A new day – a new beginning?

The next day I arrived at the office earlier and, after parking my scooter, I went to a nearby newsagent shop and bought a copy of another local paper (the Flintshire Leader), a copy of the Daily Mirror and a copy of The Guardian . . . and a packet of cigarettes.

I went straight up to our office, or the reporters’ room, whatever you wanted to call it, and put my crash helmet, goggles and gloves on the low cupboard top where the newspaper files were.

I lit a cigarette and stood looking down the High Street as the town bustled into life below me. I could see the town hall on one side and shops the other.

There was a big pub, also on the right, (I think it was called The Crown) and some other businesses. I decided if today turned out like yesterday then I would take a walk along the High Street later in the morning.

Delwyn arrived a few minutes later and we headed downstairs to see Bill.

He was sat at his desk with a cigarette burning in the ashtray.

“I’ve checked the copy you typed yesterday and it all looks good. You’ve stuck to style and there were only a couple of errors which I amended.

“Now for today. Who enjoys sport?”

I was quick to respond: “Playing or watching?”

I was actually quite keen on certain sports. Rugby had become a passion, naturally, and I had played a bit at school. My real interest at the time, however, was hockey.

When I had first been introduced to hockey at school I had taken to it like a duck to water and I quickly showed a preference for the Indian head as opposed to the English head.

When I mentioned to my father that I needed my own stick for the second year he immediately recommended the Indian head.

It turned out that during the war he had played hockey for an RAMC side when stationed in Egypt and had been quite proficient.

Delwyn said: “I like football and cricket, prefer to watch rather than play.”

This seemed to meet Bill’s approval: “Well you can take a shot at typing up the sports reports we’ve had in from local clubs. You’ll see the style to follow in the files.

“Don’t use every jot and tittle they write. They tend to play up most of their reports and most can’t spell for toffee.

“There’s a stack of them dropped off yesterday and this morning. They’re in that basket over there. Take them up and get started.”

After Delwyn had left the office Bill turned to me: “I don’t think you are a sporty person are you Robin? There was a hint in your response.”

I admitted that beyond hockey, rugby and darts, there weren’t many local club sports I was that bothered about, and I only supported Liverpool FC because it was a family tradition on my mother’s side.

“Well there are probably lots of things you won’t enjoy but will still have to report on but in this case I had a willing volunteer.

“We don’t just get sports reports sent in. We also get the WI, Scout and Guide reports and similar club activities. There’s a pile of those in that basket and the same goes for those as sport – follow the style in the paper.

“I’ll be going to the magistrates’ court at 10 and I’ve got some other meetings to attend and won’t be back until after three.”

With that I realised I had been dismissed so I grabbed the pile of association reports and headed upstairs.

The previous day I had laid claim to the window end of the table desk, meaning I had the light from the window over my shoulder and not in my eyes.

I put the stack of reports by my typewriter, put my jacket over the back of my chair and said: “Fancy a coffee Delwyn? I’m just going to get myself one.”

He nodded a yes and I headed downstairs.

Once we were sorted out with coffee and copy we started tapping away. My typing lessons stood me in good stead, even though I had only scraped a Pass in touch typing. I could at least retain a couple of lines at a time in my head and amended spelling and grammar as I went along.

By mid-morning we were ready for a coffee break and Delwyn did the honours. I took my copy of the other local newspaper and started going through it.

Initially I was comparing stories, page leads, secondary stories, even weddings, funerals and social items.

One thing I did notice was that our paper had more court stories with fuller details. Some of the opposition court pieces were little more than names, ages and addresses; charges; pleas of guilty or not guilty; verdicts and sentences. Sometimes they ran similar cases together, such as tv licence prosecutions.

I also read through the Mirror and The Guardian to compare a “working class” newspaper and a “middle class” newspaper. This was a more complicated comparison and I decided to leave that until I got home.

We worked on until lunchtine again and once more I headed down the hill for a pint with Roger.

