Up in the Air - Sepia Saturday

Aeroplanes feature in this week's prompt photograph from Sepia Saturday.  Take a look att how the early days of flight were regarded in a small  rural village in Earlston in the Scottish Borders. 

 

This 1930s poster   is in the collection of my local heritage group Auld Earlston.  Printed in the nearby town of Galashiels, it appears to be a "shell" poster, with space to fill in the details of date and venue.  

The event promised

"Famous pilots, aerobatics, stunts, looping, rolling, upside down flying,  crazy flying and  walking the wings at 100m.p.h. by Daredevil Draycott - the man who rides the winds" - plus passenger flights from  5 shillings a time.

"The Berwickshire News" of 28th July 1931  gave a fuller account, with the revelation that the local firm of Messrs Wm Rodger & Sons owned the plane. 

"Earlston is very fortunate in being the first town in Berwickshire to witness an aeronautic display.  On Monday evening a large number of Earlstonians were entertained to a succession of thrills by the advent of an aeroplane, the property of Messrs W. Rodger  & Sons which gave several aerial exhibitions at a newly constructed aerodrome at Purveshaugh, Earlston.  The enterprising firm is lucky to have secured the services of an skilled aviator and pilot   in the person of Mr J. Hinklin of Hornchurch and late of the Royal Air Force.  They have also secured the services of a competent ground engineer  viz Mr. J. Hellon  of the Scarborough Aero Club.  The pilot gave a thrilling exhibition of  flying in the presence of a crowd of nearly 400 spectators, many of whom were desirous of "getting up".  Messrs Rodgers gave a couple of free flights which were greatly enjoyed and appreciated.  It is understood that operations are to commence immediately".  

The next week's paper of  4th August 1931 noted that

"A considerable number of spectators...visited the Purveshaugh Aerodrome , near Earlston...when about 100 persons of both sexes, mainly young people, booked flights  and were taken up in   Messers Rodgers aeroplane.  The plane had also been in commission the previous evening when 50 passengers went up. All seemed to enjoy the novel and enthralling sensation".

What was the background to this event?
Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first powered flight on December 17th  1903. 

 

 

 

 

 The aeroplane came of age in World War One.   But, despite there being hundreds of sites used by fixed-wing aircraft across the UK, most British people had never been close to an aircraft and it appears that a quite large proportion of the population still hadn't actually seen one.

 

  

Photograph courtesy of Pixabay 

On 24th July 1924, local newspaper  "The Southern Reporter" thought it noteworthy to write that:  

"Three aeroplanes  passed over the west end of Earlston about 8.30 a.m  but were observed by comparatively few persons."

Following the First World War, experienced fighter pilots were eager to show off their new skills, flying into towns across the country, as well as taking paying passengers for rides. It was men like Alan Cobham who promoted air tours to raise awareness of the importance of aviation. To attract the crowds  he included displays of not just aerobatics, but stunt' flying too. 

 

 Not all sections of society were in agreement with this intensive event schedule.   in Berwick, the Lord's Day Observance Society  objected to Commercial Air Displays and Pageants being held on a Sunday - but the council decided to take no action. on the complaint. (Reported in "The Southern Reporter": 3rd December 1931.)

 
"The Berwickshire News" of August  1932 reflected the interest in this new form of transport with reports:  

"Considerable interest  was evinced....by several Earlstonians of the younger generation, especially when one of Messrs Rodger's aeroplanes landed in a field adjacent to the local football pitch owned by Mr Alexander Brownlie, The machine which had just arrived from Blairgowrie after a successful series of flights, under the pilotage of Mr Wells, made  a convenient landing preparatory to being overhauled  for further service. " 

An optimistic  writer in "The  Berwickshire News" of 9th September 1930 expressed the hope that: 

"We must concern ourselves  with the laying out of aerodromes. I thoroughly believe that it will not be long before every town planning scheme will include provision for aeroplane traffic."  

1939 of course changed the face of air travel, as war became the focus.  

Never again was Earlston  to be at the forefront of the aeroplane age in the Sottish Borders.

 

**************** 

Onto more modern times:

 

 My brother Chris in the 1980s had a half  share in a small plane and gained his pilot’s licence.  Chris flew the plane from his home on the English south coast to the small airport at the seaside resort of Blackpool in north west England for a family gathering,  

 

  

Daughter sitting at the controls! 

 

 

********** 

 

 And if you feel like being more adventurous,  - but definitely not my idea of fun   - a para glider - a photograph taken from our hotel balcony near Innsbruck Austria.

 

************* 

 Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity to share 
their family history and memories through photographs.  

