CHAPTER 12   THE FUNNY FACTORY   RICHARD GARRETT ENGINEERING WORKS   January 1966 to June1967     Unfortunately, I never managed to secure my job at the Sizewell Nuclear Power Station, as was suggested by my wife Margaret. Although, I faired a little better when I visited the local  labour exchange and managed to get a start at Richard Garrett Engineering Works. Being located just down the road from where we were living, meant that at least I could walk or push bike to work. To help us settle into our new life in Leiston, Margaret’s parents arranged for us to lodge with them in Waterloo Avenue. The Richard Garrett Engineering factory was divided into two sections. What was known as the top factory was where most of the engineering machine shops were located by the old Leiston Railway Station. While the other section of the factory was know as the bottom factory and was located down near the Leiston Post Office square. It was also where the old original factory had been located way back in the early nineteen hundreds by a local family, at that time it was known as “Beyer Peacock”. Unfortunately, the Russian Revolution brought about its demise and collapse, when they refused to honour their bills, using the old adage that they were not responsible for the old King’s debts. The bottom factory was where the original Cupola furnace and heavy machine shop had been located, before they were moved to the top factory. Richard Garretts Engineering factory had a very long distinguished history of manufacturing such items as steam engines, First World War aircraft, locomotives, buses and large field guns during the Second World War. At the time I worked at the factory many of its old locomotives were still working on the African Continent. Richard Garrett was the largest factory in the area and employed a very high percentage of local labour. I arrived at the bottom factory Tally house at 8am, on the morning of the 16th of January 1966. There I was introduced to Ben Wright another local boy from Theberton. This was also Bens first day on the job and like me he was waiting to meet the build maintenance Foreman.  Over the years, Ben and I were to become very close friends as we still are to this day. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of true friends I have and Bens name would always come up as number one. Together we both met up with Mr Bill Ellis, who asked us a few questions about our work histories. We were then asked to climb a ladder that had been placed up against the vehicle workshop wall, I guess to see if we had a head for heights. The mission successfully accomplished, Bill informed us that we had both been accepted as employees and so became members of the Building Maintenance Department. The department consisted of the foreman Bill Ellis, who lived at Sizewell and owned a very small cottage just along side of the Nuclear Power Station. Along with two Bricklayers, Percy Keeble and George Ringwood, Jimmy Atkins the plumber, Doug Free the Carpenter and a couple of other labourers, Peter Cady and George somebody from Beccles. The main task of the gang was to keep the rather large buildings in good repair, a hard task to undertake, as the factory had been built almost 100 years earlier. Unfortunately, since the Second World War, not much money had been spent on their up keep, so they were already in a bad state of decay. It was a loosing battle and usually consisted of just a patch up job, like the replacing of a slate on the roof, or the positioning a brick missing in a wall. Sometimes we had to concrete a section of the factory floor that had broken up, or to concrete a base for the positioning of a machine that we had to move from one part of the factory to another. We worked hard when the occasion arose, but there were plenty of slack periods, with lots of time to kill. Therefore, we would sit around chatting about the good times past, or of the expected good times a head. The gang enjoyed a good laugh and played many practical jokes on one another and other members of the factory. The gang became known as the “Dirty tricks department”, somebody to watch out for and not to turn your back on. It was a good time, we all got on well, we all enjoyed the skylarking and there was plenty of that. Practical jokes became the order of the day and everybody participated. Being a stranger and in a strange town, it is always hard to become accepted by the locals in general. Therefore, I used this time to try and make friends. Somebody once said that it takes twenty years to be accepted as a local. Other than Margaret’s family, I knew absolutely nobody and upon reflection, I do not think that I was ever accepted. I recall the time when Ben, Percy, Peter and I were working on the roof above the fabrication shop. It was a very cold frosty morning, while deep down below and inside the building. The workers would always light up their coke burning donkey stoves before they started their daily work. To light up these fires was an art form and usually left to those who knew the tricks of the trade. The chimneystacks were made of tin and were about forty-foot high. If they were damp, the smoke would not rise inside the stack to the top and out  above the roof area where we were sitting. Therefore, the people lighting the fires would have their special little secret bag of so-called tricks to accomplish this task. On this particular day, Percy was looking down through a crack in the roof watching as the smoke started to appear out of the chimney next to him. I placed an old broken slate on top of the chimneystack, stopping the smoke from escaping. We then all spent a few seconds looking down through the cracks in the roof watching what was happening below. By now the very thick smoke was pouring out from the front of the fire and into the factory area, at an alarming rate The people below, inside of the factory started coughing, spluttering and finally moved away from the fire. It did not take long for one of the so-called experts to arrive claiming that he would have no trouble in establishing a good fire and stopping the smoke from coming into the factory. After watching the so-called expert thrust a poker into the fire a few times and to then rattle the damper. I removed the offending slate from the top of the stack. Immediately the smoke poured out of the chimney and away into the atmosphere. While down below in the factory, the smoke had ceased to pour out from the front of the fire. The expert was by now strutting around proclaiming himself to anybody who would listen, that he was the expert and that he and he alone had known what to do. I gave him a few more minutes to soak up the praise from all his fellow workers, that he truly was the expert in this field. Then as he walked away from the fire, I replaced the slate once again on top of the chimney, immediately the smoke poured back into the factory down below. The expert ran back to the fire shouting at those standing around, telling them to leave it alone, that he knew what to do and that he would show them once again how it’s done. Once again, he poked the fire and rattled the damper just like before, so I once again removed the slate. Down below with the fire burning well and with no smoke getting into the room. The expert turned to everybody standing around and I could well imagine him telling them, that was how it was done and finishing up by telling them to leave it alone. I let him walk away once again and then replaced the slate. We had that expert running about for nearly two hours that day. However, he never did find out that he had been made a fool of in front of all his work mates             Every now and again, a consignment of bricks or cement would arrive at the factory and the whole gang would be required to take part in its unloading. On one occasion, I teamed up with old George, (Ringwood) as we named him, while Ben was with young George and Percy was with Peter. The task this particular day was to unload about ten-ton of house bricks. One guy on the truck would pass down to his partner anything up to eight bricks a time. As you can guess a small amount of rivalry sometimes existed between the partnerships and ever-increasing amounts of bricks were passed down trying to out do each other. On one occasion as I was handing down to George about a dozen, one slipped out of my grasp and dropped right onto his foot. George let out one very large scream and then started hopping around. Once he had calmed down, he started claiming that I had thrown it at him on purpose. Everybody stopped