In the afternoon, if we didn’t rush the reports available, we had enough to keep us going until 5pm.

About twenty past three we heard Bill return and a few minutes later we heard his typewriter clattering away in the office beneath us.

As it happened I finished all my reports by 4pm and had double-checked the copy as well so I continued with comparing our newspaper with the opposition.

It wasn’t too difficult to see which reports had been sent to both newspapers simply by the order and wording in which they were presented.

Just before five we went down to Bill’s office and handed him the sheaf of reports we had done.

Over the two days we had probably typed up enough to fill at most two broadsheet pages, even allowing for adverts.

I wondered how much of the rest of the news was going to come from Bill and where he was getting his stories from.

We handed our copy to Bill and he quickly looked over it before telling us we might as well head home.

When I got home this time I took my two daily newspapers and also took my parents’ newspapers, the Express and the Mail and started running a four-way comparison on which stories appeared in all newspapers and which only appeared in one or two.

If I didn’t get much direction at work I intended finding out as much as I could for myself.

We are seven

by William Wordsworth

A simple Child,

That lightly drew its breath,

And feels its life in every limb,

What should it know of death?

I met a little Cottage Girl:

She was eight years old she said;

Her hair was thick with many a curl

That clustered round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air,

And she was wildly clad;

Her eyes were fair, and very fair;

— Her beauty made me glad.

“Sisters and brothers, little Maid;

How many may you be?”

“How many? Seven in all,” she said,

And wondering looked at me.

“And where are they? I pray you tell.”

She answered, “Seven are we;

And two us at Conway dwell,

And two are gone to sea.

“Two of us in the churchyard lie,

My sister, and my brother.

And, in the church-yard cottage, I

Dwell near them with my mother.”

“You say that two at Conway dwell,

And two are gone to sea,

Yet ye are seven! I pray you tell,

Sweet Maid, how this may be?”

Then did the little Maid reply,

“Seven boys and girls are we;

Two of us in the church-yard lie,

Beneath the church-yard tree.”

“You run about my little Maid,

Your limbs they are alive;

If two are in the church-yard laid,

Then ye are only five.”

“Their graves are green, they may be seen,”

The little Maid replied,

“Twelve steps or more from my mother’s door,

And they are side by side.

My stockings there I often knit,

My kerchief there I hem,

And there upon the ground I sit,

And sing a song to them.

“And often after sun-set, Sir,

When it is light and fair,

I take my little porringer,

And eat my supper there.

“The first that died was sister Jane;

In bed she moaning lay,

Till God released her of her pain;

And then she went away.

“So in the church-yard she was laid;

And, when the grass was dry,

Together round the grave we played,

My brother John and I.

“And when the ground was white with snow,

And I could run and slide,

My brother John was forced to go,

And he lies by her side.”

“How many are you then?” said I

If they two are in heaven?”

Quick was the little Maid’s reply,

“O, Master! we are seven.”

“But they are dead, those two are dead?

Their spirits are in heaven!”

‘Twas throwing words away, for still

The little maid would have her will,

And said, “Nay, we are seven!”

Time for a break

That first morning at the office in Holywell was quite a drag and enough to put some people off journalism for life.

Halfway through the morning we had a coffee break and decided to switch subjects. Delwyn took the wedding reports (how many people can get married over one weekend?) and I took the obituaries (how many people can die in a week?).

At least with weddings you could have fun. The first line on the reports was always the surnames of the couple – the bridegroom first.

Sometimes they were simple:

Jones-Davies

Evans-Roberts

but occasionally you hit the right combination:

Farmer-Giles

King-Cole

Obituaries did not offer much relief especially as the form normally had a list of mourners (the undertakers used to leave small cards on the pews for mourners to leave their name) and lists of floral tributes (the undertaker would collect all the cards which had to be returned).

The funeral of a civic personality could take half an hour or more to complete.

Lunchtime came as a relief.

