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EVERY
PICTURE TELLS A STORY...
...
place your mouse over any of the pictures and see what you
can discover.
MUSIC
MAESTRO PLEASE
As
each page is opened you should hear some music, to
compliment each story – so, unless you hate music,
turn on the sound – and ENJOY!
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THE
WAY WE WERE
SHOPPING
IN THE FIFTIES
Long
before the arrival of supermarkets in Sheringham – in
fact, even today they have still resisted the invasion by
Tesco – shopping was done on a day-to-day basis in a
variety of shops, such as: Rusts, the International, or ‘Eye-Tee’
as the locals called it, and of course the Co-op!
EVERYTHING
IN ONE SHOP
Sheringham
Co-op had the distinction of being able to provide most of
its customer’s requirements.
As well as a well-stocked Grocery department there was also
a Drapery section, a Bakery, a Coal Office, and a Hardware
section.
Co-op
Milk Roundsmen delivered fresh supplies of Gold Top to your
door, and the Co-op Baker who would also call with baskets
of bread and cakes.
Then
there was the Co-op Insurance man who would provide cradle-to-the-grave
insurance for a shilling or two a week!
One
notable feature of the Sheringham Co-operative Society was
the ability to obtain goods on approval, or on ‘appro’!
But, once satisfied, you had to pay up of course.
Television
came to Sheringham in the early fifties, with one
of the first sets being delivered to Albie’s house, on
appro, naturally!
An
‘Invicta’ model, manufactured by the
Co-operative Wholesale Society, Manchester, proved to be far
from successful, due to a poor signal – and was sent
back!
Albie
had anew bicycle, a ‘Federation’, which also came
from the Co-op, manufactured by the CWS at their Federal Works
in Tyseley, Birmingham.
WINDOW
DISPLAYS
One
thing that always interested Albie was his father’s window
displays at the Co-op. The pyramids of tinned peas and soups,
with just the one tin at the top, leaning at an impossible
angle, yet perfectly balanced! How on earth did his father
achieve the impossible, Albie often wondered.
He
discovered the truth one day, of course!
COUNTER
SERVICE
Co-op
shop assistants, all in their immaculate white coats, waited
upon their customers, giving them the service to which they
had grown accustomed over the years.
Bacon
was sliced, butter was patted into slabs, cheese was cut to
order – shrink-wrapping was unknown then!
Biscuits
were weighed and put in paper bags; sugar and mixed fruit
also received the same treatment; vinegar was bottled with
the customer providing their own bottles, more often than
not – and everyone seemed to have more time and didn’t
mind the short wait.
Cigarettes,
especially Wild Woodbines were sold individually, as some
of the fishermen customers just liked four or five at a time,
and these, too, were placed in the ubiquitous, white paper
bag.
Then
there were the soda syphons ‘out the back’. Albie
often wondered what they did, and when he discovered the answer,
what it tasted like. He was unimpressed – and still preferred
his Vimto!
But,
alas, the end was in sight as progress and the introduction
of ‘self-service’ was lurking around the corner.
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 ALBIE’S
FATHER, ALSO CALLED ‘ALBERT’, had been a grocer
before the war, starting as a delivery boy with the Cromer Co-operative
Society and working his way up to the position of manager at the
Holt branch, just prior to the outbreak of hostilities in 1939.
On his return to ‘civvy’ life he spent a few years at
the Co-op in Suffield Park, Cromer, before being promoted Manager
and Buyer at Sheringham Co-operative Society, under the leadership
of Mr Edward Rix, General secretary.
ALBIE
HAD OFTEN PLAYED at ‘being a shopkeeper’ and one
day during his long summer holidays from the Paston School he was
to get his chance to work at the Co-op for real!
Wearing
a crisp, white coat, several sizes too large, Albie stood behind
the counter waiting to assist his very first customer, Mrs Wright,
from nearby Barford Road, who’d run out of sugar for her cup
of tea.
“Albie,”
said his dad, “could you weigh up some sugar for Mrs Wright?”