  

 

 

Click HERE To see more posts from Sepia Saturday bloggers.

************************ 

Carriages and Carters - Sepia Saturday

A busy street scene is the focus of this week's prompt photograph from the Sepia Saturday website.  My eye centred on the horse  drawn carriage, so take a look at how our ancestors travelled around in times past. 

  

The date  is 1907 and  Earlston Parish Church Choir is setting   off from the Red Lion Hotel in the village  to drive to Yarrow Manse in Selkirkshire -  according to the Distances website a distance of some 29 miles over what would be a hilly, twisting  route.   

Hopefully it would be a dry day as there was no protection from the elements.     It was surprising they did not take the railway  for part  of the route and and then by waggonette to Yarrow.

 

 They must have got there  safely,  for here they are relaxing, with some hats off, relaxing outside Yarrow Manse.  

 

In more modern times, a horse drawn charabanc in Krakow, Poland.  

My cousin's ancestors, the Oldham family of Blackpool, Lancashire  were carters and coalmen down three generations - Joseph Prince Oldham (1855-1921), his son John William Oldham (1880-1939) and his granddaughter Elsie Smith, nee Oldham (1906-1989).
 
The business was founded around 1890, steadily became prosperous and in 1905 moved to near North Station, Blackpool, Lancashire in a house with a large yard at the back with hay loft, tack room. and stabling for around 7 horses.

 

John William Oldham on one of the carriages in the family business of coal men and carters.

 

Here is My third cousin, Gloria a top of this carthorse.   In the 1901 census Joseph Oldham   was described as a self-employed carter and coal merchant with his son John a coal wagon driver. An accident at the coal sidings in the railway station resulted in Joseph being blinded and he died in 1921, with his will, signed with his "mark.  

Below - two advertisements in the stable yard at Beamish Open Air Museum in north east England.  It recreates life in the 19th and 20th century - a favourite place for a day outing.   

 

Anyone tracing their family history may well have  a "carter or carrier " in their ancestry - an essential occupation in transporting goods around.  Such a man was my great great grandfather Robert Rawcliffe of Hambleton,  Lancashire. More carter images are shown here  with  vintage photographs from  the collection of my local heritage group Auld Earlston. 

 

 

 The 1851 census for Earlston (population 1,819)  listed 9 men working as  blacksmiths, 7 carters/carriers, 3 saddlers, 2  stable boys, an ostler, a farrier, a groom and a coachman - plus of course all those who would be working  with horses on the many farms in the rural parish. 

 

 Thinking of a convivial drink? Large Clydesdale Horses here are pulling the dray, advertising Vaux Brewery  Fine Ales -  at the Border Union Agricultural Show in Kelso, Scottish Borders.   

But being a carter was not without its risks.   Local newspapers  reported cases appearing in police courts - the   offence ‘being drunk while in charge of horse" or "careless and reckless driving".  

 Likewise many graphic reports of road accidents appeared  in  local papers.  

One such casuality was my great great grandfather Henry Danson (1806-1881)  of Poulton le Fylde, Lancashire. 

 I had done a lot of research on his life many years previously, using standard resources, to find his family (6 daughters and 3 sons) and his occupations as a farmer and later as a  toll collector at nearby Shard Bridge over the Riuver Wyre.  

But it  is never too late to discover new information on an ancestor,  as more and more records come online.  Such was the case for me.    In  2021 I was doing a casual browsing on the British Newspaper Archive website.  The result was a fascinating  discovery  in newspapers that had only recently been indexed -  an obituary and a coroner’s report  on Henry Danson's  death - and information on Henry that was completely new to me.

 

I found out that he was well known locally as "a famous judge in  horse flesh"  and had died in a tragic accident on  his horse and cart. 

 

Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser: Wednesday 02 Nov. 1881

“FATAL FALL FROM A CART. On Monday evening Mr. Gilbertson held an inquest at Poulton-le-Fylde, on the body of Henry Danson, collector of the Shard Bridge tolls. The deceased, who was 75 years old, was riding in a cart with Mr. John  ? farmer, on the way to Poulton, when the horse took fright and jumped forward. Danson was standing in the cart leaning on his stick at the moment he  was jerked out upon the road. He was attended Mr. Winn, surgeon, but could never walk afterwards, his left thigh being injured, and he had an attack of pleurisy fortnight before his death, which occurred on Thursday night last. The jury returned verdict of Death  from the effects of injuries received, and resulting illness, through fall from a cart."

It is both sad and ironic that Henry,  noted for his skill with horses,  should have died,  whilst driving his horse and cart.  

************************ 

Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity to share 
their family history and memories through photographs.