Delwyn had brought sandwiches and intended to stay in the office.

I decided to go down the hill to Greenfield to meet a good friend at the pub at the bottom of the hill.

The pub was right next to one of the Courtaulds mills and my old friend Roger Steele had got a job there working as a trainee laboratory technician.

At the weekend we had agreed to meet up for a pub lunch and a game of darts.

Legally we had no right to be in the pub. I had celebrated my 17th birthday just two months earlier and Roger had celebrated his the previous October.

We must have looked confident in our right to walk up to the bar and order pints because the barman didn’t bat an eyelid.

As well as my pint I ordered a ham bap and it was quite clear they used their own home-cooked ham because the meat in the bap was no thin slice of tasteless rubbish.

We were used to playing darts as we had often monopolised the yacht club board on a Friday night.

We ignored the darts kept behind the bar, which often had cheap plastic flights or tatty-looking feather ones which had seen better days.

We were proper dart players and had our own sets kept in protective boxes. Mine were medium light with feathered flights almost as elegant as an arrow.

At about 10 to two I said cheerio and headed back up the hill to Holywell.

The next hour went quite quickly. We had completed all the wedding forms and funeral reports that had been in the wire in-trays and I went over to look at the file of previous editions.

At about 10 past three we heard footsteps clumping up the stairs to the floor below and then a door slammed shut. After about five minutes we heard a typewriter being hammered in the office below us.

The clack of the keys and the thump of the carriage return continued incessantly for the next hour or more with just brief quiet intervals when Bill must have been changing the copy paper or lighting a cigarette or taking a swig of tea.

Just after half past four there was a longer lull and we thought it time to take our typed copy down to show Bill and take any instructions.

I led the way and knocked on the door. When Bill called out: ‘What?” We entered and there he was, ensconced at his desk as he had been that morning except now there were clouds of cigarette smoke over his head and an ashtray full of stubs by his typewriter.

What was obviously his copy out tray was stacked with sheets of paper stapled at the corners.

“Right boys, how did you get on?”

We presented him with our reports on the marriages and deaths and he picked a couple up at random and flicked through them.

“Good, very good. You’ve done well. I’ll check through them and get them up to head office at Chester on the bus. You two might as well have an early break and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

That was our first day.

Tea, coffee, beer and a ham roll; a stack of wedding reports and an equal stack of obituaries.

No dashing out to report on fires; no reports of bank robberies; not even a simple local story on a break-in at the church; or a swarm of bees setting up home in a primary school.

My first day as a real journalist had proved to be somewhat of a damp squib.

Never mind, tomorrow was another day.

O Captain! My Captain!

by Walt Whitman

O Captain! My Captain! our fearful trip is done,

The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won,

The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,

While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;

But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of the red,

Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! My Captain! rise and hear the bells;

Rise up – for you the flag is flung – for you the bugle trills,

For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths – for you the shores a-crowding,

For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;

Here Captain! dear father! This arm beneath your head!

This is some dream that on the deck, You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,

My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,

The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,

From fearful trip the victor ship, comes in with object won;

Exult O shores! and ring O bells! But I with mournful tread,

Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.

The Rainy Day

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary;

It rains, and the wind is never weary;

The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,

But at every gust the dead leaves fall,

And the day is dark and dreary.

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary;

It rains and the wind is never weary;

My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past,

But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast,

And the days are dark and dreary.

Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;

Behind the clouds the sun is still shining;

Thy fate is the common fate of all,

Into each life some rain must fall,

Some days must be dark and dreary.

Hands across the sea

Today is the weekend and I digress from the story of a wannabe journalist to look back at the actor’s life.

I don’t know who came up with the idea but Joe Holroyd and Angela Day announced that we were going to take part in a youth group exchange – with a group in Germany.

First of all we had to find out who wanted to go and who could afford to do so. It was only when the numbers were confirmed that we discovered this was to be more than a group exchange.

