Tommy Kenny: a 20th century life
In the 1990s a local journalist gave me some papers. Eric Leaver was old school and knew he was ceding his beloved desk to a new generation whose connection to the area was tenuous, and whose newspaper bosses lived in a remote digital land governed by accountants.
Eric and I shared an instinctive love of real history. These papers represented real history, but they were...challenging....Namely, they were written on lined notepaper, in capital letters, in thick felt pen by someone not used to writing. In other words, they weren't an easy read.
Eric had deadlines to meet. So the papers had sat in a drawer for many years, unread. But being a good instinctive historian he didn't bin them. No, he just passed the guilt burden on to me. Cheers Eric, whichever heavenly bar you're propping up.
As a teacher I always had a thing with deciphering difficult handwriting. In pre-digital times the only acknowledged medium for expression was the hand-written word. Some folks find / found that overwhelming. I always felt that was mean on those folks. So I was used to taking the time to read a difficult hand, and I enjoyed it.
And so Tommy Kenny's life story unfolded from his clumsily written notepaper. And as I was also living a life, earning a wage, meeting deadlines, I always meant to do summat about it. But didn't until now. And so here we are, on Christmas Eve 2016, and I'm starting to do something with Tommy Kenny's life story. It needed interpretation and ghost-writing to make it readable, but what follows is Tommy Kenny's story.
Starting with his account of Christmas 1919.
Eric and I shared an instinctive love of real history. These papers represented real history, but they were...challenging....Namely, they were written on lined notepaper, in capital letters, in thick felt pen by someone not used to writing. In other words, they weren't an easy read.
Eric had deadlines to meet. So the papers had sat in a drawer for many years, unread. But being a good instinctive historian he didn't bin them. No, he just passed the guilt burden on to me. Cheers Eric, whichever heavenly bar you're propping up.
As a teacher I always had a thing with deciphering difficult handwriting. In pre-digital times the only acknowledged medium for expression was the hand-written word. Some folks find / found that overwhelming. I always felt that was mean on those folks. So I was used to taking the time to read a difficult hand, and I enjoyed it.
And so Tommy Kenny's life story unfolded from his clumsily written notepaper. And as I was also living a life, earning a wage, meeting deadlines, I always meant to do summat about it. But didn't until now. And so here we are, on Christmas Eve 2016, and I'm starting to do something with Tommy Kenny's life story. It needed interpretation and ghost-writing to make it readable, but what follows is Tommy Kenny's story.
Starting with his account of Christmas 1919.
Christmas 1919: An Apple, An Orange, And Two New Pennies
I was born at number 21 Radcliffe Street on Valentine’s Day, 1911 and I left Blackburn in 1933, first to live in the London area and then in Coventry. Now that I am old and retired, I find myself remembering the past, and some parts seem as clear as yesterday to me. They were hard times compared with nowadays but it was all we knew. We were very poor but we knew no other way of life to compare it with.
I can recall vividly one particular day, a Saturday near Christmas it was, and I was about eight years old. It might actually have been Christmas Eve. By carefully attending a number of Sunday Schools, Bible classes and good causes, I had collected altogether six tickets for free Christmas treats. It was the custom then for children to roam off all day if not at school - so unlike nowadays, no anxious parents would be fretting about where we were. Normally there was a gang of us up to all sorts but on that Saturday, instead of settling for the usual round of street games, teasing guard dogs and running away from factory foremen, I set off to immerse myself in treats, a scrawny urchin in muddy clogs and hand-me-down clothes.
The first ticket was for a free cartoon show at the King’s Hall on Bank Top and it advised me to be there for 9.00 o’clock. Imagine a queue of over-excited children waiting in the frosty morning air as the trams rumbled past and the early shoppers trudged by. We were thrilled at the prospect, fired up with Christmas excitement. The cartoon was, however, disappointing - a simple black-and-white line drawing of German dachshunds going through a machine and coming out as sausages.(my note: I believe this is the cartoon Tommy watched). I watched part of the cartoon and got the general idea, and as the plot did not develop from there I made an attempt at a discreet exit. I had another free treat to get to and I had had enough of this one. Even though I left early, on the way out I was given an apple, an orange and two new pennies. We didn’t see fresh fruit very often and two pennies went a long way in those days.