working to see what all the trouble was about and anyway it was a good excuse to have a cigarette break. George’s shouting got louder and his claims became wilder and wilder and with the others all joining in to egg him on, it soon developed into a bit of a scene. While I had the final say by calling George a silly old fool and telling him that if I had really wanted to hit him with a brick. Then I would have dropped it straight on his bloody head and there was no way that I would have missed it, as he had such a big one. One of our favourite pastimes was to use a line from one of the classic Beatle songs, “You Got To Hide Your Love Away”. While walking behind a group of people we would shout out very loudly, “HEY”, and when the people in front, all turned around to see what was going on, we would carry on singing, “You got to hide your love away”. While casually looking around making sure that, we did not make eye contact with anybody in front of us. Ben and I very quickly established ourselves as the gangs leading practical jokers, as the pranks got larger and better than the one before. Mind you, I must admit that the other gang members were always willing to join in. I became the king of the one liner jokes and cat calls. Another one of my favourites I used on the girls was to call out, “Hey dream boat” and when the poor unsuspecting girl turned around I would say, “Not you shipwreck”. The gang members loved to get up onto the factory roofs, that were about forty feet above the ground. There were about a dozen or so buildings along side of each other, and where they came together there was a valley that ran into a wide rain water gutter that you could walk in quite comfortably. It was an area where nobody could get to us very easily and so we could not be seen. It became our little world where nobody would disturb us. So we could quite usually do whatever we pleased, which usually consisted of lying back, just taking it easy, smoking, talking, helping Percy pick a race winner from the daily paper or to just falling asleep. The only person we had to look out for was Bill our foreman. Occasionally he would climb the ladder to see how the work was progressing. As an early warning system, we would place a broom handle up against the top of the ladder that was propped up against the end of the gutter. Because the ladder was extended to almost its full height, when it was being climbed it had a bit of a whip to it. Therefore, it would shake the broom off so it would drop with a bang into the gutter, awaking anybody who had fallen asleep on the roof, or at least that was the theory.   What we were supposed to be doing was cleaning out the guttering. The factory had its own Cupola furnace that used to generate a lot of ash that was blown into the air. The winds would then disperse it around the town, but mostly it fell back to earth on the factory roofs. It was our job to remove this ash so that when it rained, the rain water guttering did not over flow and end up inside dripping onto the machinery below. Our other job was to patch up the many holes that infested the roof that also allowed rainwater to get inside.  Many fine hours were spent in this way while we talked about old times and current affairs. When Percy was with us, we would all spend most of the time reading his racehorse guide. Percy was one of the luckiest guys around, when it came to racehorse betting. I can honestly say that he won far more times than he lost. While George Ringwood was the looser, he lost more times than he won. Except that is, the day he placed a bet on a complete outsider named “Peggy’s Pet” and it won, paying out a fortune to him. From then on George always had a bet on that horse, unfortunately for him, it never ever won another race. Both Ben and I never bothered with betting, believing it to be a mugs game and besides we needed our money for other things. Peter was always trying to talk Ben, young George and myself in to joining him, to enrolling in a Painter and Decorators course at the Lowestoft College. He would spend hours trying to explain to us, ways around every little problem that we picked in his scheme. This subject was always the topic of conversation but somehow it just never materialised. Although it did give me plenty of ammunition for my one liner jokes. Although we got plenty of practice as painting out offices and toilets was another of our regular occupations. One day while we were sitting on the roof, Percy told the members of the gang of an incident that he was involved in, while he was an apprentice bricklayer many years earlier. There was a particular bricklayer that Percy did not like, who kept belittling him whenever he could. Percy being the apprentice had to make the tea for all the bricklayers, ready for the tea break. On this particular occasion, Percy and a friend shot a Blackbird with an Air Gun and then plucked it. They then went into the bricklayer’s lunch box, knowing that everyday he would bring a very large pork pie for his lunch. They very neatly cut and removed the lid from the pork pie and replaced the pork with the dead un-gutted plucked blackbird. By neatly folding over the wings and legs so that it all fitted snugly inside the pie, they then replaced the lid, back on top of the pie, making sure that there were no signs that the pie had been tampered with. Then it was just a case of sitting back, to await the muck that was certainly going to hit the fan. Although I might add, muck was a little bit of an under statement. The bricklayer picked up his very large pie with both hands and like an animal took a large bite, into his long awaited lunch break meal. In his haste, he tore off a large chunk and was left with a bit of a wing hanging from his mouth. It was like everything was in slow motion at first. The guy didn’t know what was happening, he knew something was wrong because he could see all the smiles on the faces of his fellow workers. Percy told us that it was like watching a Volcano. First his face started to change colour to a very deep red then too scarlet. For a moment, the other guys in the hut all expected his face to burst open. As he slowly pulled from his mouth the large piece of blackbird, he erupted into the most violent of rages. Percy and his friend were long gone. When they left the hut his face had turned to a ghostly white sort of colour. The bricklayer called after them with every conceivable threat and bad language that he could dream up. Percy never did go back to that tea hut, in fact he had to get his employers to send him to another site. Most people agreed that the bricklayer would have carried out his threats in full, if he were ever able to catch Percy. However, he never did regret the trick he had played on the guy, telling us that it was fair justice. He had finally got back at the guy, even though for several months later he felt like he was walking on thin ice and had to constantly be looking over his shoulder. I told them of a prank I had once played while I was still living at Poplar Hill in Stowmarket. About the time the local Council had taken some land from the bottom of our garden to build a Police Station facing on to Webb Road. Once the building work had started it became a magnet to me and I befriended the workers and would visit them at every opportunity. One of my high lights was when I would run errands for them and would visit Combs Ford to buy them a bottle of Lemonade or a packet of cigarettes. In a very short time I progressed up to the regular job of tea boy, a job they actually paid me a few pence a week to under take. I soon became a regular face on the building site and would join in on all of the fun that the workers participated in. One day as I was making their tea for the morning break, I made a small hole in the bottom of their enamel mugs. I then placed all six of them on the bench in a line. I placed a nail in the hole and hammer it to the bench and put a small piece of putty over the nail in the bottom of the mug to make the hole water proof. After placing the milk into the mugs, I went to the shed door and called “Teas ready”. As the guys entered the hut I picked up the tea pot and ran it up the line of mugs filling them all up with tea. I then placed the tea pot down on the bench and made a quick exit from the shed. I could hear them swearing from the other side of the work site. That day I dare not return to the site. However, they had the last laugh, because they made it quite clear that if I wanted to return, I had to promise that I would buy them all a new mug and there were six of them. In the end, I had to work for nothing until the building work was completed and that took further four months. After several months of living with Margaret, I noticed that married life was not what I had expected, however I was prepared to work on it. Trouble was Margaret and I we were completely incompatible and had different interests and ideas. Upon reflection, I guess many couples could use the same argument, and many have managed to get over their problems. I put it down to me being restless and to having spent a few hectic years in the Royal Marines. While in the service, it meant that I could go out every night and party whenever I felt like it. Whatever I wanted to do, I could just go out and do it. Where as when you are married you have to consider your partner. In addition, I have always accepted that I was a very hyperactive person, something I still suffer with to this day. I can never sit still I always have to be doing some thing. Like in sports, I always choose fast energy sapping pastimes, like squash, martial arts, kick boxing, some of which I can still participate to this day.             