It was to be a cultural exchange which would involve us presenting a one-act play while we were there.

I don’t remember the actual play but it was to do with a prince who concealed his identity and his foppish brother who tried to steal his inheritance.

Did I get the hero’s part?

No!

I was to play the foppish brother. My costume appeared to be loosely based on a Cavalier outfit with a doublet and wide-hipped breeches tucked into boots. The outfit looked as though it had been cut from a set of 19th century curtains in a russet and gold pattern, with a deep lace collar and lace cuffs.

There was a wide-brimmed hat with a feather (think ostrich not eagle) and – a wig! Plus a shoulder length chestnut coloured wig that would have been the envy of any Cavalier, even Prince Rupert himself.

Now I had always faced a dichotomy when it came to Roundheads and Cavaliers; or Union v Confederates; even the Wehrmacht v the Allies.

My head was always with the “good guys”, those fighting for the rights of the people; the freedom of the individual; democracy etc.

The problem was the Cavaliers had a better flair for fashion; the Confederates made the Union Army look like a crowd of Bowery bums; and, no matter how wrong their ideals were, you have to admit German officers had far sharper uniforms than our boys.

The problem was we were all responsible for our own costumes on the trip and I got an odd look from a customs officer when I opened the cardboard box I was carrying to reveal the carefully coiffured tresses of my chestnut wig being kept in shape by a blow-up rubber ball.

We travelled down to London by coach and stayed overnight at a small hotel as part of the trip included a night at a London theatre.

The following day we were up early to get on the cross-channel ferry to Belgium and then we continued on to Ülm in our coach where our hosts would meet us.

Ülm is a beautiful city but we were scheduled to stay with our hosts in two small neighbouring villages, Donaustetten and Gögglingen.

We performed our play three times during the two-week visit. The rest of the time was taken up with visits to Ülm and other beauty spots. We even spent three days camping in a German forest with old-fashioned nights around the camp fire, singing folk songs in Welsh and German; baking potatoes and drinking German beer (the under-18 rule didn’t apply) and having a great time.

The thing was that we were all post-war children on both sides and this was just 20 years after a war that split the world apart.

Our young hosts were our age but their parents, like ours, had been involved in that war, whether at home or abroad.

We made friends with those people because we put the past behind us. Many of the adults who were our real hosts had been conscripted, just as many of our troops were.

In a way it had not been personal. From pictures we saw in their homes these had been ordinary people caught up in a conflict not of their making but of the monsters who had taken control.

Their children could not be blamed for the actions of their parents. Just as our children and their children cannot be blamed for the many mistakes we have allowed to happen over the past 60 years.

The future belongs to the young. They will inherit the world and they will have to clear up after us, just as we did for the generation before us.

Watch out for tomorrow’s poem but I’ll be taking the rest of the day off.

Back on Monday with the continuing story of a cub reporter.

The Garden

by Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)

How vainly men themselves amaze

To win the palm, the oak, or bays;

And their uncessant labors see

Crowned from some single herb or tree,

Whose short and narrow-vergèd shade

Does prudently their toils upbraid;

While all the flowers and trees do close

To weave the garlands of repose.

Fair Quiet, have I found thee here,

And Innocence, thy sister dear!

Mistaken long, I sought you then

In busy companies of men:

Your sacred plants, if here below,

Only among the plants will grow;

Society is all but rude,

To this delicious solitude.

No white nor red was ever seen

So amorous as this lovely green;

Fond lovers, cruel as their frame,

Cut in these trees their mistress’ name.

Little alas, they know or heed,

How far these beauties hers exceed!

Fair trees! wheresoe’er your barks I wound

No name but shall your own be found.

When we have run our passion’s heat,

Love hither makes his best retreat:

The gods who mortal beauty chase,

Still in a tree did end their race.

Apollo hunted Daphne so,

Only that she might laurel grow.

And Pan did after Syrinx speed

Not as a nymph, but for a reed.

