KBGS Old Boys' Forum

A place to discuss Keighley Boys' Grammar School. 


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Re: The Wireless

The stations I remember being able to get in Keighley were the BBC ones, then Radio Lux and sometimes AFN on medium wave (reception definitely better on winter nights, for some reason). Also, right at the end of the dial you could get Radio Eireann on a good day. It was somehow exciting to be able to get a daytime radio station with adverts, before the pirates came along (the adverts were mostly for fertiliser and tractors). Then on Long Wave you could get quite a strong signal from France Inter. Didn't understand a word, but I loved the sound of spoken French (still do).

Re: The Wireless

You youngsters must have been tots when the top twenty idea started on Radio Luxembourg, at the end of the forties (nineteen-forties...)... 'This is Radio Luxembourg, 208 metres medium wave, with the Top Twenty, brought to you by the makers of Silvikrin and Brunitex shampoos' or something very like that... but can't remember which evening it was, thoough it was on at 8pm for an hour.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1951-58

Current location (optional) Keswick, Cumbria

Re: The Wireless

Talking about youngsters------------------ enclosed is a paragraph from my memoirs of going to school/living in Yorkshire in wartime years, written about a dozen years or so ago. The period referred to is 1943-45.


It was also at this house that I first remember listening to the radio. It was known as Radio Relay - just one channel/station which was fed to all houses that subscribed. The technician was a big fellow who lived up Browside at Haworth - George Bancroft was his name. His dad was a well known Haworth character, Sam Bancroft, who I think was a gamekeeper as he usually wore jodhpurs and had dead foxes hanging outside his place in Main Street.




Hard to believe these days with the huge selection and variety of what we can see and hear that in those far off days we thought it was wonderful to listen to "Dick Barton-Special Agent" and we had two choices, on or off. Cheers.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1947-51

Current location (optional) Auckland, New Zealand

Re: The Wireless

It's amazing what you can find on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymWCanDmirI Dick Barton Special Agent.

Clara Bancroft taught Infants at Haworth Primary School

Re: The Wireless

I started off by asking why the wireless was important. Reading these posts leads me to conclude (for starters): it provided a gateway to a wider world, especially to those of us who'd not yet an opportunity to view the world beyond Keighley; secondly, it provided a comfortable and comforting structure of routine. Two-way family favourites and the Billy Cotton Band Show meant Sunday dinner; Brian Matthew and Uncle Mac meant it was Saturday morning. Housewives' Choice and Workers' Playtime meant you were skiving school with an imagined ailment. And parental favourites like Friday Night is Music Night and Sing Something Simple made you feel so grateful for Rock 'n' Roll....

Re: The Wireless

I have just submitted 2 postings on The Wireless and they were refused as SPAM. They were just genuine recollections of the radio as it appealed to me in the 40s/50s. They are lost.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1952-60

Current location (optional) Nirvana

Re: The Wireless

Hope you'll try again, Terry. I bet your recollections are good. Chris? Something going wrong with the mechanics that grind away behind the pages we all see. Meanwhile I'll try posting this and see if it qualifies for spam. Always liked a nice bit of spam myself mind...

Re: The Wireless

Hi Terry, I noted your comment about having had 2 postings rejected as Spam on this particular thread. I have had a similar experience, again with 2 postings, on the 'Ancestry' thread posted by Brian Moate. Exasperating!! I wonder if anyone else has had the same problem? David

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1945-50

Current location (optional) Keighley(still)

Re: The Wireless

A certain English teacher used to publish "The Muse", a poetry anthology every so often and one of these found its way onto the Wireless. I remember receiving a postal order from the B.B.C.for about five shillings for broadcasting my poem in the "Muse"

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1959-66

Current location (optional) HAWORTH

Re: The Wireless

Thanks, David and Allan, for your sympathy.

It is the loss of your gem (ie rare recollection) that grieves - especially if you can't remember what it was about. I think the solution might be to draft the "original" in Word; copy it; then paste it into the Forum. Then if owt untoward happens, you still have the draft to fall back on.

I think maybe the problem is in failing eyes getting past the "Please type the letters you see (?)" bit.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1952-60

Current location (optional) Nirvana

Re: The Wireless

Here goes again.......

When I was in the 3rd/4th (1954-6) I used to go home at lunchtime but when I discovered that the BBC Light Prog each day had a live Dance Band from 1215 to 1300, I RAN.

School lunchtime began at 1215 so I had to negotiate Lord St., Alice St., Lawkholme and Bradford St. smartish so as not to miss more than the first 10 minutes.

I had just previously got a drum kit and was listening to as much of my preferred music as I could to develop a technique ( which often involved the use of cutlery on other tableware) from the examples of such giants and pygmies as Ted Heath; Geraldo; Ken Macintosh; Billy Ternent; Edmundo Ros; Lew Stone; The Squadronaires; Joe Loss; Ambrose; Eric Winstone; Victor Sylvester; Harry Parry; Lew Stone – et al.

Now I just go to bed with Clare Teal fre Kildwick on Radio 2 of a Sunday neet.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1952-60

Current location (optional) Nirvana

Re: The Wireless

I know this not strictly to do with the wireless but this person on the wireless was taught by me. A very timid child . Perhaps a new thread might be started on K.B.G.S..people and "celebs" !