Arriving home from work one afternoon, I met Margaret in the kitchen. Where she informed me that an old school friend had come round to see her and that she wanted me to meet her. As she led me into the front room, I received one hell of a shock. As I was confronted with the very pretty Anne, whom I knew lived at East Bridge. Anne being one of the girls that Snowy and I had met on the train during our trip from London to Leiston, a year earlier. I could not believe it and I guess the shock horror look on my face must have said it all. However, I did my best to act as normal as possible, as Margaret introduced me to her. I shook hands with her in a gentlemanly fashion, while trying not to make eye contact or to acknowledge that I knew her. We both said very little to each other during her visit and to this day, I do not know if she realised who I was. I might add that she never ever visited the house again.       I also started to take driving lessons from a local instructor and upon passing the government driving test. Upon the recommendations of Peter Cady, who had once owned it at some time. I purchased my very first car a second hand black Ford Consul Mk2 from Crisps Garage at Knodishall.  However, after only about nine months I sold it, as it turned out to have a few problems and cost too much to run.             It was while we were still living at 122 Waterloo Avenue, that our first child, Julie was born. She had a very large mop of dark hair and looked beautiful. I must admit we were very excited and happy with the event. It even occurred to me that the birth might help to cement the marriage for us.             An incident that always seem to remain in the back of my memory, happened as I was riding my bicycle back to work, after going home for a short dinner break. From the house, the road back to work was almost all down hill right back to the factory. Anyway, I was sat upright with my hands off the handlebars, freewheeling down the road. When a police car that had been behind me, suddenly over took and waved me down to stop. I was then given a lecture by a police officer on the dangers of riding my bike with out due care and attention as he called it. Finally, I was told not to be so damn stupid and to keep my hands on the handlebars. This goes to show that the police did not have a lot to do while stationed in the sleepy little Suffolk country town of Leiston In early 1967, Margaret and I were offered a Council house at 20 Seaward Avenue in Leiston, for the handsome rent of £2 a week. Mind you, I was only earning £5 a week at that time and Margaret did not have a job. This was also another reason why I had to sell the car. We were both very pleased and excited with the offer and eager to move in. Living with in-laws is always a struggle and very hard for all involved. Margaret had experienced this with our stay at Creeting Road with my parents and that had been for only about 6 weeks. While I had just experienced over a year of it with Margaret’s parents and I found it very frustrating at times. It could have also contributed to our struggle in making the marriage work. You felt like you were always on show and that you were not allowed to let your hair down. At all times you felt like you had to be dressed tidy and were not allowed to have your say in a conversation, just in case you upset somebody. You could not relax and wander around the house in scant clothing, or even put your feet up on the coffee table. Unfortunately we were never on our own, so I always felt on edge.             As it was our first house, we were both very excited and wanted to make it work. The house already had a beautiful fishpond in the back garden and the earlier owner had also left  us a dozen Gold fish. The new surroundings seemed to work for us as we set about turning it into our private little castle. For a time we struggled on the wage that I was bringing home, but slowly we got it into some sort of shape, just as we wanted it. A few family members on both sides rallied around and helped us out with some basic furniture items. I was also lucky at work, as I was allowed to work a little overtime, which helped to pay the bills. I have always said that you must have a roof over your head, in order that you can get a good nights sleep, so that you can under take a full days work. It is also something I have always instilled in my children, that the first bill you pay should always be the rent. You can go without food for a while, but you can never go without a good nights sleep. In June 1967 our second daughter, Sue was born and she looked so different to Julie. Sue had very short fair hair, but like Julie she looked beautiful. Once again, I was very excited, as I now had two beautiful little girls, I could not ask for anything more. Life was good between us for sometime after the birth, as we under went the good and the bad things about bringing up newly born children. Unfortunately, I soon started to look for something to do. I guess I was just getting bored with the everyday boring routines that only included work, tidying up the house and sleep.  Both Ben and I were very interested in music and most days one or other of us would bring a small portable radio to work, so we could keep up with the latest pop music of the day. I had always liked the sound that the Bass guitar made and had always imagining myself playing bass with all the bands that we listened to on the radio. While Ben had always liked the sound of the Drums and imagined himself playing all the fancy long drum solos that were very popular in those days. Ben used to tap with anything that he could get his hands on, sticks, pencils, pieces of this, pieces of that and anything was fair game to be clouted by these objects. One day he was told that working in the factory was a real live drummer, one who played with the local and very successful band, known as the “Wild Oats”. Ben made a few enquiries to find out who he was and where he could be found. He turned out to be Brian “Styx” Scarlett and he soon started to show Ben a few basic rudiments of what to do with the sticks. He also gave him two old drumsticks that he had finished with, so it would be easier to tap out the exercise beats that he had shown him. On the days when there was not a lot of work to be undertaken, Ben could be heard tapping out these exercises. It was not long before I started to copy him and joined in with the tapping. Therefore, a little bit of rivalry soon started to creep in and this was good for the both of us, because it made us play better and faster. I used to accompany Ben when ever he went to see Styx Scarlett as they called him. It was not long before we were both being taught to twirl the sticks around our fingers, looking very flash and proficient. I even went as far as to make my own drum sticks. I got hold of some welding rods from the factory and removed all of the flux from around them. I then cleaned them up with some emery cloth so that they gleamed like sticks of silver. I used to practice twirling them around my fingers imagining that I looked like the top drummers of the day. Styx Scarlett was also known as a sever practical joker, a man not to be tangled with or if you did, you would have to expect the worse scenario, in a return practical joke by him. Once in a retaliation joke on one of his fellow factory workers, he had tied the workers push bike up into the