Kate's story

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Billy Hopkins, who is better known to his family and friends as Wilfred Hopkins, was born in Collyhurst in 1928 and attended schools in Manchester. Before going into higher education, he worked as a copy boy for the Manchester Guardian. He later studied at the Universities of London, Manchester and Leeds and has been involved in schoolteaching and teacher-training in Liverpool, Manchester, Salford and Glasgow. He also worked in African universities in Kenya, Zimbabwe and Malawi.

Billy Hopkins is married with six grown-up children and now lives in retirement with his wife in Southport. His two bestselling autobiographical novels, Our Kid and High Hopes , are also available from Headline.

‘I enjoyed reading your first two books about your life, and have just finished Kate’s Story. Again, I enjoyed this immensely. I should like to thank you for your authentic and compelling book’ Molly Boyes, Hatfield, Herts

‘As I sit here writing this note to you, my wife, Anne, has begun reading Kate s Story and within a few minutes, there was first of all laughter followed almost immediately by weeping! My turn to read the book next and I can hardly wait’ Angus Greenhalgh, Perth, Australia

‘I feel I must write to thank you for the pleasure I got reading your books. How true to life, as it were, they all are!’ Mrs Margaret Roberts, Keighley, Yorkshire

‘My congratulations on the freshness of your memory, the richness and generosity of your values, and the liveliness and sincerity of your creative touches’ Dr Con Casey, Retired Head of Education, Hopwood Hall

‘There are a hundred things I could congratulate you for on your books. I have read lots of things that appeal . . . but they have not touched my heart as you have’ Mrs Helen Carter, Morpeth, Northumberland

‘Your books have given me a real insight into what life was really like for our grandparents and great grandparents. Thank you so much from another satisfied customer’ Mrs Maria Hobain, Newcastle, Staffordshire

‘I would just like to say I thought your books were fantastically written; they made me laugh out loud and they made me cry. I have finished High Hopes and couldn’t put it down’ D. Gilbert, Uxbridge, Middlesex

‘Everyone will enjoy High Hopes . . . The book reflects the exuberance of youth in those early days of post-war Britain. Thank you for providing such a good read and for bringing so much pleasure to all who enjoy tales of Manchester’ Bernard Lawson, M.B.E., Retired Private Secretary to the Lord Mayor of Manchester

'High Hopes is very readable, unpretentious and brimming with humour. It lifts the curtain on life in the ’40s - as it was for students and for a young teacher in an inner-city school’ Joan Kennedy, Retired Teacher, Manchester

‘It was a great pleasure to read this highly entertaining sequel to Our Kid. Its mixture of fact and fiction, class divisions, failures and triumphs, set in the aftermath of the war recalls vividly memories of a Manchester I knew’ Dan Murphy, Retired Teacher, Manchester

‘I have read High Hopes and Our Kid - my kind of books. I laughed and cried, and thought, ‘been there, done that’. They reminded me so much of my childhood in the ’40s and ’50s. Whatever you write, we will buy. Please keep on writing’ Mrs Thelma Morris, High Peak, Derbyshire

‘The pawkish humour of Billy remains and bubbles out frequently in unexpected places . . . This latest book is a wonderful sequel to the life and career of Billy the Collyhurst Kid’ Dr Jennie McWilliam, GP, Staffordshire

‘I read High Hopes faster than many books I’ve read all year. I both laughed and cried throughout. . . Billy is a loveable character with an irrepressible sense of humour’ Mrs Kathleen Rawcliffe, Infants Teacher, Fleetwood, Lancs

‘ Our Kid . . . was the funniest book I have ever read - it had me laughing out loud, it was so great. You sure have the gift of writing’ Isobel Fox, Doncaster, Yorkshire

‘The book is like a best friend - no one likes to see the friendship come to an end - and that’s just how I felt when I read [the last] page’ Visiter

‘Reading Our Kid was a very moving experience! I was born in Salford and so you can understand my deep emotion at reading your wonderfully written, deeply touching, extremely heart-warming memoirs. Congratulations!’ John Sherlock, Hollywood Producer