 

 

 

  

 

Click HERE to see more posts from Sepia Saturday bloggers.

 

**************** 

 

Cars to Stand By, to Perch on, to Drive and to Admire - Sepia Saturday

This week's theme from Sepia Saturday is a popular one  from the past.  Cue for me to show more proud owners  standing by their cars, or driving them or perching on them, or perhaps just photographing and admiring them - with some new images.    

 

 

A photograph of my elegant mother taken I suspect before my parents married in 1938.  

 

  

 

 My  Dad, John Weston (on the left)  with his first car, here with his brother Charles. I was delighted to get this photograph from my cousin,  as it  is one of the few photographs I have of my father prior to his marriage in 1938  to my mother, and means a lot to me.   John and Charles were close as  brothers and often went on motoring trips together. Here looking very suave in a smart casual style of the day.  c.1936 

 

Decades later and Dad with his latest car c.1960s.  

 

  

Brother with his pride and joy - pity whoever took the photo cut off the bonnet! 

 

 

  

The car daughter and I hired on our trip to New England in 1996 - my first visit there since I had spent a year working in Cambridge, Mass 1965-66.  This was in Falmouth, Cape Cod where we stayed in this wonderful cottage  and made a magical trip on a beautiful Autumn day sailing across to the island of Martha's Vineyard.

 

 Cars for business rather than leisure, in my home village of Earlston in the Scottish Borders. 

Andrew Taylor & Sons, Ironmonger & Grocer in Earlston,
  - listed in a Directory of 1931.  

 

A  rather rickety looking vehicle  belonging to the Donaldson family  butchers   in Earlston - no relation!  

 

 

From butcher to baker.  

 

 Driving a Car 

 

 

 

But I cannot resist in this blog sharing again my father's memory of his first car - and first drive,  told in his "Family Recollections " that he wrote down for me.  He was a commercial traveller  and in the 1930's got a new job with instructions to pick up a car at Derby and drive 90 miles north  to a new position in Blackpool, Lancashire 

"I had never driven a car before.  On Boxing Day, I went to the British School of Motoring and said I wanted some urgent lessons.  When I told the instructor I was driving to Blackpool the next day, he nearly had a fit.  I collected my car - a four door Morris saloon which I was expected to buy on hire  purchase at 18shillings per week.  It was a traumatic journey with me being  a complete novice, having had no proper tuition.  There was no heating, no radio of course to help pass the time, and the windscreen wipers kept seizing up.  I had also been told that the tyres were awful for punctures.  Still I made it, as darkness fell - just as well, as I wasn't too sure about the lights!"

 

Compulsory driving tests were introduced in the UK in June 1935.  

 

Cars to Perch On

 This photograph was dated 1968 - I am surprised that my father allowed someone to sit on the car. 

  

 

 

 

 

 This was my husband's first car  - a silver grey Ford Escort, bought just a few weeks before we first met in 1970. He was always proud of his cars and looked after them well.   This brings back memories of our engagement. It must have been love, that he actually suggested I sat on top of the car for this photograph - not something he has allowed since!  But he did spread out the tartan rug for me. For once I am quite in fashion with my mini skirt. 

 

Admiring Cars 

 

1889 and First Sight of a Car  in Earlston drew much attention in this report in the local paper.   

"MOTOR CAR - A motor car passed through the village on Sunday morning.  The two gentlemen who were driving it left Newcastle-on-Tyne the previous day en route for Edinburgh. In this neighbourhood one of the tyres got damaged  and it was resolved to put up at the Red Lion. 

This was done and the  car when it reached the hotel, being stopped for a little while was quickly surrounded  and examined with no small degree of curiosity, this being the first time  such a machine  has been seen  in operation here. "

Obviously a very newsworthy event!  

            Earlston High Street. in the early 1920s, with the Red Lion Hotel on the left.   

 

 

Below -  two cars on display at a recent vintage car rally in the Scottish Borders 

 

 

 

 

  Not forgetting  - to look after your car...........

 

Granddaughter helping her great uncle wash his car.  

 

 

With thanks to my local heritage  Auld Earlston for the Earlston photographs.  

 

*************** 

 

 

 Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity to share 
their family history and memories through photographs.

 

 

Click HERE To see more posts from Sepia Saturday bloggers

 

 ***********************

 

A Nostalgic Look at Toys.

 A little lad in a toy pedal car is the prompt picture from this week's Sepia Saturday.  Cue for me to take a nostalgic look back at toys  in my life. 

  

My cousin's little son, learning to drive at an early age!  My brother had a very similar pedal car - but no photographs was ever taken.  

  

Not driving a car but a tractor.We live in a rural area and from an early  age, granddaughter loved seeing tractors out and about in our village.