roof area, forty feet above the ground. He then went home leaving the poor unsuspecting worker wandering around the bicycle shed looking for his bike and with no means of transport to get home. It was so well executed that nobody knew how “Styx” accomplished this feat and a forklift was required the next morning to cut the bike down. Ben and I got on well together, so much so that by this time we had become very close friends. We also started to meet each other socially at weekends. On a Friday or Saturday night, we would meet and under take a tour of the local Pubs meeting most of Ben’s old friend’s and acquaintances. The orders of the night were always the same, to enjoy a couple of drinks, have a good game of darts or pool and to listen to the Rock n Roll music blaring out from the jukebox. Meeting most of Ben’s friends was good for me, as I was still very new to the area. Being new to an area is always hard to fit in, especially in a small Suffolk country village where everybody knows everybody else’s business. Where strangers are looked upon with suspicion and not accepted very easily. In some cases, it could be many years, while I had been told of people who had been there for over twenty years and were still classed as outsiders. Being with Ben made me more acceptable, it being a case of, if he is a friend of Ben’s then he must be okay. Back at work on a Monday mornings the conversation of the new week was always what had happened during the weekend and to what we had gotten up to. Usually some of the details were a little clouded by the large amounts of alcohol that we had consumed during our night out. We both enjoyed reliving it all over once again, getting a good laugh while telling the other members of the gang what we had done. One night a week Ben would take me along with his brother in-law, Tubby and Allister the publican from the Theberton Red Lion Pub, to the newly opened indoor swimming pool at Thorpeness. On one occasion, I was following Ben in his car not knowing the way. I must add that by this time I had purchased my second car, which was an old Austin A35 grey van. Anyway, just before, we reached the Aldringham Parrot Public house turn off. Ben stopped by the side of the road to talk to a pretty young girl he had seen walking, so I pulled in behind Ben’s car. After a few moments Ben came back to tell me that he was going to give the girl, he called Emily a lift home to Aldeburgh. He then explained to me that he would meet me at the swimming pool later. I was not too sure of the way, so I just told him that I would follow behind him. As we sped off towards Aldeburgh, I started to think that maybe I was intruding on Ben’s privacy, it was more than likely that Ben was possibly trying to make a date with the girl. She was a new face to me, as I could not remember seeing her at anytime. I did notice that she was good-looking, but only after a slight glance not wanting to stare at her. Ben dropped Emily off like he had told me in Aldeburgh. It was now that I felt like I was playing gooseberry as we called it in those days. As I was parked behind Ben’s car, I could see everything that was happening in the car ahead. I am sure Ben felt obliged not to keep me waiting to long, so he just dropped Emily off and with a little wave to her, we both continued our journey. I followed close behind him, just giving Emily a slight glance as I past her. I did not want to tread on Ben’s toes, in case he was making a play for her. While at the swimming, pool a young guy turned up and went over to Ben claiming that his sister Emily. Who he had just given a lift home, had left her purse in his car. Ben wasted no time in taking Jack out to his car to retrieve it. I didn’t know it then but this small incident involving Emily, would lead to a major change in my life, a couple of years later. George Ringwood was always good for a laugh, because he would leave himself wide open with whatever he said. One morning George came into work in his little Austin Mini car and parked it near the workshop. He then got the members of the gang to go and have a look at the car engine, asking where do you put the oil in to the engine. Most of the gang members started chuckling, while one of them pointed to a cap on top of the engine. George then said that his friend had mistakenly filled that cap up with water, but that he had drained it out before refilling it up with oil. He then asked if it would do any damage to the engine. By this time, most of the guys were curled up laughing, knowing that it was in fact George who had actually poured the water in by mistake. It had to be George or his wife, because George did not have that many friends anyway. From then on whenever cars or engines came up in the conversation, somehow somebody would manage to drop into that conversation, the fact that you should not let George near your car engine because he will fill the engine up with water. George came into work one morning asking if anybody had heard on the radio news that morning that an insurance company had gone broke over night. Most members did not have a clue what he was talking about. George went on to tell us that his friend had invested a lot of his hard earn savings in the “Fire Auto and Marine Insurance Company” and that they had gone bust overnight. His friend had lost every penny he had invested and what made it worse was that the, Insurance Company was owned by an Indian businessman. Something he had not known and usually the brunt of most jokes in those days. Once again, the gang members knew that it was George and not his friend that had lost his savings. Somebody would also usually drop into the conversation about not putting your savings into Insurance Companies, or do not use George for any financial advice. The words Fire Auto Marine also became the brunt of most jokes, especially if a Coloured guy’s name came up as well. You can imagine the one liner jokes that came from that and if he was an Indian, well the mind boggles. The laughs came thick and furious for a long time to come. I arrived for work one morning at 8am, after forgetting that I should have been there at 7am to do a special job. Peter was there to greet me and to inform me that everything was okay and that he had actually clocked me on at 7am. Although I pointed out to him that I was not happy with what he had done. Unfortunately and unknown to me the tally house gatekeeper had made a note of the time that I had arrived on site. Therefore, when he went to collect the clocking on cards to take to the pay office, he noticed that my card had been clocked on at 7am. The tally house gatekeeper was Bob Wisby and he had never liked me from day one. Maybe it was because I was not a local lad, that I was an interloper and not to be trusted. Anyway, he reported the incident to the Engineering Manager, who within an hour had me standing in front of his desk, where I was asked for an explanation. I had to think fast for a credible answer, as I did not want to get Peter in trouble. My brain was ticking over at breakneck speed, when I suddenly came out with, something plausible. I told him that when I came in this morning I noticed that my card had been clocked on at 7am. I was going to tell the guy behind the desk, but until now, I had not had the time. I went on to explain to him that Bob Wisby had always hated me and that I bet it was him who had actually clocked me on and had then report me. I went on to say that Wisby was obviously trying to get me the sack and that he had never liked me since the day I set foot on Richard Garrett’s. I walked out of the office with a broad smile on my face and through the maintenance workshop. In doing so I had to pass most of the other workers who were all standing around expecting me to be sacked, as the word had spread of the incident. I just raised my thumb to them all and said, “That will stuff up Bob Wisby”. I never heard another word from anybody on the subject, although I’m sure that Bob Wisby went out of his way to try and get me at a later date. Some of the factory workers started rumours, that we were laying a round on the rooftops instead of working. I often wondered how they came up with the rumour in the first place. Because we knew, that nobody had the nerve to climb a forty-foot ladder in the first place. Added to that the early warning systems that we had in place kept most people away. Therefore, it’s was hard to work out how the rumours got started. Because of the work that we did on the roofs, nobody knew just how long each job would take. For instance, we