Ah, the absolutely best times of my life, an' it din't cost owt much!
IW came up with "proggin'" on my other thread. What memories that work evokes! I had some of the best times of my life going progging.
What a sight! 20-30 scruffy, snot nosed, raggedy arsed kids prowling far and wide like worker ants. The stuff we dragged back....everything was fair game if it would burn and wasn't bolted down. We would range as far as the tarn and Greenhead Lane, go through fields looking for fallen branches, even cut down dead trees. Even once in a while raiding other bonfire site and stealing their stuff.......dangerous, but what a thrill.
Mischievous night...what little bloody sods... it's a wonder we lived to tell the tale. Had to be fast off the mark....Picked on the wrong fella one night in house next to railway lines...banger through his letter box....young fella...out of the door with amazing speed...caught David Hinchcliffe and threw him over those spiked railings! Bloody 'ell! didn't mess with him again!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 52-57

Current location (optional) USA

Good times they were Bernard---- remember "knock-a-door-run?" tie the handles of 3 or 4 houses together,knock on each one at the same time and watch and laugh at them pulling against each other,trying to open their doors. Another favourite of ours----------- a drawing pin upside down on a door sneck smothered in a dob of manure---- our logic was that they would prick their thumb and then suck their thumb. Bangers in the letter box--------- yeah-right-we could always rely on the same old grouch's to chase us. Nowadays we would be labelled vandals and/or hooligans.Another old chestnut-go in the fish shop and ask how much they charged for their salt and vinegar? Nothing they would say---so we replied "right-we will have a packet of salt and a bottle of vinegar" before running off laughing.
They were simple times really and the youth of today must think we were really strange to be amused by such simple pastimes.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 47-51

Current location (optional) Auckland,NZ

'Appen so, Bill. But it beat PT for thumbs - whether on a mobile phone, game boy, play station or X box. We woh fit not fat.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 52-60

Bill. We have people, even today, who do the old 'knock-on-the-door and run away' trick. They call them 'Parcel Force'!!!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 45-50

Current location (optional) Keighley

My elder brother, Bob,( not a KBGS chap)was a chemistry 'genius'( well I always thought him such.) When we had a bonfire and in the days before the big lighting, bits were pulled off and a smaller fire lit by some of the older boys. This particular night this older boy had a good fire burning and was holding forth to his small court of younger boys. My brother got a glass full of 'Thawpit', the clothes cleaner which was basically carbon tetra chloride, used in fire extinguishers. The fire was on T'holler, close to our house. My brother sauntered across with the aforementioned glass behind his back. At a chosen moment he threw the contents onto the blazing fire. There was a sort of muffled 'whoof' and a great black cloud of carbon ladened smoke rose into the air. The older boy dissappeared in the smoke. The wind caught the ball of black smoke and carried it down back Emily Street between backyards. I will never forget watching this great black billowing pall drift quickly down that street with a pair of running legs stuck out of the bottom. The poor sod must have thought the whole world had turned to smoke.

And it must've drifted over the wall and blackened my mother's washing - hence the expression - "It looks black ovver Bob's mothers. Must be them Seeleys!".

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 52-60

Remember "plot toffee" and roasting potatoes in the embers on the fringes of the bonfire? What delicious lumps of charcoal!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 52-57

Current location (optional) USA

What about parkin pigs to go with the plot toffee?

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 58-61

Current location (optional) Originally Haworth, now Blue Mountains Australia

I don't think that parkin pigs would go down so well down Lawkholme/Showfield/Dalton Lane these days

My older brother,Bob, tells me that back in '38, when we first came to live in Keighley, my Grandma, who owned the shop in Bradford St, would bake a whole load of potatoes on 'plot night',in the large baker's oven we had. Small ones would sell at 1d and large ones at 2d(old money, of course). On top of that, she would make a large quantity of of sheeps-head broth which was given away free(!), provided you bought your fireworks at our shop(bring your own pint pots!).
During the war years('39-44) there were no bonfires of course, due to the 'blackout'. But in 1945 we had THREE! There was VE Day in May, VJ Day in August and then Guy Fawlks back again, in November. The 'proggers' were hard pressed to find suitable material for the bonfire in November, but I do remember the odd three-piece suite and old mattresses that helped to bulk things up!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 45-50

Current location (optional) Keighley

One of my earliest bonfire memories was the VE bonfire referred to by David in Bradford Street in 1945. I remember walking up the middle of Bfd St with one hand in each of my parents - ie at about ear-height. There was a shindig going on up the street and a lot of excitement. - Just as we got near to the top 'oller, 2 men ran out of a house on the even numbers side and across the street, carrying a dummy which they threw on to the bonfire with great shouting and cheering. I often thought about this later and could not equate it to a Plot Night fire. When much later I checked with my mother, she confirmed my conclusions that the effigy was Hitler. I must admit, there did seem to be a lot of bonfires when I was a young'un.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 52-60