‘To say I couldn’t put Our Kid down is an understatement. . . I kept laughing at the truly funny incidents and had to read some out to my husband. I really didn’t want to finish Our Kid but knowing High Hopes was waiting in the wings was a bonus’ Mrs K. Pearson, Gosport, Hampshire

A cknozvledgements

Kate y s Story is the first in a trilogy, though oddly enough it was the last to be written. I have many people to thank for their help along the way. I owe a debt of gratitude to all those relatives and friends who gave valuable advice, in particular my brother Alf for carrying out research in Manchester (especially with regard to the Swinton Industrial School), to members of the General Practitioner Writers’ Association, especially Dr Darragh Little of Limerick for his expertise, to my daughter Catherine for her insightful comments and feedback, and to her husband Steve for tracking down documents, to the staff of Ainsdale Library for their ever-willing help in answering my many inquiries, and finally to my wife Clare for her endless patience in listening to early drafts and for her unfailing encouragement.

I could not possibly end this section without mentioning the inspiration given by Isobel Dixon of the Blake Friedmann Literary Agency, and Marion Donaldson of Headline Publishing. They have always been there ready to give professional support whenever I needed it.

Foreword

This is the story of my mother Kate. When she was eighty- nine years old, I took a tape recorder into her room and asked her to tell me her life story. How she could talk! Her story filled two ninety-minute tapes! This book is based on what she told me and whilst I have taken a certain poetic licence with names and characterisation, the events themselves - all of which took place before I was born - are true. Life in the early part of the twentieth century was tough but Kate was a survivor and retained an optimistic outlook right to the end of her life. There is no doubt in my mind that it was this outlook that enabled her to live to the ripe old age of ninety-two.

I want to say finally that I found writing this story to be one of the most moving experiences of my life. If you share some of these emotions in reading it, my labour has been worthwhile.

Chapter One

If you were to ask me which was the happiest day of my life, I think, looking back, I’d probably pick my eleventh birthday. It was also the diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria, and at school we’d been given special mugs with her picture on them and, what’s more, we’d been given the day off as well. I can see it now. But let me tell you a little about myself first.

My name’s Catherine but everyone called me Kate, except teachers and priests who always gave me my full title, Catherine Lally.

We lived in Butler Court, a little cul-de-sac with a gutter running down the middle, off Butler Street in Ancoats, Manchester. There were only three terraced houses on the court, the two-up, two-down, scullery at the back kind - you probably know the sort. Next door to us lived old one- eyed Annie Swann who kept a flea-bitten, mangy dog called Pug which was supposed to guard her, and a fat lot of good it was too. Why, our black cat Snowy only had to arch its back and spit and it ran off down the court howling in terror. Annie wore an old battered hat with tatty artificial flowers round the rim and I think it was welded to her head for she never took it off, not even when she went to the lavatory. Mam said she was the district layer-outer who put pennies on your eyes when you were dead and

she was also a pawnbroker’s runner - whatever that was. I think the hat was her badge of office. Danny and me were always tormenting her by playing black rabbit, that is tying cotton to her door knocker, pulling the string to make it knock, and hiding when she opened her front door to see who it was.

Old Annie may have been the layer-outer but I was the letter-writer, not only for our court but for a few streets beyond. Many of the people round there couldn’t read or write and so they thought I was a scholar because I was the only one with a fountain pen - one of the new Waterman’s which Dad had bought me at Christmas along with a book of fairy tales by the Grimm Brothers. So people came to me when they wanted a form filled in or a letter written applying for relief or that sort of thing; they usually gave me a penny but I was only too happy to do it for nothing if they had no money.

The end house was occupied by Mr and Mrs Sam Hicks, a drunken pair if ever there was one. I hardly ever saw them sober and they were always bickering and screaming at each other, usually over money. I don’t think Sam Hicks had a job and Mam used to wonder where they got their money from but at six o’clock every night, Sam’s missus, Ivy, went out dolled up to the nines. Dad said she was on the game but I never saw her playing any games, not once. Not like Dad who’d play hide-and-seek with us if he wasn’t at work and he wasn’t too tired.