regularly had to sweep and bucket the ash from the main gutters, carrying each bucket by hand to the ladder area and to then empty it to the ground. This ash was an on going problem, coming from the cupola in foundry part of the factory. At times, this ash would be almost six inches deep. It had to be removed mainly because of its weight and if it were not, whenever it rained, the gutters would flood over into the factory below. After all who was I to admit that I was lying around when I should have been working. Hadn’t I learnt these tricks from the more senior members of the gang in the first place. It was a case of join them or move on and get out. The last thing they wanted was for some out of town stranger to come in to their domain and up set the apple cart. Given the chance, I’m sure that there would have been hundreds of young people who would have willingly filled my shoes if given half a chance. Then on one occasion, after a very heavy rainstorm past through the area, it added fuel to the rumours. In the main machine shop, there were so many holes in the roof that half the floor area was wet from the storm. The supervisor wasted no time in going after our foreman Bill, to report the rain leaks in his part of the factory. Within ten minutes Bill had us all lined up, as he told us all off for not fixing the leaks in the main machine shop roof. He grabbed a two-litre tin of paint and a brush. He then insisted that we all follow him to the machine shop, where he wasted no time in pointing out to all of us, where the leaks had been hitting the floor. In a temper, he then grabbed the paintbrush and the can of paint and started marking each leak by placing a ring of paint around the offending small pools of water. He then spent the next fifteen minutes going around the machine shop marking every leak that he could find.  We were then all told that once it had stopped raining we were all to go back up on the roof and to fix the leaks he had just marked. With this, he walked off and back to the meeting he had just left.             Once he had left us, I then went around the floor area once again, only this time I was only marking the dry spots with a paint ring. When I had marked a further forty of so rings, we all packed up and went back to the workshop.             It is always hard to find a leak in a roof, from a painted ring on the floor. Even if we were lucky enough to be able to look through the roof, to actually line it up with the paint ring below is almost impossible. Therefore, whatever Bill had to say to us, it would always be luck if we managed to block one up. One of the most common of problems is that once the rain water had leaked through the hole, there was a good chance that it would have run down the inside of the roof before actually dropping off and falling to the floor. Sometimes it might land feet away from where it actually came through the roof.             It did not rain again for a couple of weeks, but when it did, once again Bill ordered us all to meet him in the machine shop. Where he pointed to the rings he had painted on the floor and all of them still had water in them. He then laid down the law to us, telling us to pull our fingers out and to start fixing the leaks, as we had been order originally. I then got his attention by pointing to some of the rings I had painted on the floor, of course they were all dry. What about these I told him, there must be over forty or so that we did manage to plug up. He was dumb founded not knowing what to say next. However, I said it for him, when I added that it would be all right and that we would accept his apology. With a very red face, Bill just turned and walked away knowing that he had lost the day. Very funny but we never heard another word about the leaks on the main machine shop roof for quite some time.             I might add that most of the roofs were unsafe and that we had to be very careful where we walked. I have up till now only mentioned that the roofs were covered with slates, but some were covered with corrugated asbestos sheets. We usually assumed that if we saw bolts coming up through the old asbestos sheets that underneath was steel, so it was safe to walk on. However, Percy told us that one day he was walking up a roof with Bill beside him while one of the earlier guys was on the other side of Bill. Suddenly there was a loud cracking noise, as the sheet under Bill cracked and he went through. Luckily Percy grabbed Bill from the left and the other guy grabbed him from the right. Together they puller him back up on to the roof to safely, the only damage being his badly cut knees on the Sharpe edges of the asbestos sheets.             On another occasion while Percy was removing tiles from the old foundry roof on the bottom works, and placing them on the roof behind him, ready to relay later in the day.  The weight of the tiles is unknown but the most you could carry in one go was around four or five. Anyway after about an hour Percy had quite a heap of tiles stacked up behind him, then as he turned around to add some more to the heap. Suddenly the roof holding the tiles gave way and crashed along with all the tiles to the ground forty feet below. Percy immediately found him self staring down through the by now very large open roof and confronted by the drop. It was only luck, but some how he managed to correct his balance and to sit back on the roof he had been taking the tile from which still had timber for him to grab hold of. There were no such things as harnesses in those days. He was also very lucky that nobody was hurt that day as it was a weekend and so there was only the building maintenance gang working.             Bill Ellis lived within a stones throwing distance to the Sizewell Nuclear Power Station perimeter wire fence. The constant noise from the place was enough to drive you mad. While at night the place was lit up like a prisoner of war camp. We could never understand how he and his wife managed to sleep through it all. Although he did tell us that at one time he had tried to get his rates reduced, mainly because where he lived was a dead end. There was no running water, no electric strange as it might seem, no buses, no sewerage absolutely nothing. I was going to say no street lighting but that was something he had in abundance. Anyway came the big day at the council hearing. Bill wanted to know why he was still paying for all of the amenities that most towns’ people enjoyed while he could not access any of them. He was told in no uncertain words that he was paying for privacy. A regular job the gang had to do was to unload the cement a trucks. During our daily work we would use a very high tonnage of cement, so every couple of months or so, a ten-ton load in bags would arrive at the factory. The truck would be parked near the area where the cement was to be stored. Then each member of the gang would pick up, on his shoulder one bag and carry it to the shed where he would have to stack it. These bags would still be very hot, having only been made a couple of hours before delivery. One particular consignment was unloaded in a large building that was being converted into the new foundry by the gang. After the completion of this particular unload, the gang sat around having a rest and dusting our self’s down. While complaining about how hot our shoulders had been due to the heat from the bags. In some instances if we did not use a rag on our shoulders we would actually burn the skin. The foreman Bill informed us that five bags were required at the other end of the factory and had to be taken to our gang hut. It was decided that Ben, young George, Peter, Percy and I would carry the bags on our shoulders a distance of about a quarter of a mile. I let most of the boys pick up their bags and put them on their shoulders. Without anybody seeing what I was doing, I placed a small slit with a knife into the corner of the cement bag on young George and Peter’s bags. I then picked up my own bag and off we all went heading for the gang hut. Because of the rivalry amongst us, a race soon developed, with most of the guys dropping into a trot, trying to be first to the shed. This meant that the bags were now being shook around on our shoulders. It was not long before young George’s and Peter’s bags split right open, completely covering both boys with one hundred weight of cement dust. What a sight all that could be seen was the whites of their eyes, everybody stopped to have a good laugh, unfortunately, no photos were taken that day. Most of the other