*************

 

Funnily enough I cannot remember having any favourite soft toys, though presumably the one I am clutching in this studio photo must have been high on the list. 

Here I am, aged around two,  holdimg a soft ball, which I think is one my mother probably made.  She enjoyed making such balls from felt and embroidering the sections in contrasting colours with numbers, or motifs  for sale at village fetes etc.  Today the picture of my father smoking a cigarette close by me, would   no doubt,  be distinctly frowned upon!  

 I was a "dolly girl" -  I loved my dolls, which, as my mother was a dressmaker, were the smartest on the street.  With my best friend, Carol, we would wheel  our prams up and down  and put the dolls in their cot (an old box), with a crocheted blanket and lace trimmed pillow and quilt cover, again  courtesy of my mother, or set up the doll's tea set for a tea party.

My dolls were not particularly sophisticated, usually a rag doll that my mother made, though I had one that said "Mama" if you pressed it in the right place. My mother made rag dolls, but my very special doll she made me in 1953 for Queen Elizabeth’s Coronation, with a long fur trimmed purple velvet train, and embroidered, beaded dress.  I so wish now I had kept it as a family heirloom.   

                                           

I had a "Last Doll" for my 11th birthday, which seems in today's lifestyle, really old for a doll. The inspiration came from the book "Sarah Crewe or the little Princess", by Frances Hodgson-Burnett, where Sarah was given a grand doll with an extensive wardrobe on her 11th birthday.  I saw the book serialised on television and decided that would mark the end of my "dolly" era - it didn't really,  as I went on to collect costume dolls.

As for other toys, I  remember being  given (from the TV series) a Muffin the Mule and a Sooty puppet and these formed a major part of the "make believe" games we played.    We got a new jigsaw every Christmas.  The one I best remember was of a winter scene of skaters at the White Horse Inn, near Salzburg in Austria - 45 years later I actually visited the inn on holiday.    Games were popular such as dominoes, snakes and ladders, ludo, tiddlywinks and colouring books and join-the-dot books.
 

Puppets were a favourite pastime.  We would set up a makeshift theatre in the  front room with the clothes-horse and a sheet, and make simple glove puppets from felt and bits and pieces from my mother's trimming box.  I was usually the script-writer and my brother did the  sound effects, with  my father the hero or villain role and my mother and aunt the audience.  

I loved getting in my Christmas stocking a pristine notebook to write in, a blank scrapbook to show off my collection of scraps and a new pencil case, with new pencils, rubbers and sharpener to take to school at the start of the fresh term.  The really classy one that everyone wanted was wooden where the top swivelled round to show the bottom compartment - the only drawback was it was heavy in your satchel.

 

 I enjoyed playing at shops, so a toy till , with play money  was an ideal choice.   We also played at libraries, so I was in seventh heaven to be given  a date stamp - and I went on to become a librarian!

                                  

Books remained one of my favourite presents for any time of year, with an Enid Blyton at the top of my list.  I loved school stories, particularly   the Chalet School series. 

   

  For my brother it was  meccano, marbles, conkers, his train set, Dinky cars and Airfix models.  Outside, he had his pedal car and football, whilst  I had my tricycle and skipping rope to practice  "crossovers" and "bumps".  I always wantgd  a rope with bright red handles. 

 

And not one needed a battery

Looking back, toys seem very simple compared with the range today's children have in their crowded toy boxes.   I have happy memories of what we did have.  

******************

 

Onto the next generation and my daughter's favourite toy -

 donkey, ridden later by her own daughter.

 

 

 

 

 

Daughter   was never a particularly "teddy" girl - panda was her favourite.   Here is Scottie dog, with two owls perched on top of him and alongside  two pandas, a  koala  bear present  from Australia and a  Brownie, knitted from a pattern in "Woman's Weekly" magazine - a great source of ideas for home-made toys for children. 

 

Around the age of 8, she  had a collection of Cindy dolls - the British version of Barbie, I think - with a lovely wardrobe of clothes again made by  my mother.  

My  little granddaughter showed not the slightest interest in dolls but  she too  struggles to find  a place in bed amongst the myriad of soft toys.

   

Christmas Day - but there is as much fun in the box as with the presents! 

 

And if you get bored inside there is always pleasure outside. 

 

Kicking the leaves in autumn  

Helping Daddy cut the grass.

************

 

Or helping  Daddy with the logs.

  

 

 Or feed the swans

  

*************  

 

With  images courtesy of pixabay.com   

 Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity to share 
their family history and memories through photographs.

 

  

 

Click HERE to see more posts from Sepia Saturday blogger