What wondrous life is this I lead!

Ripe apples drop about my head;

The luscious clusters on the vine,

Upon my mouth do crush their wine;

The nectarine and curious peach

Into my hands themselves do reach;

Stumbling on melons as I pass,

Insnared with flowers, I fall on grass.

Meanwhile the mind, from pleasure less,

Withdraws into its happiness:

The mind, that ocean where each kind

Does straight its own resemblance find;

Yet it creates, transcending these,

Far other worlds, and other seas;

Annihilating all that’s made

To a green thought in a green shade.

Here at the fountain’s sliding foot,

Or at some mossy fruit tree’s root,

Casting the body’s vest aside,

My soul into the boughs does glide;

There like a bird it sits and sings,

Then whets, and combs it’s silver wings;

And, till prepar’d for longer flight,

Waves in its plumes the various light.

Such was that happy garden-state,

Whil man then walk’d without a mate;

After a place so pure and sweet,

What other place could yet be meet!

But ’twas beyond a mortal’s share

To wander solitary there;

Two paradises ’twere in one

To live in paradise alone.

How well the skillful gard’ner drew

Of flow’rs and herbs this dial new,

Where from above the milder sun

Does through a fragrant zodiac run;

And as it works, th’industrious bee

Computes its time as well as thee.

How could such sweet and wholesome hours

Be reckon’d but with herbs and flow’rs.

In the beginning

In 1967, while I was still too young to have driving lessons, I bought a secondhand Lambretta scooter to get to college and back and be able to get around at the weekends.

A 1950s Lambretta similar to the secondhand one I bought for £25 in 1967. Mine was a faded dark red.

I will set things straight, here and now, I was NOT a mod and I was NOT a rocker. I bought the transport I could afford and listened to the music I liked and was as happy in a smart two-piece Italian-style suit as I was in jeans and a T-shirt.

Now to get back to the story.

At some point, and I still don’t know whether I saw it advertised or if one of the lecturers told me about it, I discovered there was a vacancy for a probationary trainee reporter at the Holywell office of the Flintshire County Herald.

The head office was in Chester at the Chester Chronicle offices.

I had obviously completed my exams and one fine May morning I headed off from home at Rhyl but part-way to Kelsterton I turned off the Coast Road at Greenfield and headed up the hill to Holywell.

A busy Holywell High Street in the 1960s. A sight that became very familiar for two years.

The entrance to the offices was via a side door to a three-storey building, the ground floor of which was a general hardware shop.

On the second floor was a reception office, where advertisers could drop in with their details; and the chief reporter’s office.

There I met the Holywell grandee, the Herald’s chief reporter, Bill O’Brien.

He was not just getting on, he was old. His hair was white as was his moustache, two of the fingers on his right hand were stained brown with nicotine and he had a figure that would have won him the part of Falstaff in any Shakespearean production.

He sat at a large, old-fashioned table desk with a sit up and beg typewriter, an overflowing ashtray, two wire filing baskets, and a spike with numerous typed sheets on it.

One wall was lined with filing cabinets and there were two straight-backed chairs facing the table and the larger than life character seated at it.

One of the chairs was taken by a young chap about my age, with curly black hair and a lack of fashion sense when it came to matching up shirt, tie and jacket.

Bill spoke: “Robin, this is Delwyn, he’s starting as a trainee reporter as well. You’ll share an office upstairs and I’ll start you off on some basic stuff this morning but you’ll have to fend for yourself later as I’ve got meetings to attend.”

He took us upstairs to a large dusty room with a single large window giving a view straight up the High Street. There was a large table desk similar to the one downstairs with a similar sit up and beg typewriter at each end; a half-pint glass full of pencils (there was an old-fashioned pencil-sharpener screwed to the desk half way between the typewriters); and two reporters notebooks.

“This is where you’ll work. There’s a file of this year’s newspapers over there and recent copies of the newspaper on the desk. Study them to learn the style, especially wedding reports and funeral reports.