guys were just doubled up with laughter and lucky for me, nobody had seem me do the dastardly deed. Everybody was left thinking that it was a natural occurrence. Unfortunately knowing the record of accomplishment of the gang it is a wonder that somebody did not smell a rat. On another occasion a contest developed as to who was the stronger in the gang. We each took turns to raise a bag of cement above our heads and to try to lower and raise the bag as many times as possible, with out touching our heads. Lucky for Ben and me, we went first and both managed around ten times. However, young George was the last to go and I could just sense that some thing was going to happen. About five lifts in Percy, who was standing behind him, took out his pocket knife and slit the bag cross its middle just above his head. Within seconds he looked like one of the Papua New Guinea mud men, the only place on his entire body that did not have cement dust on it, was his eyes. Poor old George he could not go home to clean up as he came from Beccles and the bus he went home on was not due for several hours. While re-bricking one of the ovens in the old foundry on the bottom works, Peter along with myself was helping Percy with the laying of new firebricks. These ovens were very large but only had a very small opening to get inside and pass in all of the bricks and equipment needed. The opening was so small that it was always a very tight squeeze and if you were a little over weight it would have been almost impossible. On this particular occasion, both Peter and I were inside, stacking all the bricks ready for laying and setting up the compo (fireproof cement) boards. It became very hot for us, as the air was being used up at an alarming rate. Most of our movement had to be undertaken while we were lying on our sides. I am a little claustrophobic and so I was becoming a little anxious. Peter was nearest the opening so he was going to have to squeeze through first. This he started to do but suddenly he could feel himself becoming stuck and the more he wriggled and struggled the more he seemed to become wedged. It is a known fact that if you panic your body does swell up. Well Peter was panicking and blowing up like a balloon and by now he was stuck fast. While all this was going on I was also starting to panic, with my claustrophobia, no way did I want to stay inside the oven one minute longer than was necessary. Unfortunately, as Peter was filling up the only escape hole, this meant that no air could get in for us to breath. In the end, I panicked so much that I started kicking Peter up the backside harder and harder. Peter was already in pain from being stuck in the opening and now he was feeling pain in his backside. He had no idea what was going on because his head was on the outside, so he could not hear my shouting. The only thing for him to do was to somehow wiggle his way out. The kicks up his backside were getting more violent by now. So the pain from his stomach wedged in the opening, became only secondary to him. Then just like the cork being removed from a lemonade bottle, he popped out and was suddenly free. The pain suddenly subsided from his backside, just as my head popped out for a breath of fresh air. After this little episode, I was always very nervous when the word oven came up and would usually find some sort of excuse for not going inside ever again. Occasionally one of the Labourers would have to assist Jimmy the Plummer or Doug Free the carpenter. On one occasion, I was chosen to go with Jimmy while he set up a special water tank, in the experimental part of the factory. A few of the engineers were developing a new commercial size dry cleaning machine. Jimmy had been asked to set up a water tank for them, which would feed constant water to some sort of apparatus that they required. Around the factory was a maze of pipes that had been installed during the past 100 years. To help identify what each one carried, a colour code had been used. White was for compressed air, Yellow was gas, Blue was water and Orange was for electric, to name but a few. Anyway, Jimmy set up his tank on a frame in the corner of the workshop and attached a ball cock to one end, so that it remained full at all times. Came the big moment to turn it all on and a small crowd had gather to watch the official opening as I called it. Jimmy felt a little embarrassed by all of the attention, as he open the valve, to release the water. Unfortunately, nothing happened, the tank remained empty. However, we could all hear a slow faint hissing noise. While at first nobody paid any attention to it, we just laughed at Jimmy as he informed us all that it was probable an air lock and that it would be all right in couple of minutes. Suddenly somebody started shouting gas, in just a couple of seconds, panic set in to all those standing around the water pipe. Jimmy was the first to react and started to close the valve, until I tried to stop him, telling him that it would be all right, because once the tank was filled up the ball cock would close the pipe. I carried on laughing as I also told him that by then he would have a tank of gas, maybe we could sell it, if anybody wanted any. Making an unfortunate mistake, he had actually connected it up to the wrong pipe. Instead of connecting it to the water pipe, he had in fact connected it up to the towns gas supply. As you can guess Jimmy copped a lot of flack over that incident, when ever a similar subject came up. I sometimes wonder if he ever lived it down One Friday night, Ben took Ginger, David Bridges and myself for a night out on the town. We went to the coastal summer resort town of Great Yarmouth. A great deal of beer was drunk, so it turned into a big party night and we all ended up at the Tower Ballroom on the promenade to listen to some live music. We were all interested in music, so we wanted to see the Band. That night the entertainment was supplied by “Peter Jay and the Jaywalkers”, who’s father just happened to own the Tower Ballroom. I was later to learn that they usually supported most of the touring bands that played at the Tower. On other Friday nights, we would work our way around most of Leiston’s public houses. Once we had received a skin full of drink, we would make our way down to the International Club. Where we knew that we could obtain a late night drink and listen to a live band, so it was a great way to end a goodnight out. A German named Walter had opened the International Club, to accommodate the American Airmen who were stationed at the nearby RAF Airbases of Bentwaters and Woodbridge. This venture had been very successful for him, until the sudden influx of workers that had invaded the sleepy little town of Leiston. During the construction of the Nuclear Power Station, at the nearby coastal village of Sizewell, about six years earlier. There had been hundreds of them and of course with them, had come many of the usual problems that a large group of male workers bring. The club developed a bad reputation, as there were usually, a couple of fights every night between the workers and the US Servicemen. This kept many of the local people away from the place. However, now that the power station had been completed, most of the workers had moved onto the next large construction site that would employ them. Therefore, the locals had started to return to the club in large numbers especially on a Friday and Saturday night. Using the club as a meeting place, while also wanting to see a live band. Something that was very rare in those days in an out of way town like Leiston. Unfortunately, the American Servicemen never returned in the numbers that had been there during the clubs early hay days. The club was also open during the week, but because most of the young people in Leiston had a lack of cash, the club would usually be only about one quarter full, where as during the weekends it was always packed full. Pete Ginger got his old bomb of a car on the road and it resembled an old Austin A10 or could have been an A12, I’m not sure. The name A.S.P would have been more appt description for it, “All Spare Parts”. For a test run, he talked Ben, David and I into a trip one Friday night to Lowestoft. To me it seemed to be a good excuse for a drink and a wander around the local pubs and so after what could be described as a good nights drinking. Ginger picked up a couple of girls who he was trying to date. In his haste to impress them, he offered them a lift home in his new sports car. At least that is how he described it to the two