Mailbag, February 3, 2014

I WAS interested to see the picture of the Pressed Steel workers’ outing (Memory Lane, January 6).

If my memory and eyesight are correct, it was a day trip to the Isle of Wight by the maintenance departments around 1957-58.

Although I am not in the photograph, I was on the trip – a good day was had and a few pints of liquid refreshments were enjoyed.

I was about 25 then and worked for the welding department and recognise my workmates – George Jelfs (foreman), Larry Harrop, Phil Harrop, Charlie Burrows, Tommy Bowen, Tom Whalley, Nobby Clark and Tommy Gilmore.

Many have long gone, but memories of factory life live on.

Perhaps someone will contradict me – we’ll see!

ERNIE PULLEN Hillary Way Wheatley

I was apprentice

I CAN throw some light on the picture of the Pressed Steel outing.

From the left standing are the following: 2 Larry Harrop, 3 Tommy Gilmore (safety department), 5 Charlie Burrows (welder), 8 Tommy Bowen (welder), 11 Tom Whalley (welder), 13 Henry Hilsdon (millwright), 14 Phil Harrop (welder), 19 Bob Coleman (welder).

I started work at Pressed Steel in 1959 as an apprentice in the welding department. I retired in 2000 after working for 41 years with some great guys.

JULIAN WOODLEY New High Street Headington Oxford

Missing from photograph

I WROTE in my letter about the Pressed Steel workers’ outing to the Isle of Wight (Memory Lane, January 20) that my dad, Tommy Bowen, was standing seventh from the left and his mate, Chuck Burrows, from Headington, was fourth from the left.

In the picture you published with my letter, my dad is eighth from the left and Chuck is fifth from the left.

Relatives of the workers may be confused.

PAT SANSOM (Mrs) Cowley Oxford

• Editor’s note: Our apologies. When the picture was first published on January 6, the man on the left was unfortunately omitted.

Scouts’ summer sojourn

I ENCLOSE a photograph (below) of the lads of the 9th Oxford Scout group camping in Charmouth, Dorset, in August 1956, which I hope will be of interest to your readers.

• SCOUTING FOR SCOUTS’ NAMES: The 9th Oxford Scout troop at summer camp at Charmouth, Dorset, in 1956 – can anyone fill in the gaps? Back, left to right: B Jackson, F Shepherd, M Thurling, T Jesset, B Greenough, N Minet, D Payne, J Wheeler, A Scofield, R Watkins. Middle: G Evans, B Davidson, B Kingsly, ?, J Temple, K Triton, H Kingsly
• Front: M Masters, D Jarrot, ?, R Hanna, D Bruce, ?

I look forward to reading Memory Lane every Monday.

BILL GREENOUGH Edgeway Road Marston

On your Nelly

THE pictures of the circus elephants parading through Oxford, Banbury and Chipping Norton (Memory Lane, January 13) brought back memories of the late 1940s and 1950s.

This was when the arrival of Billy Smart’s Circus was a yearly occurrence in the field opposite our house at the bottom of Headington Hill.

Two ladies from the circus always stayed at our house. Because of that, we were able to go over and watch them set up, look at the animals ahead of time, and get free admission to a performance.

It was really the only time there was a lot of activity around our house.

• Billy Smart’s elephants parade through Oxford in 1963. Note the teenage girls riding without helmets or body protection!

I also remember Mr Smart was a very big man, or at least he looked that way to us.

Of course, once the field was turned into a park, sadly the yearly circus there stopped.

DAWN GRIFFIS Vermont United States

A measured response

READING Ann Spokes Symonds’s letter (Memory Lane, January 6) set me thinking of the wartime 1940s when I first became acquainted with Bulwarks Lane in Oxford.

Does she remember the terrace of three houses on the right hand side at the New Road end?

In No 5 lived Mr and Mrs Richard Smith. Mr Smith was a ‘scalemaker’ and his main work was repairing coal merchants’ deadweight weighing machines and their weights. His premises were very close to the New Road coal wharf.

Unfortunately for me, his workshop was in one of his bedrooms, on the first floor, and I, as a young trainee, had to carry the weights and measures inspector’s testing equipment upstairs for him to approve or reject the repair.

At the time I entered the county weights and measures service, the offices were two rooms in a converted stable in Tidmarsh (or Titmouse) Lane.

Our telephone messages and mail came courtesy of the county education department.

Next to the county education offices, where Macclesfield House is now, was the headquarters of the Oxfordshire Constabulary, the entrance for the motor garage being in Tidmarsh (Titmouse) Lane.

In contrast, Oxford City Council boasted a purpose-built weights and measures office and a purpose-built coroner’s court in Floyds Row, off St Aldate’s.

A E KIRTLAND Grovelands Road Risinghurst Oxford

Mikado reunion

I SAW the photograph, below, of The Mikado at Temple Cowley School, Oxford, in 1957 (Memory Lane, January 13).

• Pupils in the Gilbert and Sullivan opera, The Mikado, at Temple Cowley School in 1957 – left to right, Trevor Goodchild as Pooh Bah, Pat Boyce as Pitti-Sing, Clive Davies as the Mikado, Ruth Underwood as Katisha and Roger Tyler at Ko Ko

I was in that opera and remember it all quite well.

The pupils in the picture were my friends. Does anyone know where they are now? I would love to meet them again. The two girls will have different names if they married.

If anyone knows their whereabouts, please call 01865 771064 or write to the address below.

Temple Cowley School was bulldozed to make flats and houses.

PATRICIA ANN STRAUGHAN (nee Stowe) 61 Church Cowley Road Oxford OX4 3JS

A sad day when store closed

I REALLY enjoy reading Memory Lane every Monday and I was particularly interested in your article about Cape’s department store in St Ebbe’s, Oxford (Memory Lane, January 6).

I remember very well going shopping there with my mother when I was a little girl in the early 1950s.

• The hat department at Cape’s in 1971

I was fascinated by the overhead cash railway. It whizzed back and forth from the various counters to the cashier’s desk and was quite wonderful!

I especially enjoyed being taken there at Christmas time because, downstairs in the basement, they had a Christmas grotto.

I can’t remember how much it cost to go in or what the theme was, but I do remember what was supposed to be a large old tree in one corner.

A little door would open in the tree trunk and you had to put your money on a shelf.

It would then swivel round and a very lifelike owl would appear, bearing a small gift.

They had this novelty every Christmas, and I thought it was magical!

Many years later, it was my turn to take my mum shopping there, to help me choose my wedding veil in 1966.

Very fond memories, and it was a sad day when Cape’s finally closed its doors in 1972.

SYLVIA PENDREY Millmoor Crescent Eynsham