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1959-66

Current location (optional) HAWORTH

Re: The Wireless

Terry's mention of all those great dance bands (I'd add Diz Disley's Hot Club Trio, covering the Django oeuvre) reminds me that the BBC, in those days, was allowed (I think) 5 hours per day 'needle time' (i.e. gramophone records), the remaining output being given over to spoken word or 'real' musicians. The deal had been worked out with the musicians' union whose members congregated each day in Archer Street in Soho to vie for potential jobs. Also in those days, there was a lengthy ban on US singers and musicians. US hits were regularly covered by the likes of Tommy Steele, Alma Cogan and Dickie Valentine, not to mention the no-name hopefuls who covered hits of the day for Woolie's Embassy label.

Re: The Wireless

What! Clare Teal timid?

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1958 - 65

Current location (optional) Embsay nr Skipton

Re: The Wireless

Very much so Brian and in my book totally ignorant in that I forwarded to her very, very supportive mother a photo of her playing the recorder asking her to give this to Clare and to write to me so I could explain the reason why she was raising money for charity. The photo came from the K.N. She never bothered. So am ,"I boverred" No, because I`ve learnt some people conveniently forget the hand they have been dealt in life and without dedicated individuals they would n`t be where they are today!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1959-66

Current location (optional) HAWORTH

Re: The Wireless

Terry's mention of the Big Bands and Ted Heath got the memory juices going.On holiday in Sydney in the mid 50s, from Geelong, Vic., and I saw a Ted Heath concert advertised at the Sydney Town Hall. I had to see him. Fanbloodytastic!!!! A bonus was his vocal soloist, Lita Rosa, who I thought was the most beautiful lass I had ever seen ( up to then!). On that same holiday my mate and I went to an afternoon pictures, it was raining, and when we emerged and headed towards the station, in a virtually empty street, who should drive past but the Queen Mother on her way to a function. I swear that she smiled and waved to us personally !! Haha. Happy memories eh? Cheers.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1947-51

Current location (optional) Auckland, New Zealand

Re: The Wireless

I think it was for that tour, Bill, that Kenny Graham (Heath's principal arranger) wrote the Australian Suite - featuring such titles as:
Kings Cross Climax; Boomerang, Dance of the Dingos - and my favourite - When a Bodgie Meets a Widgie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vF2u20Uxxsw

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1952-60

Current location (optional) Nirvana

Re: The Wireless

On today's news - someone has sent into the BBC a cassette tape containing a copy of a hitherto 'lost' Goon show episode. Terry - and anybody else - do you have favourite episode or quote from the Goon Shows, which were required listening in the '50s?

Re: The Wireless

1. Neddy - "Eccles, what are you doing here?"
Eccles - "Everybody's got to be somewhere."
2. My favourite is the "two one-legged men in the upstairs tent"

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1958-65

Current location (optional) Leeds

Re: The Wireless

"What's the time, Eccles''
"Wait, I've got it written down on a piece of paper"

Re: The Wireless

You can hear it on You-tube.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 55-60.

Current location (optional) Under the stairs.

Re: The Wireless

On a slightly wireless related note, when I was a student in Germany in 1967 I became friends with Alvar Lidell's daughter, Lucy. She took me home to meet her folks, and what nice folks they were. Alvar was announcing on Radio 3 at the time, having given up reading the news on the Home Service some years earlier. He had a passion for classical music and after Sunday lunch the whole family picked up instruments and played together. I left my guitar in its case.

Re: The Wireless

Alvar Lidell! Wow, there is a name from the past. For us at the time, he was THE voice on the radio at the end of the war. Maybe earlier too I suppose but seeing as I was 9 at the end of the war that was about the time I remember him from. For years though I thought his name was Alvarli Dell.Haha. Happy memories. Cheers.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1947-51

Current location (optional) Auckland, New Zealand

Re: The Wireless

What a wonderful experience, Allan. To wartimers and immediately afterers, his voice was the voice of our side that told the truth (?).

http://www.wimbledonguardian.co.uk/heritage/news/10135731.This_is_the_news___with_Alvar_Lidell/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/desert-island-discs/castaway/a40e0404

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1952-60

Current location (optional) Nirvana

Re: The Wireless

Like Bill, I had the name wrong. I thought it was Al Varley-Dell.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1958-65

Current location (optional) Leeds

Re: The Wireless

If no-one believes Ackers about CT then all they have to do is see her 'signed'(?) photograph in Geoff Walbank's barber's shop in Silsden.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1959-66

Current location (optional) Shoreham-by-Seaj

Re: The Wireless

In the light of the subsequent postings - maybe I should have confessed that I alternatively turned in ov a Sunday neet with David Jacobs.
That should take some of the steam out of the issue and leave the Poor Clares to their usual contemplative mode.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1952-60

Current location (optional) Nirvana

Re: The Wireless

Jacobs was a consummate broadcaster. Another disc-spinner whom no-one remembers much now was Jack Jackson, a pioneer in cutting comedy snippets and other sound clips into his record shows. Previously a jazz trumpeter and band leader, he became better known as a DJ in the fifties and sixties.