vaughans posts of memories of thorpe and the broads.

[Vaughan]

JM, Barry was one of three men who taught me how to sail - and race, when he used to helm Evening Flight. The other two were Jimmy Clabburn Senior and Leslie Landamore. Barry was the one for "light airs". His patience and calm were incredible. And Jimmy? We tend to forget that he and Martin Broom were Olympic Trials helmsmen in their youth. To sit at Evening Flight's mainsheet, with Jimmy at the helm, and watch a race being thrashed out by those two on Oulton Broad, was living!

Broadscot, yes, that sounds like Simon. I think in fairness, that the pub was run by his wife Lillie, and Simon was left to do the "front of house". When I was at Womack we had a pair of old and wizened Muscovy ducks that lived with us on the boatyard. We called them Simon and Lillie!

And so to Susan at Geldeston! There are hundreds of stories about her. She is actually the only person ever known - in the World - to have refused to serve my father with a drink! She told him he had had enough, and that was that! Cyril Fiske, who owned the old Friend of All Nations, and was foreman painter at Hearts, told of one night in there, when a group of young rowdies off a hire boat had come in and bought a half of beer each, and then proceeded to linger for an hour or more at a table making too much noise. Eventually one of them stood up and took an old sword off its frame on the wall and started to play with it.

Susan came out from behind her hatch (there was no bar) and said "Young man, are you familiar with the words used by Oliver Cromwell when dismissing the Long Parliament?" The youth just stood there and gaped, and she said "You have sat too long for the good you have done and so therefore be gone, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!"

Suffice to say, order was restored.

[JennyMorgan]

Patience and calm, Barry did have his limits! Didn't pay to be around when aroused. Remember when he had a boat returned in what appeared to be immaculate, pristine condition. Boats returned thus, hirers didn't want to loose their deposit, generally suggested that something else was amiss and being covered up. In this case the windows had been polished to within an inch of their lives. Wasn't until the hirers were headed for the railway station that Barry realised that why the windows looked so clean was that the glass had been removed on one side of the boat. Ohhh errrrrr! 

As for your three tutors, Vaughan, you knew how to choose well! 

[JennyMorgan]

2 hours ago, BroadScot said:

JM and Vaughan,....? please....Was  the gentleman landlord at Surlingham the one who wore shiney waistcoats, and was very particular regarding the pouring of a pint of real ale!

Iain.

Hats and waistcoats. He had a hat rail between his two bars, swapping titfers each time he moved from one to the other. Got to say that I can't remember the pub's layout from those days but presumably our lot quaffed in the spit & sawdust whilst the nobs and snobs sipped in the lounge bar!

[BroadScot]

The same Susan at Geldeston sold a bottle of the infamous Tolly Cantab250 - a lethal brew - to a well built gent, he duely supped it and was about to ask for a refill, when he was shown the door. She told him it was for his own good!

Iain

[Boatingman]

Susan took a real shine to my then young sister had her running around clearing tables in no time

This thread does bring back real memories

Ray

[webntweb]

I only met Susan once, in late September 1966. My wife (then my fiancee), myself and another couple holidaying with us were the only customers. I had heard of Susan's reputation and was a bit wary of going in as the other lad with us was prone to using ripe language. 

He was fairly well behaved but still came out with the odd unsavoury word. We'd had a couple of pints and on ordering the next I apologised for his language. Susan replied with something on the lines of "Aye lad I'm still deciding whether to chuck him out or not".

Roy

[Wussername]

Before the second world war it was not unknown for a coaster to "slow down" at Thorpe Island. Contraband was thrown ashore. It was secured in a cellar of one of the houses. The financial transaction was concluded with one member of the crew at Norwich riverside. It was this man who would admit guilt if caught, but it never happened. The rest of the crew would have denied responsibility, but of course they were all in the plot!

[JennyMorgan]

My picture of How Hill, the gentleman on the left, biggish looking bloke, was a WWII POW in Japan. On release he weighed a little over six stone, some five years prior to that snap. He'd worked in a Japanese copper mine, barrowing recaptured prisoners that had their feet cut off because they had attempted to escape, back and forwards to the work-face. I wonder at his feelings as surveyed the Broads on his annual 'lad's week'. Prior to his rehabilitation to the UK he was sent to Burma to recuperate, and be fattened up. There he learned to make the most wonderful curries, a very popular feature on their 'Lad's Week' right through to the early 1970's when age started to catch up on some of the members. Who needs a refrigerator when you can have curries on-board?

[JennyMorgan]

3 hours ago, Wussername said:

Before the second world war it was not unknown for a coaster to "slow down" at Thorpe Island. Contraband was thrown ashore. It was secured in a cellar of one of the houses. The financial transaction was concluded with one member of the crew at Norwich riverside. It was this man who would admit guilt if caught, but it never happened. The rest of the crew would have denied responsibility, but of course they were all in the plot!

Wuss, you have family connections and recollections? 

[Wussername]

I used to live in Thorpe St Andrew and met a few "old boys" Seems a long time ago. It was known as the Richmond of Norwich, the home of many wealthy people. Even now one can see the large houses with long drives and big gardens.