No
pre-packed in those days!
The lad proceeded to scoop the sugar, out of a large sack, and tipped
it into a large oval-shaped bowl on the scales ready to be weighed.
Placing a 2lb brass weight on the scales, Albie then began to add
some more sugar, a little at a time, until the correct balance was
made.
 Tipping
the sugar into a blue sugar bag, he then folded the top over –
a real knack in itself – just as his father had shown him.
“Here
you are, Mrs Wright,” Albie said, proudly handing her the bag
of sugar, “will there be anything else?”
“Why,
yes please, Albie,” she replied, neatly putting away the bag
of sugar in her wicker basket, “I’d like a pound of broken
biscuits.”
Now,
that always puzzled the lad; customers asking for broken
biscuits. But, eager to oblige, the lad went to the row of shiny,
square tins, each with its lid off displaying the contents. There
were round biscuits, long biscuits, plain and crumbly ones, and
above each bore a description and price, for example: ‘Huntley
& Palmers Digestive, 9d per half-pound’. Then, on the end
of the row, was a tin simply labelled: ‘Broken Biscuits’.
“But,
Mrs Wright,” suggested Albie, most politely, “wouldn’t
you prefer some unbroken biscuits instead?”
His
customer just stood there and laughed. “No, thanks, Albie,”
she chortled, “broken biscuits are only half price! Besides
I always break ’em in half afore I dunk ’em in me tea!”
Albie could see the sense in that!
The
lad began to add up Mrs Wright’s bill, writing the total in
a little book with tear-off slips.
“Don’t
forget to include Mrs Wright’s ‘divi’ number, Albie!”
called his dad. “An’ give the lady her copy, please.”
“328,”
the lady replied, so, Albie wrote the number on the slip, as his
father had told him. “I carn’t be a-doin’ without
my divi, can I?” laughed Mrs Wright.
ALBIE
MOVES THE CASH
By
that time, Sheringham Co-op had dispensed with the separate cash
tills on each counter and replaced them with a centralised cashier’s
position, linked to the counters by a system of overhead cables.
Above each counter dangled a little spring-loaded, thingammyjig
– that resembled a miniature cable car – to transport
the customer’s money to the cash desk.
The
method was quite simple; firstly, the bill would be totalled and
a small slip of paper made out and this, together with the money,
would be placed in a cup below the cablecar – then, with a
quick, sharp pull on the handle, it was away!
 “Thanks,
Mrs Wright,” said Albie’s father, then, as the lad couldn’t
quite reach: “here, let me do it for you, Albie!”
Unscrewing
the Bakelite cup under the cablecar, the Manager placed the cash
and hastily-written slip of paper inside. Then he gave the handle
a really good pull to send the little cable car winging its way
along the wires to the cashier. But on this occasion, as was so
often the case, the cablecar stopped mid way, as it had the habit
of ‘running out of steam’ at times.
“Go
on, boy Albie,” laughed his father, “get the broom an’
give it a shove, will ya?” Albie willingly obliged by tapping,
with the aid of the broomstick, it all the way to the cash desk.
“Da-ad,
wha’s this here divvy bus’ness, then?” Albie asked,
turning to his father. “Wha’s it for then?”
Albie’s
father thought for a moment, then decided a stint in the office
of the Sheringham Co-op would explain the ‘divi’ to the
lad, to which the Society Secretary, Ted Rix, thought it a marvellous
idea, and agreed that Albie should benefit from the experience!
So, the next Monday morning, it was arranged that the lad would
begin his first day as the office ‘junior’.
THE
OFFICE JUNIOR
Mr
Rix found Albie a nice desk in a corner of his personal office,
which, the lad noticed, smelled of wax-polished woodwork, paraffin
fumes from the Aladdin fire and aromatic tobacco, as the Secretary
was a habitual pipe-smoker.
“Now,
young fellow-me-lad,” said Mr Rix, puffing on his pipe and
pointing to a large pile of divi slips, “I’d like you
to start work addin’ up the ‘divi’.”
