Christmas / New Year Memories

Every year Holy Trinity held a service of "Carols and Nine Lessons", and each year The Coventry Standard sent a photographer to the choir practice for the service Here are a couple of such photos from the early 1960s In both photos, the choirmaster is Leonard Tanner PS I see the service is still held, although its title has been altered to "Nine Lessons and Carols" Happy Christmas

I was not much on parties but did I love Santa. I wonder if anyone remembers Johnsons Pet Shop just off Trinity Street, New Buildings, the shop stood on the corner just to the right as you walk in I remember going with my mum to see Santa at the back of the shop (I think it's a bookies now) just to the right was a path that led to the Grotto (could not wait to see Santa). Makes me feel a bit sad now most grandparents that have taken their grandkids to see Santa over the past few years will have noticed the difference, we sat on Santa's lap when we were young but now it's almost like visiting a prison (not that I ever have visited a prison, just to make that clear) the kids have to sit in rows of seats not having any contact with him at all. What's the world coming too? A bit o.t.t if you ask me. Anyway the question was, does anyone remember Johnsons Pet Store and Good ol' Father Christmas? The photo is me as you may have guessed but note the wellies, it had been snowing. Best make it clear, I am the one on the right lol. All good stuff. Colin.

The earliest recollection of Christmas decs was those DIY morbid, drab links of paper that you had to stick together to make garlands, combined with a few balloons and those dusty Chinese Lanterns which were far more magical than the latter. There were those cut-out paper decs as well, bells and such like. None very glamorous like todays sophisticated stuff. A real tree that smelled lovely and in my childhood, electric fairy lights and woolworths baubles and a nasty plastic angel for the top After all my derision, I still thought it was magical though! People/families didn't seem to travel about so much and meet up if they lived away so it was a time for 'gathering of the clans' which seemed to whip up a bit more excitement. After the austerity of the war rations as well, it must have been a treat to have the 'christmas spread of food' that we are used to all the year now. I do remember hearing from my nan that she truly only had oranges and nuts in her christmas stocking at the turn of the century. A Woolworths Christmas

Up until perhaps about 8 years of age, the whole of December was an absolutely magical time, which seemed to go on for ever and ever.... would Christmas day EVER arrive??? The wait was made bearable by a very old and beautiful Advent Calendar that my parents had, which was a fold-out, pop-up type with the whole nativity scene on it. The 24 doors to open were of various sizes, hidden in different parts of the scene - and after a few years I knew each window number and the picture behind it off by heart. No need for a chocolate treat back then - just sitting staring at that scene and knowing that Christmas was around the corner was easily good enough! That whole period for me was warm, magical and slightly mystical - I hope we managed to give our own children the same feeling as they went through those wide-eyed innocent years.

Foxcote, I LOVED those paper strips - I remember myself and my brother sitting at the kitchen table, deciding which colours to put together! My mum made an angel from a doll which she dressed herself and gave wings to. I did love those 'honeycomb' decorations as well-the ones that turned into lanterns and so on. I loved all that tinsel - of course, no lights but I loved them when they appeared later on! Rob, the advent calendar sounds lovely - is it still around? Or is there photo of it? We didn't have an advent calendar but I do remember all that magical excitement!

The biggest Coventry Christmas build-up memory I have is on the Father Christmas sleighride upstairs in the Co-op. In this more modern micro-chip age I'm sure that if it were recreated exactly now it would seem extremely naff but my memories of it at the time were it was amazing. I'm sure the 'sleigh' held a lot of people on each ride and it rocked back and forth and I'm sure (though it might be rose-tinted) that there were moving images along the walls giving the impression of the sleigh moving along. This would have been mid 70s. It was on the upper floor in the Co-op where their Bank/Item repayment office was.

Hi Anne, I really wish it was still around so I could show our kids, but it disappeared many years ago - I assume it eventually got tatty and was replaced by a more modern one. I'll ask my mum and dad some time, though, just in case they kept it somewhere. I don't know if it was ever captured in a photo, I'll have to search through their photos to see if there's a picture with it on.

I have been on the sleighride in the 70's and is so cleverly done with the sleigh wobbling about. I found a bit of film of it in recent times. The Sleighride At some time they must have moved it from the top of the Co-op, because hubby remembers it when it was in the basement.

Christmas was certainly a magical time for myself and my brothers and sister. As has been mentioned, we too made the paper chains and lanterns to decorate the living room with. Mum used to do a catalogue order prior to the big day and when the parcel came, it was put away in the cupboard under the stairs (the bogey hole) with strict instructions not to peep in there. I was always allowed to help mum with the mince pies and enjoyed cutting out the pastry shapes with a glass tumbler. I remember her standing in the kitchen plucking the chicken... feathers everywhere. Christmas day was so exciting waking up to the rustle of paper wrapped presents at the end of our beds. After we had eaten our Christmas dinner mum would bring out the Christmas pudding and somehow dad managed to slip a silver thrupenny bit into our dishes and we were given strict instructions to look for it and not to swallow it. Our next door neighbours always popped in mid-morning to share a glass of whisky or sherry, with mum and dad and the favour was returned on Boxing Day. We always had a family party with our aunt, uncle and cousins from the Chantries. Mum would prepare the buffet before we trooped off to the Howitzers Club before returning later for a good sing song and the occasional ditty from members of the family. My Uncle Len always did his party piece "Albert and the Lion", and we used to join in the bits that we knew. What magical times they were!