My second ticket was for a magic lantern show at the People’s Mission, next to the Regent’s Cinema on Leyland Street. We shuffled on hard wooden benches and scuffled our feet on the dusty bare boards on the floor. Veiled by the dark, we pinched and punched each other, biting on our fists to stop the giggles. A kindly gentleman showed us bright coloured scenes portraying the evils of strong drink, which went right over our grubby little heads, while a large lady played solidly at the upright piano with the brave air of a missionary in the presence of savages. Once again we were rewarded for our attendance with an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
The third ticket let me into the Olympia Picture House which was just off the top of King Street, towards the town centre. The treat was arranged by Blackburn Ragged School, by the generosity of a certain Mr. Chillman who was a well-known local benefactor and one who knew how to cheer up hungry boys. Mr. Chillman’s treat was a proper film show – Keystone Cops, no less - followed by a meat pie and a cup of coffee. Of course, on the way out we were given – yes! – an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
St. Paul’s Working Men’s Club was the location of my fourth free treat that Saturday. This club was in the remains of a grand old house on Montague Street, and there on that Saturday I saw my very first Punch and Judy Show. I found it rather baffling. I had never been to the seaside and the travelling fairs that came to Blackburn were tough places where puppet shows went down badly. Nonetheless I sat as spellbound as the next kid, and on the way out you’ll never guess what we were given – an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
My fifth free treat was at the Play Centre in Princess Street next to the Ribblesdale Dairy. I think this treat was provided by the Methodists who had a big church nearby. We had games and races and on our way out - an apple, an orange and two new pennies! Weighed down with fruit and copper coins, I raced home to Radcliffe Street, not for my dinner but to stash my treats under my bed. I couldn’t carry any more fruit and I still had one more free treat to get to.
My sixth free treat that Christmas Eve was at the Harrison Institute and Gymnasium, which lay some way off across dangerous territory. Bigger boys and the Havelock Street Gang lay in wait for the unwary, and for a little lad on his own the only safe way through was to keep your head down and run like heck. I arrived unscathed but completely out of breath, gulping air in great lungfulls and with knees turning to jelly – the kind of out of breath where you just know your lungs could burst and it hurts to breathe – the kind of out of breath that only kids can do.
The Harrison Institute treat started at half past two and the grey daylight outside was already fading. In its huge, barrel-vaulted gym a scrum of small boys were led in games and races for a manic hour and then released onto the cold, dark winter afternoon. I then faced the race against time across enemy country, imagining my fate at the hands of bigger boys, terror snapping at my heels, as I pelted headlong through the gaslit cobbled streets. Crossing Hancock Street to the corner of Shakespeare Street returned me to the world I knew. I was safely back in my own territory. I could stop running there if I wanted and from here on the bullies were lads I knew. From the Harrison Institute and courtesy of the Education Committee, my coat pockets bulged with a treat to take home, in the form of an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
So in all I had enjoyed six free treats on that Saturday. I gained a fine display of fresh fruit and twelve pence in copper coins. In those days twelve pence could buy a lot. In my case, it was carefully eked out to take me to the cinema, and to acquire a net bag of marbles and a small pen-knife.
As I said these six treats all occurred on one Saturday near Christmas and I still had Christmas Day itself to look forward to, a day of good cooking smells and tasty food, and for once the sensation of being full up with ham and potatoes and cake and pudding. You see, we were hungry for a lot of the time. Everyone was the same where I lived. Our mams could not afford big meals all through the year and we lived largely on stew, bread-and-dripping, treacle butties and sugary tea. Christmas Day was different.
So the anticipation of Christmas Day was huge. We knew there would be no huge piles of tinselly-wrapped presents but we still hung our Christmas stockings up last thing on Christmas Eve. We did this as a tradition – our Mam always got me and my brother a little something, a knitted scarf or a book, but I can’t think of a time when I believed in Father Christmas or elves or nonsense with chimneys and sleighs. The harsh reality of life in Radcliffe Street in 1919 discouraged fantasy. But we hung up woolly knee-high socks, me and my brother, mine on the high cornice of the cast iron mantelpiece, his on the ‘spear’, the wooden screen that stood before the front door and stopped draughts sweeping straight in from the street.
After we had been persuaded to bed and gone to sleep, our mam never failed to fill our socks with a little wrapped-up present and some nuts - plus an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
I can recall vividly one particular day, a Saturday near Christmas it was, and I was about eight years old. It might actually have been Christmas Eve. By carefully attending a number of Sunday Schools, Bible classes and good causes, I had collected altogether six tickets for free Christmas treats. It was the custom then for children to roam off all day if not at school - so unlike nowadays, no anxious parents would be fretting about where we were. Normally there was a gang of us up to all sorts but on that Saturday, instead of settling for the usual round of street games, teasing guard dogs and running away from factory foremen, I set off to immerse myself in treats, a scrawny urchin in muddy clogs and hand-me-down clothes.