“But,
wha’s this all about, Mr Rix?” Albie queried, eager to
learn more, “this here ‘divi’ business?”
The
Society Secretary, pausing from his efforts at raising a smokescreen,
swivelled in his leather-upholstered chair and began to enlighten
the boy.
“Well,
it’s like this,” he began, “sit yourself down, here,
by me, an’ I’ll tell you all about it.”
Albie
sat next to Mr Rix and viewed, with trepidation, the vast pile of
divi slips laying on the table in front of him.
“People
– like your mum and dad and other customers at the Co-op –
are, in a sense, shareholders,” Mr Rix continued, “and
receive a small part of the profits, divided up, – known as
‘divi’ – usually in time for Christmas.”
Albie
could now see why it was called the ‘divi’, but where
did he fit in, he wondered?
“You
know your mum’s number?” Mr Rix continued, “which
she has to tell us each time she buys something.” Albie nodded
that he did. “Well,
every customer has their own number, so that we can add up all the
money they have spent with us throughout the year.”
Albie
then recalled his mum quoting a number when buying sherbets and
Liquorice Allsorts for him one day, and began to look closely at
the pile of divi slips, and there it was!
“Oh,
look, ‘627’, this is me Mum’s number,” Albie
proudly declared to Mr Rix, who was now intent on relighting his
briar pipe.
“Right,
well now I’ll tell ya what I’d like you to do,” the
Secretary announced, almost invisible in a cloud of sweetly-smelling
pipe smoke. “Firstly, you’ll sort the slips into alphabetical
order and then file them into these pigeon-holes.”
Glancing
around the office, Albie noticed a large open-fronted, wooden cupboard
with a great many compartments, or pigeon-holes as Mr Rix called
them. So, now that he knew what he had to do, he began sorting out
all the little divi slips and posting them into their appropriate
pigeon-holes.
During
the afternoon came the hard part, or so it seemed to Albie.
“Now
you’ve sorted ’em out I’d like you to add up the
amounts on each customer’s divi slips,” said Mr Rix. “Make
sure it’s done correctly, and try not to make any mistakes,
will you, Albie?”
Now
the lad was a bit alarmed by this, as he wasn’t too good at
mathematics, one of the reasons his father thought a spell in the
office might do the lad some good, of course.
“I
dun’t hev to do it in me head, do I, Mr Rix?” Albie asked,
nervously.
“Good
heavens, no, lad,” the Secretary replied, with a wry smile,
and handed him an archaic-looking adding-machine, with a large handle
on the side, for Albie to use instead. Following a brief demonstration,
the boy was soon pressing all the buttons and pulling the big lever,
and thoroughly enjoying himself, although it still didn’t help
much with his arithmetic!
Following
all the ‘adding up’, Albie entered each total into a large
feint-ruled book with a leather cover, that Mr Rix called a ‘ledger’.
“When
you’ve done,” said Mr Rix, “someone on the office
staff will calculate the divi later this week!” Albie heaved
a sigh of relief at
the news!
It
is to be hoped that all the Sheringham Co-op shareholders received
their correct amount of divi that Christmas, but, there again, maybe
they didn’t – as Albie was never asked to work in the
office again!
ALBIE
RELUCTANTLY ACCEPTS A NEW ROLE
A
few days before Christmas 1955, Albie was about to be in great demand
down at the Co-op, not in the office, or weighing up sugar, but
in a far more demanding role...
It
all began when
a disaster occurred with the non-appearance of Father Christmas.
Everything was ready; the decorations, such as they were, had been
put in place and a suitable ‘grotto’ constructed for the
important man at one end of the store. Outside, the crowd of long-suffering
mums and their excited offspring reached half way up Co-op Street,
but still no Father Christmas!
Where
was he? Had he been delayed at the North Pole? Or had one of his
reindeer dropped a shoe? The answer was rather more down-to-earth,
Father Christmas had taken to his sick bed with a bad dose of ’flu!
