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Growing Up In Feltwell in the 1950s & 60s – Part – 15. The Shops
Feltwell’s range of shops and facilities is the envy of many Norfolk villages but sixty years ago it was even greater. Until the early 60s there were no supermarkets to tempt folk to nearby towns; no internet for online shopping; few fridges and even fewer freezers to facilitate a “big shop”. Perishables, often delivered to our homes, were bought shortly before use. And the RAF camp possibly generated more trade back then than currently. I recall over 20 village shops and outlining their character and range of goods, will extend beyond this month’s article.
One of two filling stations in the village, Listers at Crosshill (opposite the Crown pub) had 3 attended, cream and black Shell petrol pumps with a delightful backdrop in spring of pink flowering cherry trees. It later changed from Shell to Jet. It also sold a small range of tinned food and household goods from its front ground floor room. It mainly served Lodge Rd and Munson’s Place: for us boys, it sold sweets (sweet cigarettes at 2d a packet were popular) and “Matchbox” toy cars and army vehicles displayed in its window. At just 1/6d each (7.5p!) they were not quite pocket money toys (a bar of Cadbury’s was 6d) but were affordable with patience. In 1960 the detached, single storey grocery shop was built; the first “self service” shop I think in the village. Both buildings are now residences. There was always a slight whiff of petrol and oil, inside and outside the old shop. I remember a tanker driver allowing us boys to stand and watch his delivery procedure – until an older boy Reg produced a box of Swan Vesta matches (the non-safety sort that would easily spark off concrete) and holding a match and grinning, asked “Should I? Should I?” as if he was about to strike it. We were about 10 years old and knew the stupidity and danger of what we were watching. The driver to his credit immediately stopped his delivery then calmly took the match from Reg in one hand and then the box and deposited both some distance away with the instruction that no-one was to touch them until he said they could. No-one did.
Ray Parnell’s Ladies & Gents hairdressing opposite the chapel in Bell St, was always busy on Saturday mornings. A boy’s haircut cost 1/- (5p) and a man’s 1/6d. The chair had a special cushion some 300mm deep for us boys to save Ray stooping. He had a lovely art deco black glass Brylcream dispenser and he seemed to regret the decline in use of hair cream in the early 60s in favour of the more natural look and on finishing, always asked “A little cream on that?”- and looked quite dejected when we said “No thanks”. Jim could do a wonderful mimic of Ray asking that question which ended with “Ray” kneeling on the ground pleading with the invisible incumbent “Please, PLEASE!.. just a LITTLE cream…?”!! An “Oh alright then” response caused an exaggerated pumping motion on the invisible dispenser and his fingers pulling through an invisible head of hair to apply the invisible hair cream, whilst whistling briskly just as Ray did. On Saturdays you might have to wait an hour for your turn while The Runaway Train was playing on Uncle Mac’s Children's Favourites on the BBC Light Programme. Next door but out of sight, ladies might be having their hair permed: though faint, the smell was quite revolting.
My father’s cousin Gert Walden had a little grocery store next to the hairdresser’s. A Morris Minor Traveller enabled her to deliver weekly orders to her customers – and she also provided monthly credit. She also sold damp cornflakes which customers had to dry in their ovens. There was no fridge: she stored ham in an unheated back room and a long, straw-lined Fyffes banana box on the floor greeted anyone entering. On the counter was a cracked, old glass cabinet with “Cadbury’s” in gold letters on the glass. Next to that was a blue, plastic stand holding “spares” for the Brooke Bond tea cards we all collected and which could be swapped for others (Conquest of Space; British Bird Portraits; British Wild Life etc). Of course rare cards – the Nuthatch or the Red Shank were never in the rack – only cards like the Black Headed Gull which we already owned. A smell of tea, ham, bananas and damp, pervaded the little shop. In 1969 I was living there while studying for my A-levels: to my horror I found 3 maggots crawling out of the joint of ham and rushed to tell Aunt Gert. Far from being perturbed, she simply said “Great Scott! That’s nothing to worry about – it’ll be alright once I’ve wiped it over with a little vinegar!” She was however fastidious about not allowing me to wash my hands in the “shop bowl” in the sink. She sold the business soon after and the purchasers at once installed a fridge.
Hughie Vincent’s little shop was just 50 yds closer to the Church. As well as sweets and cigarettes he sold speciality goods: roller skates, Timex watches (much advertised on the new Anglia TV), and shoes and sandals for school. There were two steps down on entering and the distinctive leather smell from within was not unpleasant.
Broadwaters (Londis), probably tied with the Co-op (The Wellington) for the most extensive range although the Co-op also sold fishing rods, floats, hooks etc. Geoff Broadwater was a good hearted, jovial man who clearly loved his business and also made home deliveries in his big Vauxhall estate car. The shop entrance was a pair of narrow black doors which opened inwards and the smell of fresh ground coffee and home cooked ham was always heavy in the air. I can see him standing at the counter, in a white coat over his light grey suit, a yellow pencil and a ballpoint in the breast pocket, beside a large set of white Avery scales and the bacon slicer ready to fulfil the orders as his assistant Brenda called them out: “A quarter of ham” or “6 ozs of mousetrap” while the customer enjoyed the theatre. When sweets and foods were weighed and served in paper bags it was satisfying to watch the server hold the full bag at its top edge and spin it rapidly towards their body a few times so that it closed itself tight.
Next door to Broadwater’s, Dorothy Wright’s grocery shop was a light, timber structure with a narrow floor plan. It sold groceries, Lyons Maid ices and cigarettes (which we were sometimes sent to buy for our teacher for his lunch break at the new school!). The new shop was built when she married Cliff Waterman: few people walking into the original long, narrow, wooden store ever realised they were walking directly over the route of the old Beck Canal. (to be cont’d)
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