In the back entry behind the houses, we had one cold tap between the lot of us the kind that had a button to press - and we all shared the one lavatory, though not at the same time, thank goodness. Each house had its own big key so as to keep the privy private like, as we didn’t want strangers in there messing it up. Outside the lavatory door, there was- a hook with a big wooden curtain ring on

it and when you went, you had to take the ring inside with you to let everyone know there was somebody in. For Annie Swann, though, there was no need for the ring because her poxy dog used to stand outside on sentry duty. She sat in there singing songs like ‘Home, Sweet Home’ and us kids clung to each other giggling. I never went to the lav at night, though, as I was too scared of the dark and there was no candle. I was terrified as well that Mrs Swann would catch me and lay me out with pennies on my eyes. If any of us needed to go during the night, we used the chamber pot.

We took turns to clean the privy and cut up fresh newspaper squares to hang on the nail. Saturday morning was my turn to wash out and donkey-stone the place, worse luck, ’cos it usually stank like mad from the night before when the Hickses had been on the beer. Late on, the night-soil men used to come round with the cart to empty the privy. We always kept the windows closed when they went past but just the same we couldn’t avoid getting a strong whiff of the terrible pong, no matter how late it was.

We lived in a quiet court but Butler Street and Oldham Road were near and they were always busy with people and traffic of every kind - horse trams, coal carts, delivery vans, hansom cabs. At the corner of the two big roads there was a massive hoarding with thousands of bills stuck all over it and I was always fascinated by them, for they told of things I’d never tasted, places I’d never been to or even heard of, stage shows I’d have given anything to see. Cameo Cigarettes; The Best Tea in the World 1/10 per lb at Seymour Mead’s; Meadow Sweet Cheese; Kompo for Colds; Moore’s Ladies’ Costumes 10/6d at John Noble’s; Zebra Grate Polish; In its last week at the Prince’s Theatre - Babes in the Wood ; At the Queen’s

Theatre - Mr Louis Calvert in a Grand Production of Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra ; Singer’s Sewing Machines; He: ‘OXO?’ She: ‘Rather!’; Bovril Cures Influenza; Colman’s Starch as good as Colman’s Mustard; Van Houten’s Cocoa - simply the best and it lasts longer; prepare to meet thy god; Devon & Cornwall for holidays by G.W.R.; Saved by Virol; At the Casino: Vesta Tilley and Dan Leno admission 2d to 6d.

There were lots of shops on Butler Street but we went to Greenall’s at the corner because it stocked everything you could think of from food to firewood, medicine to mousetraps. On the wall they’d pinned up one of those notices which said: ‘Please do not ask for credit as refusal often offends’ but they were always happy to let you have something on tick as long as you paid them at the end of the week.

Though Butler Court was a small alley, there was always something going on. Apart from the Hickses tearing each other’s eyes out, we had other entertainments and visitors, like the street singer, the knife-sharpener, the Gypsy with her snotty-nosed kids selling paper flowers and God help you if you didn’t buy something ’cos she put a terrible curse on you, the terrifying old rag and bone man who swapped old clothes or old iron for a donkey stone or scouring soap, the door-to-door salesman with his case of razors, safety pins and shoelaces, the club man to collect the funeral insurance money, and the tallyman to collect the weekly payments. And every morning, we had the milk cart with its massive churn and the milkman ladled out a pint or a gill or whatever you wanted into your own jug. We always gave his horse, Ben, a treat - an apple, a carrot or a jam butty - and he refused to go on until he’d got it. Sometimes we offered him a sugar lump on a flat hand but that took a lot of nerve and I was the only one who would do it.

In the morning of the day I’m talking about, we were playing the usual games in the street. When I say ‘we’, I mean my younger brother Danny who was eight, my little sister Cissie who was five, and Lizzie Brennan aged nine who lived with her mother, my Auntie Gladys, in our cellar. Lizzie was not only my best friend but my cousin as well ’cos she was the daughter of my Uncle Jack who’d been killed when he fell off a ladder. Oh, yes, and there was our baby Eddie an’ all, but he was only two weeks old, too young to play, and besides, he thought of nothing but his next meal at the breast. Mam and Auntie Gladys were sitting on chairs outside our door enjoying the sunshine and Eddie was fast asleep in his bassinet.