I was a Saturday lad when the Co-op ride was introduced in the mid 1950s (more somewhere else on this site). I don't remember it being any where but the basement.

Funny that Heritage, my husband can't remember it being anywhere other than the basement either. NeilsYard seemed sure about it being upstairs.

I only have two stuck in my head memories of Christmas, apart from always getting just what we wanted. One is when mum decorated the living room with balloons - 2 round ones and 1 long one - and not realising what she had done until we had visitors and her friend couldn't stop laughing long enough to tell her what they looked like. The other was the time our parents decided to have a goose for Christmas dinner. On Christmas Eve, the butchers delivery man came to the kitchen door and dumped a dead goose on the table. We had to pluck and prepare the goose ready for the oven, sitting round the table pulling out feathers. Funnily enough, I do not remember eating that goose at all. Also, and this was a brilliant idea, we never had Christmas dinner on the 25th as we were too busy with our presents and visitors so we just had something like chips and sausage or pie then and had the big dinner on Boxing Day.

So glad you started this Christmas theme. I as you may have gathered I love Christmas it's the best time of year for me. I have done my best to compile a list of bygone Christmas memories. If we wanted a Christmas tree it was a case of get it yourself so I would go up the High Mounts armed with an axe, we could not afford a real fir type tree so it had to be an Holly tree of which their was an abundance at the high its, once back home it was down to my Mum and I to decorate. From reading other post re Christmas it would appear that we were not so well off. The paper chains we made were from news paper cut into strips and glued with flour and water to make a chain we then painted the links. Thais always baffled me, in my stocking every year would be an orange, an apple, a bag of Bluebird toffees, and some nuts. All these items were in a bowl on the dinning room table before I went to bed Christmas eve? The strange thing is, I thought it was great, they were mine. About a week before Christmas Dad would dispatch the biggest Chicken we had (we used to have a Chicken run) we would gut and pluck the Bird and make it ready for the Dinner table but first it would be hung up in the coal house to drain. It's strange I thought nothing of cleaning the Bird, it was the norm in them days. Don't forget the smell of roast chestnuts, mmmm. Carol singing and snow ball fights, wet soaking knitted woollen gloves, chilblains and hot aches. Best way to keep warm was to make a "winter warmer" this was made from an old tin can (large) by making two holes in the top we attached a length Wire (wire was used so it would not burn) we then would load it with small bits of coal and set it alight once it was going well we would swing this about our heads to make it get read hot, and it did, it was great carolling we would give it a swing in between carols. One thing that used to bug me and my friends was the the deep snow falls and not being able to play in it, School got in the way. I remember on one occasion going to School after a blizzard the night before, it was great, only way to walk to School was in the tyre tracks, snow coming over my wellies, having got to school sitting at my desk looking out of the window while the sun melted it away. It was so unfair. The episodes that made up Christmas will for ever be with me. I just hope that my Grand kids will look back at their Christmas and feel the same. It just goes to show, money was not everything and as a kid it did not seem commercial but don't forget the batteries, nothing worse than getting a toy that need batteries and no shops open until after Boxing day. I maybe an humbug on this one but I wish that was the case today.

Christmas memories of the weeks leading to Christmas consisted of visiting father Christmas in the old sand stone building which stood on the opposite corner to the Old Fire Station at the entrance to Pool Meadow (The old art school?). My paternal grandfather, Frank Parker was employed by Caludon Engineering and they put on wonderful Christmas parties for the children in the (Baroque?) church hall opposite the Craven Arms, Binley, with Woody Woodpecker cartoons and Laurel and Hardy films. I am lucky to have had a fabulous childhood and my Christmas memories include great family gatherings. It somehow was magical and not just commercial

I too recall the winter warmers, Radford Kid and recall walking to school snow up to my knees and sliding in the playground, those days you could slide from top to bottom of the playground at Hill Farm before they put the fence up dividing the playground, mostly the boys would do the large slides no health and safety then we would use socks for throwing snowballs had nt got any gloves, we use to collect a lot of money from carol singing around the streets, between us all we use to share the money out when we got home, some were meanies but most always willing to give, never did we get called beggars like they do now, yes the paper chains most Christmases we had the ones which were glued but I recall making some like you and sticking them and colouring them in, the tree was an artificial one like bottle brushes still got a few of the old baubles which I gave to my daughter who still has them. We some years were taken to Owen Owen to see Father Christmas. From the Daimler Club some years we would have free admission to the pantomime at the old theatre, one year Frankie Howerd was there singing "and it swam and it swam right over the dam", sometimes a large present with a party, and the AEU club on the Foleshill Road we would go to a party there too, as dad was a member of both, also a present from Westwood Heath club too.