Hi Yossarian, I loved your post as it added some detail to my own memories of living in Salisbury Street which I had tried to set out in an earlier post when looking for detail of Wright Street School. The photo posted by Philip was most helpful but I've yet to hear from anyone with memories of actually being taught there. That photograph is the first I've seen. I was almost beginning to believe I'd imagined my first three years' education as there is nothing I can find on the internet to prove it actually existed!
I too noticed that the buildings opposite were demolished, no doubt soon to be followed by the school itself. I think i might be a bit younger than you as the Travellers Rest was certainly closed by the time I was old enough for pubs. The Gladstone Arms was the place to get served without being asked awkward questions, although I was turfed out of the the Sydney on Cowpen Road on more than one occasion by an angry deputy head from the Grammar, hunting down lunchtime absconders, (the red school blazer and tie apparently a matter of conspicuous indifference to the landlord: business is business).
I have quite strong memories of the Boys' Club in Wright Street, although only as a small child; I was never a member. My Dad was a member in his youth, and after him two maternal uncles were strongly associated in the late fifties and through the 1960s, and they used to take me in there for a bottle of pop and and a caramac on saturday mornings. Jackie Allen was running the club then and he was a family friend. The elder of my two uncles was club secretary and had a small office in there with a telephone, which was impressive to a six year old. Let me try an recall the layout. The front door, (blue and heavily panneled), led onto a corridoor. On the right was the cafe/bar with a counter and the room was filled with a full size snooker table that I could hardly see over. The cafe was attended by a guy called Walter, who was ever present and seemed to have been there forever. Opposite, (so on the left as you entered) was the office area. I seem to remember there being a small library of some sort which led on to the actual office at the back. Beyond these rooms, to the left at the back, was a workshop where there was always some half finished project set out, a canoe being polished being the standout when I think of that room. The smell was distinctive, modelling paint and turps, and I found it quite oppressive, dark and somehow threatening, although without any rational reason. Back in the corridor, and a flight of stairs led to the first floor dominated by a dance hall and a stage, the space seeming huge at the time but given it was in a terrace block, probably wasn't. The abiding memory of this part of the building was being allowed to speak into a PA microphone used for dances, or more often Saturday night Bingo. The Bingo sessions were a favourite of all my mothers side of the family except for perhaps the younger of my two Uncles, still a teenager so not the Bingo type, who had the job of babysitting my brother and me, while everyone else "went down the club for the Housey". I'm probably at a safe enough distance in time to recount how he would always have a girlfriend round and leave me and my brother watching TV while they went upstairs to "look for a book to read". This must have been around 1962, as I remember clearly one girl bringing a copy of an LP saying "you have to hear this, its so good". That was the Beatles first album. We were allowed to stay up late on a Saturday, and sometimes he'd even take us to meet my pareants as the club came out and we'd stand in the queue at Martins fish shop, just around the corner on Turner Street, for fish and six pennorth with "scramptions", left open, with salt and vinegar, the steam billowing off the food in cold night air.
Incidently, not sure if you noticed, but Jackie Allen is in the picture of the football team I posted. Far right standing, with the cap at an angle and arms folded. No sign of the familiar pipe though. Maybe that came later.
Another chord struck in your post was "Vauxies". I referred to that as the Vaux Off-Licence in my post, but you're quite right - I remember now that it was always Vauxies. I'm struggling to remember a distinctive smell but if pushed it would make me think of that aroma you get from an empty beer bottle left standing. The crisp boxes were arranged along either the floor, or a low shelf; my favourites were plain with a small blue waxy wrap of salt which you sprinkled on yourself, or Beefee. And the owner - yes - as soon as you said foreign I was there; bald, strange accent - I picture him in a grey shop coat, but I definitley remember the same person.
I'll leave you with another picture, this is my Dad, who is also in the football team photograph, sparring at the Boys Club, which seems to have been taken from the Blyth News.