As I said, we were playing in the street. Danny spent his time falling off the homemade stilts which Dad had made out of two tin cans and pieces of string while us girls were playing hopscotch in the squares we’d chalked on the flags. Much to our surprise, Luigi Granelli appeared with his barrel organ and his monkey and began churning out ‘Little Dolly Daydream’. Funny that, ’cos he didn’t usually come down Butler Court - ‘There’s no enough bambini,’ he’d say. I think my dad must’ve slipped him a tanner because of my birthday. Anyway, we left off our games, and we danced and sang in a ring to the wobbly piano sound of Luigi’s barrel organ.

We laughed our socks off at the antics of Pongo, his pet monkey, which ran round with the hat collecting the pennies. While we were doing that, we had a second surprise ’cos Antonio Rocca and his ice-cream cart suddenly turned into the court. The first time he’d ever done that. I knew for certain then that Dad had fixed it.

‘Mam, Mam, can we have a cornet?’ I pleaded. ‘Please, Mam. It’s my birthday today, remember.’

‘Oh, very well, Kate,’ she said. ‘Go and get my purse off the kitchen table and bring two cups for me and Gladys here. And we’ll need two teaspoons as well.’

‘It’s good of you, Celia,’ said Auntie Gladys. ‘Ice cream’s just what the doctor ordered in this scorching weather.’

I ran down the lobby and into the living room. There was the scent of cedarwood as I pulled out the heavy drawers in the big sideboard, rattling the statues in their glass shades. I was soon back with the two cups, the spoons and the purse. Mam took out a tanner.

‘Right, Kate. Get ice cream in these two cups for me and Gladys and five cornets. And ask Antonio there to put raspberry on ’em.’

Antonio filled five cornets and gave each one a big helping of raspberry. He handed them one by one to me and I passed the first one to my young sister. ‘First one’s for you, our Cissie, ’cos you’re the youngest. Next one for you, Lizzie.’ Lizzie was a beautiful girl with rosy cheeks and shoulder-length golden hair like her mother’s. I handed the next two to our Danny. ‘And one for you, Danny, and take this one over to Luigi and tell him to change the tune. You know which one I mean,’ I said, giving him a wink.

‘God bless you and your bella famiglia, Mrs Lally,’ Luigi called across as he began a frontal attack on his ice cream.

Finally I handed one of the cups now charged with ice cream to Lizzie. ‘Take this over to your Mam, Lizzie. And I’ll take the other cup to mine.’

Soon, we were busy devouring ‘Rocca’s delicious ices’ as it said in the bright curly lettering on the side of his cart.

Luigi obeyed the whispered request from Danny and laughingly turned the pointer of the organ to change the tune.

‘By special request of Caterina and Daniele, the favourite song of Signor and Signora Lally,’ he announced and began turning the handle. The strains of the new tune went round Butler Court and, still licking our ices, we lifted our voices to sing the chorus.

By the time we had finished, both Mam and Aunty Gladys were in tears. The song never failed to have that effect. They said it always reminded them of Ireland and the times that used to be.

‘ Adesso , devo andare ,’ Antonio laughed as he trundled off with his cart. ‘ Arrivederci . Now I musta get a move on

to maka sure I get my place on Market Street. I see everybody at the big parade, maybe?’

Luigi Granelli was next to go, leaving behind some- thing of an anticlimax. The other kids went back to their games but I sat on the step next to my mam. I liked to listen in to adult conversation though I didn’t understand much of it.

‘I’m so grateful to you, Celia, for all you’ve done for our Lizzie and me,’ Auntie Gladys was saying. ‘If you hadn’t taken us in and given us your front cellar, I don’t know what we’d have done without you, I really don’t.’

‘Don’t mention it, Gladys,’ Mam said. ‘It’s the least we could do for you. We look on you and Lizzie as part of the family. I only wish we could have given you the parlour but as you know, we have to keep that nice in case we have important visitors, like the doctor or the priest.’

‘The cellar’s fine for us, Celia. It’s nice and warm there, especially when you’ve done the washing on Monday morning. My job at the soda works pays me only one and six a day and so if you hadn’t come to the rescue, we’d have been in Queer Street and no mistake.’

Queer Street! What a strange name, I thought, and I wondered where it was and if it was anywhere near Butler Court but I didn’t ask in case they told me to run away and play.