unsuspecting young girls, he was about to pounce on. On finding out that they both lived a long way out of Lowestoft and in the opposite direction to the one that we would be taking home. A look of disbelieve came over our faces. Trying to fit six people into Ginger’s very small car became a bit of a nightmare. I asked a passer by if he had a shoehorn, I could borrow to help ease the larger of the two girls into the back seat. Unfortunately, Ben, David and I, were also expected to fit into the same area. Ginger had planned for the good-looking girl to get into the front seat with him. However, it didn’t end up like that, instead Ben sat in the front, while David and I plus the two girls had to get into the back. After a lot of laughter and playing about somehow we all managed to fit in, even if a couple of us were on each other’s laps. As Ginger pulled out of the pub car park I leaned out of the window to ask a young couple if they had a tin opener, so that when we got home someone could let us out, to me it felt like being inside a tin of sardines. Ten minutes into the journey it started to rain very heavy and Ginger had neglected to tell us that he had not finished repairing the floor in the back of car. Suddenly the car was full of a very fine damp mist, then it turned into a heavy droplets. Ben shouted out that we would be dryer if we got out and walked. I was quick to tell everybody that if we were not careful somebody might drown. Ben then had to somehow place his feet up onto the dashboard, to try to keep his feet dry. This left his knees propping up his chin, leaving him in a very uncomfortable position, forcing his voice up a couple of octaves. I shouted out that I was drowning and only just had my head up above the high water level. Then one of the girls remarked that something was going up her dress. I answered that it was not me because I could not move my hands. David just sat there with a smile on his face. No, she said, adding that her back side was all wet. Everybody started laughing and together we all said that she should have gone before we left. The girls complained so much that Ginger was forced to pullover to let them out and that was the end of his chance of a future date with them. During alterations at Richard Garrett’s to convert one of the old buildings into the new foundry, all the maintenance gang were involved. The building was forty feet high with an asbestos roof, but the sides had all been removed, so you could see right through the entire building area. There was a lot of rubbish to be got rid of, so it was decided to burn most of it and a fire was lit inside the building. There did not seem to be any problems at that time. As there was usually a strong wind blowing through the building,  so the smoke would quite easily disperse. It was left to Ben, young George and I to carry out the site, boys being boys it was something that we all enjoyed doing and our faces lit up at the chance. After a short time, it became boring just throwing items into the flames and so it was not long before the skylarking started. Earlier some old paint cans had been opened and stood amongst the flames, these were by now well alight and blazing away merrily. I picked up a shovel with some dirt on it and slopped the dirt into the by now very hot burning liquid paint. Whoosh, a sheet of flame shot up to the roof forty feet above. Then almost as suddenly the whole inside of the building became blacked out by dense smoke. David Barber a welder was also working with us, he was also a member of the local part time Fire Brigade base in the town. David was always on call, day or night and would drop whatever he was doing to attend a fire whenever the local alarm bells rang. When he saw the flames, he just panicked and started to run for his bicycle, intending to race down to the local Fire station, so he could catch the fire engine and return to attend the fire. Suddenly, Ben started shouting at him, “Stay here you are already at the fire and you will most likely get a medal for being first on the scene”. Everybody in the gang was cracked up with laughter by his remark, plus the flames had by now started to subside anyway, so there did not seem to be a problem. I had at first been a little worried, as had a few other members of the gang. The sight of those flames and all that black smoke swirling around had scared us all and I began to think that this time maybe I had gone a little too far. Then just as suddenly as it had first appeared, it all died down and the smoke gradually drifted away. Then seeing that it would not do any damage, other members of the gang all started to throw more dirt on to the still blazing very hot liquid paint. After an hour, it was all getting out of hand, as by this time a thick pall of smoke covered half the town of Leiston. Then somebody reported what was happening to Bill our foreman, who rushed up and put a stop to it. Fortunately, he only saw Peter throwing a shovel full of dirt on to the fire. So as you can imagine it was Peter who took all the blame for what had been happening. This hurt poor old Bill as Peter was his favourite and he didn’t think that he would get up to these sort of tricks, in future Bill would not be able to trust Peter just like he could not trust Ben and I. One morning when it was a little quiet and not much work to be undertaken. Ben and I took a walk through the factory, something we did whenever we got the chance. We would always stop to talk to anybody who wanted a conversation. One of Ben’s friends George from Kessinland, who was working on a lathe, became our first stop. During the conversation George asked Ben what we were doing, I butted in and told him that we were checking the serial numbers on the electrical motors that were on the overhead cranes and lifts high in the roof area. They were at least thirty to thirty five feet above us. With this, I took out from my pocket a piece of paper and a pencil and looking up into the roof area at a motor that was only just visible to the naked eye. I read out an imaginary number and proceeded to write it down on my piece of paper. This task was completely impossible to achieve, when you take into consideration the distance of thirty feet that the motor was away. In addition, the motor nameplate which would have only been about two inches square and more than likely it would have been unreadable and coated in a thick coating of oily dirt and grease. Ben cottoned on to what I was doing and very quickly joined in with the joke on George, asking if I had the relevant information. We then said our farewells to George and told him we would see him later. With this, Ben and I walked away leaving George with his mouth wide open in disbelief staring up into the roof. How ever could he read it at that distance he must have been thinking to himself. Then after walking about fifty feet, we both looked behind us to see George over by another lathe telling his fellow worker that these two guys can read things at long distances. Where as other workers would require a ladder to do the same task. We never did tell George the truth we left him thinking that we had incredible sight, in fact we played this joke more than once on other factory workers. Margaret my wife was a Leiston girl and one of her uncle’s, Dick Bailey was the Blacksmith at Richard Garrett’s. I would usually go along to him whenever I needed a cold chisel sharpened, or I needed a new one made, from a piece of specially sprung steel. Because of the family relationship between Dick and myself, Dick would always do a good job for me, by adding a very hard, tip on the chisel that would last for months and months. Dick was very highly skilled in using his eye and all the experience that he had gained over the years, was highly respected in his trade. However, Dick did not like Percy, so upon a suggestion from me, he would go out of his way to sabotage Percy’s chisels, whenever he was asked to sharpen and toughen them. He would do the exact opposite and he would soften them up. Poor old Percy when he went to use it, after only one hard hit the end of the chisel would bend round and look at him. Upon which everybody standing around would burst out laughing, because most of the gang knew what was going on. Percy would always persist, taking the chisel back to Dick to do it all again and again and again, unfortunately for Percy these attempts all had the same results. I then started bragging that I had a chisel that could cut through anything. So very cunningly Percy asked me to show him, to which I was