The first ticket was for a free cartoon show at the King’s Hall on Bank Top and it advised me to be there for 9.00 o’clock. Imagine a queue of over-excited children waiting in the frosty morning air as the trams rumbled past and the early shoppers trudged by. We were thrilled at the prospect, fired up with Christmas excitement. The cartoon was, however, disappointing - a simple black-and-white line drawing of German dachshunds going through a machine and coming out as sausages.(my note: I believe this is the cartoon Tommy watched). I watched part of the cartoon and got the general idea, and as the plot did not develop from there I made an attempt at a discreet exit. I had another free treat to get to and I had had enough of this one. Even though I left early, on the way out I was given an apple, an orange and two new pennies. We didn’t see fresh fruit very often and two pennies went a long way in those days.
My second ticket was for a magic lantern show at the People’s Mission, next to the Regent’s Cinema on Leyland Street. We shuffled on hard wooden benches and scuffled our feet on the dusty bare boards on the floor. Veiled by the dark, we pinched and punched each other, biting on our fists to stop the giggles. A kindly gentleman showed us bright coloured scenes portraying the evils of strong drink, which went right over our grubby little heads, while a large lady played solidly at the upright piano with the brave air of a missionary in the presence of savages. Once again we were rewarded for our attendance with an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
The third ticket let me into the Olympia Picture House which was just off the top of King Street, towards the town centre. The treat was arranged by Blackburn Ragged School, by the generosity of a certain Mr. Chillman who was a well-known local benefactor and one who knew how to cheer up hungry boys. Mr. Chillman’s treat was a proper film show – Keystone Cops, no less - followed by a meat pie and a cup of coffee. Of course, on the way out we were given – yes! – an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
St. Paul’s Working Men’s Club was the location of my fourth free treat that Saturday. This club was in the remains of a grand old house on Montague Street, and there on that Saturday I saw my very first Punch and Judy Show. I found it rather baffling. I had never been to the seaside and the travelling fairs that came to Blackburn were tough places where puppet shows went down badly. Nonetheless I sat as spellbound as the next kid, and on the way out you’ll never guess what we were given – an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
My fifth free treat was at the Play Centre in Princess Street next to the Ribblesdale Dairy. I think this treat was provided by the Methodists who had a big church nearby. We had games and races and on our way out - an apple, an orange and two new pennies! Weighed down with fruit and copper coins, I raced home to Radcliffe Street, not for my dinner but to stash my treats under my bed. I couldn’t carry any more fruit and I still had one more free treat to get to.
My sixth free treat that Christmas Eve was at the Harrison Institute and Gymnasium, which lay some way off across dangerous territory. Bigger boys and the Havelock Street Gang lay in wait for the unwary, and for a little lad on his own the only safe way through was to keep your head down and run like heck. I arrived unscathed but completely out of breath, gulping air in great lungfulls and with knees turning to jelly – the kind of out of breath where you just know your lungs could burst and it hurts to breathe – the kind of out of breath that only kids can do.
The Harrison Institute treat started at half past two and the grey daylight outside was already fading. In its huge, barrel-vaulted gym a scrum of small boys were led in games and races for a manic hour and then released onto the cold, dark winter afternoon. I then faced the race against time across enemy country, imagining my fate at the hands of bigger boys, terror snapping at my heels, as I pelted headlong through the gaslit cobbled streets. Crossing Hancock Street to the corner of Shakespeare Street returned me to the world I knew. I was safely back in my own territory. I could stop running there if I wanted and from here on the bullies were lads I knew. From the Harrison Institute and courtesy of the Education Committee, my coat pockets bulged with a treat to take home, in the form of an apple, an orange and two new pennies.
So in all I had enjoyed six free treats on that Saturday. I gained a fine display of fresh fruit and twelve pence in copper coins. In those days twelve pence could buy a lot. In my case, it was carefully eked out to take me to the cinema, and to acquire a net bag of marbles and a small pen-knife.
As I said these six treats all occurred on one Saturday near Christmas and I still had Christmas Day itself to look forward to, a day of good cooking smells and tasty food, and for once the sensation of being full up with ham and potatoes and cake and pudding. You see, we were hungry for a lot of the time. Everyone was the same where I lived. Our mams could not afford big meals all through the year and we lived largely on stew, bread-and-dripping, treacle butties and sugary tea. Christmas Day was different.
So the anticipation of Christmas Day was huge. We knew there would be no huge piles of tinselly-wrapped presents but we still hung our Christmas stockings up last thing on Christmas Eve. We did this as a tradition – our Mam always got me and my brother a little something, a knitted scarf or a book, but I can’t think of a time when I believed in Father Christmas or elves or nonsense with chimneys and sleighs. The harsh reality of life in Radcliffe Street in 1919 discouraged fantasy. But we hung up woolly knee-high socks, me and my brother, mine on the high cornice of the cast iron mantelpiece, his on the ‘spear’, the wooden screen that stood before the front door and stopped draughts sweeping straight in from the street.
After we had been persuaded to bed and gone to sleep, our mam never failed to fill our socks with a little wrapped-up present and some nuts - plus an apple, an orange and two new pennies.