[Vaughan]

When the war ended, my parents, newly married and living in Surrey, had the choice of going back to Hong Kong, where he had lived the colonial life in the thirties and still had a job to go back to, or to move to Norfolk and go into the boat business. They hired the lovely Easticks cruiser "Royal Oak" for 2 weeks in 1946, to cruise and see what they could find. They had to literally cut their way into places like Womack and Rockland, which had grown over during the war. Shows how fast the Broads disappear if you don't look after them (Objection! Stay on the subject).

One day they were on their way up the Ant and my father was at the wheel. As was customary then, he was wearing his naval cap as a yachting cap. In his case it had "scrambled egg" on the peak. He was still in the Navy at that time, and still in command of a warship. Just then a fast open launch came past the other way, driven by what my mother described as "a rather dashing young man". As he dashed past he called out "take that bloody hat off!"

Father said nothing and they came onto Barton Broad. Half an hour later the launch came back the other way and started to overtake. Father stayed looking straight ahead but held a gin bottle out over the side. The launch swerved in and came alongside and a good session started, in the middle of the Broad. The dashing young man, also ex Navy, turned out to be Miles Simpson of Stalham Yacht Station. The two at once became firm friends, for the rest of their lives. The next two generations of our two families are still firm friends and my daughter, Helen, now lives in the house on the staithe, once part of the Stalham Yacht Station yard and rented to her by Pat Simpson.

But they never found a suitable business, so after the holiday they were back in Surrey (father back on his ship) and were making plans to go to Hong Kong. Two weeks later it was Miles Simpson who sent them a telegram to say that he had heard Harts in Thorpe was up for sale.

And the rest, as they say, is history.

[Vaughan]

If anyone should be interested in my father's war service - it is quite a good story - there is a site called hongkongescape.org where you can look up Lt. R.R.W.Ashby.

It is quite a tale, of the escape in the MTB's from the fall of Hong Kong and even includes a one-legged Chinese admiral.

The site is run by Richard Hide, who is the son of the chief engineer on my father's MTB. As a result we are now in contact with more than a hundred relatives of the 67 men who escaped, on Christmas eve, 1941.

[JennyMorgan]

Loving or mocking sailor hats exists to this day, can't think why?! Rather a different situation back then, men who had earned the right, bit different to the natty yotty headgear of today! Leather cowboy hats is the way forward!

[Wussername]

Surely you had a Rumsey Wells cap JM? However, the Tilly seems in vogue today. Join the BA and get one free. (£60 a pop!)

[Vaughan]

12 minutes ago, JennyMorgan said:

Leather cowboy hats is the way forward!

Especially for Dr Packman in a canoe. (Objection! Strike that from the record).

I have just remembered one about the Frostbites. On rum punch Sunday they always have a raffle, which is heavily rigged, so that certain members get "topical" prizes. I remember one year when Raymond Jeckells won a breeze block.

He had earlier complained that he couldn't reach the urinals in the new club toilets!

[JennyMorgan]

5 minutes ago, Wussername said:

Surely you had a Rumsey Wells cap JM? However, the Tilly seems in vogue today. Join the BA and get one free. (£60 a pop!)

No, Yarmouth Store's best was more my style. Always having had a full set, being a 'bald git' never held any appeal, I was never much of a 'hat man'. As for Tilly Hats,what is the appeal?

Vaughan, naughty! An apt hat, some might suggest!

   

[Wussername]

A number of the BA rangers seem to have a Tilly. A dark navy blue jobby. Provided by the BA. I do not think that Dr P wears a leather cowboy hat. It is a Tillly. They do look very similar

[JennyMorgan]

Wuss, he does! See here:

http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/news/broads_boaters_fury_over_smash_and_grab_raid_on_tolls_1_746065

[Wussername]

Well JM, I stand corrected. It certainly looks like a cowboy hat. Perhaps he cannot afford a Tilly, or does not qualify for one. Or indeed he considers a cowboy hat more appropriate!

[JennyMorgan]

Somehow I think that he can afford one! 

[jillR]

there is a nice selection at JPs shop at ranworth .......

 

[JennyMorgan]

When I had a riverside shop we sold hats by the boat load. For so many people the first thing they would buy on holiday would be a hat. Some for a laugh, some would be rather more serious. Bobble hats and 'Captain's' hats we bought and sold by the twelve gross!  hats hadn't been invented in the last century! Some were self conscious, most looked on it all part of the fun. Did they wear them at home? I doubt it! What's it about holiday hats?

[jillR]

"What's it about holiday hats? "

 

kiss me quick and i'll tell you

[Vaughan]

OBJECTION!

Stay on the subject.

Comments on the BA are not "old" history. I only wish they were!

Sorry, maybe it was me who went "off piste"?

[LizG]

Bobble hats were essential wearing in the 60s when on a boat in the spring holidays. I suspect many families didn't appreciate how cold an east wind coming off the north sea was and the first shop selling head gear was stopped at. The sellers thinking all holiday makers wanted bobble hats and all purchasers finding the only hats for sale were bobble hats  They were also easy to knit.....by grandma's as Christmas presents as well,.....