|
|
Growing Up In Feltwell in the 1950s & 60s – Part – 12. Guides, Scouts and ….the Pirates
With the explosion of colour, the invasion of plastic and the acceptance of the pill and the mini-skirt into everyday lives in the 60s, the idea of the scouting and guiding movement did seem a little dull, drab and archaic to many, myself included. I had joined the cubs partly because I was simply following big brother’s footsteps and, unknowingly, my father’s also. But others at school seemed to be enjoying the weekly meetings. My introduction to the movement had really come through Mrs Carter my Godmother who for many years was the Guides’ leader. In 1953, she took me at the age of 3 to a Guides Christmas Party in the old YMCA timber hut which stood to the south of the ancient Oak tree where Bell St became the Wilton Rd. Perhaps mother was ill or maybe Mrs Carter just thought I might enjoy it. I remember little about it except there were no other boys there and I think just one man – possibly a squadron leader from the RAF Camp. There was a giant papier mâché coloured toadstool for the Brownies to dance around and chairs arranged around the perimeter. The one game I recall went like this: in the centre of the room was a plate on which lay an opened, giant 2/6d bar of Cadbury’s Chocolate and a knife and fork; two large woollen gloves, a hat and a scarf. Two guides then went around the circle of chairs inviting each person in turn to shake a dice in a tumbler onto a tray and if they rolled a 6 then they had to run into the centre, put on the garments and then attempt to cut up and eat the chocolate a piece at a time. They couldn’t use their fingers. They could eat until someone else shook a 6, at which point they had to shed the clothes and retire and let the next person have a go. Sometimes another 6 arrived before the person in the middle had had time to pick up the cutlery! When they came to me I shook a number other than 6 but kindly Marion shouted “Six!” and her companion pulled me out of my chair and dragged me to the centre while I protested loudly that it wasn’t a 6! Another shout of 6 arrived before I had got the gloves on (I could have got both my feet in any one of them) and as the new person arrived Marion quickly popped a piece of chocolate into my mouth amidst shrieks of laughter from all the girls. Sitting with a mouth full of welcome chocolate surveying the audience, I knew both the feeling of failure but also the feeling of warmth and kindness which women can show to children out of their depth.
In the Cubs we went on parade at St Mary’s and Downham Market Churches to celebrate for example St Georges Day as well as Remembrance Sunday. In the Scouts we made fishing rods – having learnt how to tie knots, lash and whip two pieces of wood together it was a relatively simple matter to tie eyelets to bamboo canes. We were told: “DYB DYB! DYB! (“Do Your Best!”) and answered “We’ll DOB! DOB DOB!” (“Do Our Best!”). We went on midnight hikes which sounded more exciting than the reality. We at least wore long trousers on night time hikes but otherwise wore shorts to all our meetings. This wasn’t such a hardship because we were used to short trousers until the 2nd year at Grammar School but it certainly did not make the movement appear more attractive after our mid teens.
One night in 1961 we cubs completed a 23 ml round walk from Feltwell to Northwold via Cranwich (Terry still has the newspaper cutting confirming the distance). I had no proper walking boots but had the brilliant idea of putting each shoe into a plastic bag to keep them dry in long grass! I looked ridiculous as we departed the scout hut (adjacent to the Ex- Service Men’s Club, Lime Kiln Lane) and before I had reached Broadwaters (ie the Londis Shop by the church) the bags had ceased to be bags but flaps of plastic fluttering around my ankles. No-one laughed but there were a few smiles! Chris, one of our assistant Scouters was a Forestry Commission employee and knew the routes through the forest and in particular, the site of a large tin hut where we rested up for some 20 minutes and drank from our flasks of hot cocoa. Another assistant David had just bought himself expensive new leather boots and defying conventional wisdom, decided to wear them for the event without “wearing them in”. The last 15 mls were literally, painfully slow for him! Dad was just getting up when I walked into the house and he produced a most welcome, hot, mustard bath in which to soak my feet.
Do I look back on my involvement as time wasted? Not at all. It wasn’t for everyone and eventually, not for me – but as many of those who undertook National Service said: “I’m glad I did it”. I learnt how to shorten a length of rope without cutting it (sheepshank); join two pieces of unequal thickness (sheet bend) and why the flat reef knot was favoured by nurses for tying bandages. One “all nighter” was a hike with obstacles (“Empezar”) such as crossing with laden ruc-sacs a stream near Weybourne, by means of a rope strung between two trees. I made the mistake of going first which made it almost impossible to push the other three in my team to attempt it also: I had not succeeded, having let go of the rope just yards from the bank’s safety and went in above my ankles. It was not until the award ceremony in the morning that I discovered no-one else had even attempted it. Sometimes doing your best is enough.
We went to RAF Coltishall air show and watched my first real Spitfire twist and turn, jet Meteors and Vampires. A very noisy English Electric Lightning screamed along the runway, flying very low before it turned skywards in a near vertical climb, blocking our ears with sound. We also got to know Swedish and US Scouts at the 1964 International Jamboree at Sandringham. On returning home Terry appeared before I had even entered our drive with the news that some Pirate Radio Stations had started broadcasting from the North Sea. This was such novel news; we lived in a world with no daytime commercial radio, just the BBC with little or no playing of pop records. Now for the first time we had continuous pop music and when you heard a jingle that went: “(rapid drumbeats) Going back in time on the sounds of the nation it’s a Caroline Flashback… flashback… flashback…”) - you knew you were not listening to the BBC Light Programme and were going to hear something that already made you feel nostalgic for just one or two summers ago! As Dylan had sung: the times they were a changing.
Back to Times Remembered