“When you type your stories you make a carbon copy. The copy paper and carbons are in that cupboard.

“At the top of each page you type a story name and number each folio; double space and leave good margins; at the bottom of each folio you type “mtc” if there is more to come or “ends”; use a paper clip to hold together pages of a story.”

He looked at us as though to ask if we had any questions.

“Right, in that case once you know the style you can start on typing up the wedding reports from those forms in that basket and the funeral reports from the other basket. Completed stories go in that basket on top of the cupboard.

“I’m going out soon and I’ll be out until 3pm but if anything important turns up you can get me by calling that number on the noticeboard. Other than that I’ll see you later.”

Then he was gone and that was our introduction to local newspapers.

We spent the next half-hour getting to know each other and then began looking through the newspapers.

After an hour Delwyn said he was going down to ask the receptionist where we could get a cup of tea.

I picked up a wedding form, with a picture attached, rolled my two sheets of copy paper with carbon in the middle into my typewriter and typed:

Jones/Jones . . 1 RGP

and began to type up my first wedding report as a “proper” journalist.

Delwyn came back in with two mugs of tea, it appears there was a kitchen downstairs. He had also discovered the toilet was opposite our “office”.

As he settled down to type a funeral report we both tapped away on our first day as journalists.

Little did we know what was to come.

How do I love thee?

Sonnet 43

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of being and ideal grace.

I love thee to the level of every day’s,

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for right.

I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

How time flies

Time can play funny tricks with your memory.

For instance I know I started at Kelsterton College in September 1966.

I thought that I completed the college year the following June or possibly early July.

That would mean I started work (yes I actually got a job very quickly) some time in July or August 1967.

Yet I have documentary proof that I was working by the end of May 1967. How do I know? The answer lies with the Beatles and Sergeant Pepper.

Let’s backtrack to late 1966.

Things were going well at college. My typing was going great guns, as were the mathematics, English and office skills – apart from that terrible Pitman’s which was harder to grasp, as far as I was concerned, than quantum physics.

My only real problem was following information on the chalk board at the front of the class. Gradually I was moving closer and closer to the front, sitting next to a different girl almost every other day.

I don’t know if any of them thought I was sharing my favours (young boys can be very vain) but I was just trying to concentrate on the chalk board.

I didn’t cotton on to the actual problem until one day at Flint station, a simple two-track line, I realised the station name sign on the other platform was a fuzzy white on purple blur.

Now these signs were big with bold white lettering on a purple background. The lettering had to be over a foot high and just five letters.

I only knew I was at Flint station because I had stood there every college day for weeks.

By the time Christmas came I was the proud owner of a pair of black-framed spectacles in the style of Harry Palmer (Michael Caine).

The glasses did make a lot of difference, even if my vanity was pricked a little.

I had always had keen eyesight and when at sea whether sailing or manning the rescue boat I was always first to spot any marker whether it was a navigation buoy or a marker buoy we had dropped to establish a course.

The glasses didn’t help with the Pitman’s, however, and if I did make it as a journalist I would need to perfect my own form of speed writing.

Now we come to the anomaly.

I know I finished my course because I have all my certificates including one from the strangely-titled English Speaking Board. This had involved public speaking amongst other aspects of the English language. That certainly proved useful in later years with regards to political ambitions.

College terms usually ended in mid-to-late June.

I know that I managed to get a position as a trainee reporter with the Chester Chronicle group at the Holywell office of their Flintshire County Herald newspaper.

My fellow trainee was a lad called Delwyn Edwards and we spent more than six months in a large dusty office on the second floor of a building at one end of the High Street. The ground floor was a general hardware shop.

More about that in the future but one thing Delwyn and I did was to launch a new record release column.

There it is. My review of the Beatles’ new album, Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which was released in May 1967.

Funny how you can remember certain things with clarity yet other memories are out of time.

Next time: Learning the ropes?