At
the time, Albie was kicking his heels at home, doing nothing in
particular, after all it was a usual Saturday afternoon for the
lad and, as usual, he had little or nothing on his mind.
“Oh,
for goodness sake!” shrilled his mum, as her poor lamb
followed her from room to room. “Stop moochin’ about an’
find suffin to do, will you?”
Just
then a frantic knocking was heard on the front door of Regis Cottage,
which did nothing to lessen Albie’s mum’s aggravated state
of mind.
 “Who
on earth is that on a Saturday arternoon?” she grumbled,
turning the key in the lock and throwing open the door. There, on
the doorstep, stood a very worried-looking Geoffrey Winterbourne,
the Co-op baker, who had just driven up in a very smart-looking,
gleaming Co-op van.
Draped
over Geoffrey’s arm was a bright-red suit, trimmed with snowy-white
fur.
“We
need Albie,” he blurted out, “at the Co-op, an’ he’s
gotta put this on!”
Albie,
it seemed, had been ‘volunteered’ to play the most important
role of his life, that of Father Christmas!
Protesting
vociferously, Albie was bundled in the bakery van, wearing the familiar
red and white garb of Father Christmas, complete with a cotton-wool
beard.
In
an attempt to disguise the fact that there was only a boy present
under all that get up, Albie was forced to wear a grotesque Guy
Fawkes’s mask, left over from 5 November!
The
little van left Regis Place and headed for the Co-op where hordes
of children were, by now, growing increasingly impatient. Through
the town they drove, eventually turning into Co-op Street, and as
Father Christmas stepped out of the bakery van a loud cheer went
up from the excited children.
Several
of the mums looked in amazement at the seasonal character and wondered
how he had been able to lose so much weight in just a year, as Albie
definitely lacked padding!
But
‘beanpole’ Albie, suitably disguised, with a wave of his
hand and an obligatory ‘Ho, Ho, Ho’ strode into the shop
with a large sack over his shoulder, whilst, quick as a flash, the
children followed their hero.
In
his grotto, Father Christmas sat on a hard, wooden wheelback chair,
brought in from the office next door, and beside him stood the bran
tub, or lucky dip. Somewhere inside, under all that sawdust, were
presents for the children, girls and boys alike.
For
the princely sum of ‘one shilling’, a child would come
forward, sit on the bearded gentleman’s knee and answer a few
simple questions, before taking a lucky dip in the tub for a present.
 “Hello
little girl, an’ wha’s your name?” asked Father Christmas.
“Dun’t
know!” replied the little child, somewhat overcome, “I
watta go hoome!”
Many
were struck speechless in awe of meeting the great man, or perhaps
it may have had something to do with his Guy Fawkes mask –
alas, we shall never know.
Some
had plenty to say, however, especially when it came to the second
question: “And what would you like me to bring you for Christmas?”
“I
watta trearn set, wiv rearl smook,” said one little boy. Father
Christmas, not wishing the little lad to be disappointed, replied:
“Well, I shall hatta see what I can do, although I may not
have enough to go round this year!”
“But,
they’re still got pletty on ’em in Randalls’ Toy
Shop!” quipped the lad.
Albie
just promised him, and the other children, the Christmas that dreams
are made of, but afterwards hoped they weren’t going to be
too disappointed. Anyway, they all seemed to have enjoyed themselves,
sitting on the knee of Father Christmas, who was not much older
than some of them and, by the end of the afternoon, Albie was enjoying
himself as well.
One
little lad tugged at his beard to see if it was real, and reeled
back in fright at the grotesque face that was revealed under the
beard. Albie just took comfort in the fact that, being incognito
as the result of wearing that hideous mask, he was totally unrecognisable
to anyone – which came as a great relief to him!
“You’ll
never, ever, catch me actin’, ever again!” Albie declared,
removing his disguise in the safety of his home, quite relieved
at his ordeal being over at long last. But
how wrong he was to be!
NEXT:
Albie turns his hand to music and playing
the guitar. But will he impress his parents and the neighbours
with his less-than-harmonious renditions?
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