‘When Jack was killed in that accident,’ Gladys said, ‘I thought my life had come to an end, I really did. The world doesn’t take kindly to an unmarried mother. Not even the church would help us. A fallen woman, they called me.’

I was puzzled by this. What did she mean when she said she was a fallen woman? I’d never seen her fall, not once.

I looked at both her knees to see if she had any scabs but I couldn’t see any.

‘That’s in the past, Gladys,’ Mam said. ‘I should try to forget it if I were you. After all, it’s nine years ago. And there’s no shame in any of it ’cos Jack would have married you if he’d lived.’ -

‘Try telling that to the gossipy neighbours,’ Auntie Gladys said. ‘They used to say some right nasty things about me, like “He died leaving a bun in the oven” and “He’s left her in the pudding club”.’

I’d never realised that my late Uncle Jack had been a baker as everyone’d told me he was a bricklayer. And what were they doing in a pudding club and why had he left her there?

‘Little pitchers have big ears,’ Mam said, flicking her eyes and her head in my direction.

My mam always said this when she thought I was listening to adult talk. Thought I didn’t know what it meant. She must’ve thought I was daft.

‘I take your point, Celia,’ I heard Auntie Gladys saying. ‘Anyroad, if you hadn’t taken us in, we’d have ended up in the workhouse.’

‘Don’t even breathe that word in this house.’ Mam picked up the baby and clutched him to her breast as if to protect him. ‘The mention of it sends cold shivers down my spine. I’d rather give myself and my kids an overdose of laudanum than go into one of them places. You’ve had some rotten luck, Gladys, and I only wish we could’ve done more for you but never wish yourself into the workhouse. Pray to God that it’ll never come to that. We’ve been lucky up to now, touch wood. As you know, Mick has a good job at the Poland Street glassworks, being a gaffer now with his own chair.’

‘He’s gone up in the world, has Mick,’ Auntie Gladys said. ‘And good luck to him. He deserves it - he works that hard.’

‘He does an’ all. There’s no denying he has a good job but they work such funny shifts at that glassworks - twelve hours on and twelve hours off. One week he’s on nights and on days the next. It has something to do with keeping the furnaces going, he says. Today, though, he finishes at dinnertime and he’s got the day off because of the jubilee. So we mustn’t grumble. He works all the hours God sends but he earns good money. Last week, he came away with thirty-two shillings in wages with overtime.’ Mam gave a deep sigh of contentment.

‘Our rent’s only seven and six a week and we’ve even started to save a few bob. If we go careful, one day we might be able to afford a bigger house with our own yard, our own lavatory, and even our own water tap. That’s pipe- dreaming, I suppose.’ She laughed at her own joke. ‘Mick has even talked about buying a piano on the never-never. He loves a bit o’ music, does Mick. New, they’re twenty- five pounds but we’ve seen a second-hand Broadwood for only three pounds - that’s three bob a week from Worsley’s on Rochdale Road. And who knows? One of these days we might manage a little holiday back home. I’d love to see Tralee again.’

‘That’ll be the day, Celia. Holidays in Ireland, your own tap, your own lavatory, and a piano. That’s asking a lot.’

‘Talkin’ of Mick,’ Mam said suddenly, ‘that reminds me. I promised to send his snap over to him by ten o’clock. He’ll go mad if he doesn’t get it.’ She hurriedly put baby Eddie back in the bassinet. ‘Instead of listening in to things,

our Kate, you can run a couple of errands for me. Take your father’s snap to him; he’ll be waiting for it. Tell him I’ve managed to get him some nice boiled ham and there’s a brew of tea and condensed milk in his billycan. And on the way, go to your Auntie Sarah’s with this half-a-crown. I promised to help her out till Friday. And here’s a bowl of broth for your grannie. Tell her to warm it up in the oven for her dinner.’

‘Right, Mam. And I wasn’t listening in. Are we really going to get a piano?’

I collected the items and set off. My Auntie Sarah was a little, short-tempered woman who lived with my Uncle Barney in a one-up-and-one-down in Portugal Close a few streets away; and there was no question of who was boss in that house. She had only to give him one of her looks without even uttering a word and he was already saying ‘Yes, dear, yes, dear’ over and over again. And even though Auntie had a part-time job in a bagging factory somewhere on Shudehill, they were always short of money as Barney was only a casual builder’s labourer and was in and out of work. Mostly out.