delighted to do, especially in front of all the other gang members. The result was that I always ended up doing all the chisel work. Something Percy delighted in, he could take it easy while I did all the sweating and cursing. This was one time that I wasn’t as smart as I thought I was and had been caught out by my own game, in future I would think twice before I jumped in with both my big feet. The winter times were always good for a laugh, even though it was always very cold. Whenever it snowed, the maintenance gang was always employed to clear away the snow from around the factory, and from the public footpaths. This was always a good time, because it would take as long as we wanted it to. In addition, we would be able to talk to anybody who might walk by and boys being boys there was always the usual snowball fights. Occasionally the snow would have to be removed from the roof areas or from the gutters, to relieve the weight on the buildings. On one such day Ben, Percy, Peter Cady and I were up on the roof of the bottom factory, where the snow over hung the main street. It was not long before I was dropping small snowballs on to passers by walking along the footpath below us. I would drop the snowball trying to hit them right on top of the head and then pull myself back out of sight, as it began its freefall on to the unsuspecting target below. The other members of the gang seeing the success that I was having in hitting my targets all started to join in. The problem was that the snowballs started to get larger and larger, then they started to include ice inside the snowballs. The poor unsuspecting people being hit down below had no idea that they were being targeted from above. They just thought that it was normal snow melting and falling naturally from the rooftops. Finally, Ben and I built up a very large heap of snow on the edge of the roof to await the next victim, who was not to long in appearing. Just before he arrived directly below us, we both pushed our very very large heap of snow over the edge. At the time, we had planned the drop, it was all a big laugh. Unfortunately, now that the snow was on its way down, suddenly we started to realise, just how big our heap of snow really was. We both pulled our heads back not wanting to be seen. Suddenly we heard the guy down below cursing and shouting at the top of his voice. Percy panicked and ordered everybody off the roof, well he was in charge that day. Just before Ben and I went to the ladder to go down, we both took a quick peek over the edge to see what all the noise was about. There was this guy looking up at us shaking his fist and shouting. We never even waited to see who it was, we were down off the roof in ten seconds flat and made our way to the tea hut, to await developments. We did not have to wait to long, as the poor guy who had received the direct hit. Made his way to the tally house and made a complaint, about what he described as a ton of snow being dropped on him. Fifteen minutes later Bill Ellis was entering the tea hut, telling us that we were all bloody fools, as we might have killed the poor bloke. Percy, with his fingers crossed behind him, then told a little white lie. By explaining to Bill, that it was not us. Explaining that it was probably some loose snow that had come adrift from the roof and that we had nothing to do with what had happened. After this little incident things quietened down, but only for a week. After the next big fall of snow, it was all back to normal and full on. Only this time we had to make sure that nobody was seen dropping the snow. We had learnt from our mistakes and this time we would not be caught. David Bridges mentioned to me that he was teaching himself to play the guitar. This awoke an old desire within that maybe now was the right time that I should have another try at learning the guitar myself. I went over to David’s house in Theberton where we spent a couple of hours together, mainly with David showing me everything that he knew. Unfortunately, David was very limited and at that time, there were not many people around who were giving lessons. He did tell me that in the beginning he had spent some time with Neville Edmunds, who was a solo singer and guitarist in the area. Neville used to play at one of the Snape public house on a Saturday night. Unfortunately, David had ground to a halt and did not seem to be able to progress any further. Back at Richard Garrett’s while Ben and I were visiting Styx Scarlett one morning. It was mentioned that David Bridges was trying to learn to play the guitar. Styx was asked if any members of his band the Wild Oats would be able to help David and myself. A meeting was arranged for David, Ben and I to go to Styx’s house, along with all the other members of the “Wild Oats”, so we could meet them. It was all very helpful for us, with a lot of useful information being passed on about guitars and their amplifiers. However, it was out of the question for one of them to teach us to play the guitar. Mainly because they were so busy and did not have the time, it would require. However, the evening was very successful for us and a lot of valuable advice had been passed on. A few weeks later when we paid Styx another visit, he had some very good news for us. He had learnt that there was a boy in the newly completed foundry, in the moulding shop. Who was also learning to play the guitar and was supposed to be very good, he was also looking for other musicians to practice with. It took Ben and me just five minutes to find him. His name was Ray Callahan and he was the same age as Ben. Because he was working and his foreman was watching what we were up to, a hastily arranged meeting was decided on, for that evening at Ray’s house. That night David, Ben and I all turned up at 8 Prospect Place in Leiston. The meeting started out with Ray showing David a few chords, with Ben and me looking on and listening to everything that was being said. The night was a great success and went on to the very late hours, as we ended up listened to a selection of records that Ray wanted to copy. One thing lead had led to another as time was forgotten. As we departed other meeting we arranged for another one later in the week, it seemed like we were all in a hurry. After several of these meetings everybody seemed to be getting on with each other’s company, and David was making good head way with the guitar lessons that Ray was giving him. Ben and I would also come along to all of these meetings just sitting around listening to what was being said and enjoying the night out. Ray would always accompany David on whatever piece of music he was playing, always saying that it would sound so much better if a Bass guitar were playing along with them. Ray would even show us what the Bass would have been playing, he was good, so good in fact that he was also teaching himself to play the Electric Organ and was doing a great job of that as well. Ray was so good that he would have been able to join any band in the area, playing Guitar, Bass or keyboards.  After a few evenings at Ray’s house, I was starting to feel out of it and was getting a little bored, mainly because I never had a guitar to practice on. I had always liked the sound of the Bass guitar, from way back in the days when I went along and saw Cliff Richard the Shadows, at the Ipswich Gaumont Theatre way back in 1959. When at that time Jet Harris had played the Bass guitar in the Band. I liked the deep sounding thump, thump that it made. I was also secretly in the process of trying to get some money together to buy a guitar, unfortunately not knowing what sort to buy. Therefore, a conversation developed between Ray and me on what to look for and even where to go to buy one. I suddenly asked Ray that if I bought a Bass, could he teach me. Of course he could it was no trouble, Ray then picked up his guitar and started to plonk away playing some Bass riffs. This was good enough for me, it being the answer I had wanted to hear for years. Ben had been sitting near us listening to our conversation and suddenly told us that he was not going to sit around here listening to us, enjoying ourselves. That he wanted to be apart of it and to join in. He then announced that he was going to buy himself a Drum Kit. If he did, could he still come round and join in with us. Suddenly everybody started talking at once. Hey, that would mean that we would now have a full band line-up. We would now be able to practice like any other normal band. The air was full of excitement, on what this could all lead to.