Radio and TV - Memories and Favourites

Nostalgic night on Radio 2 last night. First, two hours of Bobby Darin, and then further back to the thirties for me with an hour of the great Caruso. The first records we ever had, played on a His Master's Voice wind up machine, even the song 'Two lovely black eyes' was played.

I remember just before the war there was a special programe about Orson Wells upsetting the USA by reading part of the book War of the Worlds. Made quite a stir then, I think that's when I discovered H.G Wells. We knew little then about space, and I tried to relate it with Flash Gordon at the cinema and if there was another world. There were a number of announcements on the radio that gripped you as a kid. Another was about this giant fireball (Zeppelin), where the announcer was choked up with tears, you heard something like that on the radio, and that was it, no other source of news to judge things. Left you in the dark often.

Hi Kaga. War of the Worlds was transmitted as a series of live bulletins over the course of an evening, it did cause quite a stir but as it had been previously trailed so many people were expecting it. It is generally accepted now that the "panic" caused was greatly over emphasised for publicity reasons. The Hindenburg was indeed a very traumatic event and was probably the first disaster covered live.

Old Lincolnian, 'wow', was that some story, that is the first time I have seen anything about it since I was a kid, it did flash through my mind once when I was suspended from a balloon. Thanks for putting that on, Kaga

Yer daft girl's blouse'. Now, who used to say that???

Hello Dream, wasn't it Hylda Baker in Nearest and Dearest? I think she said "yer big girl's blouse".

You are so right Slim, thanks.

I could remember Hylda Baker and 'Pledge's Pickles', but couldn't the name of the programme!

Another one, 'Have you been, Walter?' and 'She knows y' know'. There never will be another Hylda Baker and those like her.

As a final comment about Hylda Baker and a very minor claim to fame. I met her a few times when I was very young. All I can remember was she was always laughing. My Grandma knew her because during the war she played the piano at concert parties and accompanied many well-known artists. One of my aunties knew her very well because she ran a theatrical guest house in Barnsley and Hyldas friends stayed there when they were appearing "oop north". My auntie also used to help to organise the clothing for the audience for "The Good Old Days"

That takes me back to a time before I was born. When my mother was in little girl in Spon End, naturally they were poor, her father was a skinflint, so they had no electricity (not even gas lights), but a wireless set. Every week or so, Mum had to take the accumulator to the local shop to be recharged. That was in the days of valve technology, before transistors. The youth of today have most likely never heard of an accumulator (o.k., maybe in the context of betting!). My grandfather, when Mum's elder sister suggested having gas lamps, would not hear of having "them new-fangled things in my house". Until he came home one day and she'd had the gas board install them, which was a fait accompli. The word wireless was replaced by radio for decades, but has in recent years made a comeback with computer technology. Why do people mis-pronounce WIFI "why-fie"? I always call it "whiffy", as it's spelt!

Slim, I was interested to hear about the accumulators. My dad had the shop in Spon End in the mid 1930's and used to say he did more business charging accumulators than selling radios. That property was, I believe, 16th century, and my mother always said that whenever she was cooking in the kitchen she could hear the rats above the ceiling and then they would poke their noses through a hole and sniff to see what she was cooking. Eventually they had to get a rat exterminator to try to clear them. The smell of dead rats afterwards was with them for weeks. We all regret the loss of the old buildings in the town, Butcher Row etc. but forget that they must have been infested with rats.

My grandad had a bit of a shop in Leamington where he made Cossar Radios from kits and he also charged accumulators (he also worked at Coventry Chain). It was mum's job to deliver them and she says all her clothes had holes in them from the acid burns.

We have gone through all this accumulator posting somewhere back a year ago, and yes Coventry was infested with rats in the thirties but the bombing sent them scuttling as well as a lot being killed, but it's not something we want to talk about.