involved in the melee, but I believe fists were sometimes thrown as well as oranges.

If I’m three in that picture, it’s 1966. England are about to win the World Cup for the first and only time. The Beatles have just released Rubber Soul, and their most recent single was “We Can Work it Out/Day Tripper.”