Barney’s one escape was his rabbits which he kept in a hutch in the yard. Everybody in the district knew about them. Understandably, ’cos you could smell them a mile away.

‘I’m not joking,’ Aunt Sarah said, ‘he thinks more about them bloody rabbits than he does about me. He’s given them names and is out there talking to them all the hours God sends. He could be dead out there and I don’t think anyone’d notice for a couple of days until he stopped coming in for his tea. One of these days, I swear I’ll serve them up to him in a pie.’

We saw Barney every Friday when he came over to our house to borrow the tin bath.

‘Ta, love,’ Auntie Sarah said when I handed over the money. ‘You’re a good girl. And your mam tells me it’s your birthday. So here’s ha’penny for you. Get yourself a few toffees.’

A ha’penny bought a sherbert, with a twist of liquorice that you dipped into the powder. It tasted nice but it left a sticky mess round your mouth.

‘Ta,’ I said to my auntie and I went over to my gran’s in Bengal Street across the road. She lived in a furnished room that used to be someone’s parlour but she’d made it her own by filling it with her old furniture and a great big aspidistra.

I didn’t like going to my gran’s ’cos she was a bit strange, was my gran. I was told that she and Grandad came over from Kerry because there’d been a famine there. Sometimes I thought Gran hadn’t changed her frock since because as long as I’d known her, she’d always dressed in black from head to foot with a cameo brooch at the neck and a silk mob cap stuck on the top of her head. On her sideboard she had a grim-looking photo of my grandad when he’d been a soldier in the Dublin Fusiliers. His name was Henry and he had a face like an ox with one of those big droopy moustaches. I’d never met him ’cos he’d been killed in Africa before I was born. Gran was always going on about Zulu warriors and how they loved sticking spears in people, especially people like my grandad. She had a good army pension of seven shillings a week but since she’d lost my grandad she’d gone a bit funny and the only thing she wanted to do was sit in her chair talking to herself. That wasn’t so bad but she was always wanting to give me advice, and when she started I made for the door and quick. One thing I’d say for her, though, she told me

things my own mother was too shy to talk about. Anyroad, I gave her the broth. She said, ‘The only broth worth having is the kind you can stand your spoon up in.’ She had some right funny ideas, if you ask me.

I told her I couldn’t stay as I had to take my dad’s snap. ‘Don’t you worry yourself about me,’ she said. ‘I won’t be bothering any of you much longer. Leave the basin on the sideboard. Call in tomorrow after school and do my errands.’

Not so much as a please or a thank you. Didn’t smile. Never did. There was gratitude for you. I left her and walked down George Leigh Street to the glassworks.

I loved going over to the works as it gave me the chance to watch the men turning out all kinds of glass objects. It was like magic. The man on the gate knew my face and always let me go straight onto the factory floor as long as I didn’t go too near the furnaces. And Dad always made some little thing for me. At home, I had lots of glass stuff he’d blown for me - little toys, or friggers as the glass- workers called them - a bell, a dog, a deer, and even a horse. Maybe today, I thought, he’d make something extra special.

I waited on the edgings for a horse and coal cart to go past and then I went down Silk Street, taking a short cut along Radium Street. Over the road, on the Portugal Street Rec, the Sanger’s Carnival Company was setting up their fairground of stalls, sideshows, and roundabouts. I always felt a thrill of excitement when I saw the men unloading the tents, running about, hammering stakes into the ground, shouting instructions to each other, hoisting up poles, cranking handles, and creating a wonderland before my eyes. I loved fairgrounds - the lights, the piped music, the smell of the food and the oil of the machinery. There were the booths with the freak shows: the bearded lady,

the three-headed animals, the mermaids. Was there any chance of Dad taking us? Maybe if I reminded him about my birthday, he might.

I crossed over Poland Street and went into the works. The glassworks was a large, funnel-shaped building on a small industrial estate. In the glass-blowing department where Dad worked, there were twelve men in two teams of six, all of them stripped to the waist in the heat. They sweated like mad because of the furnaces which were kept hot by the teasers who stoked them up. I’d watched them before many a time. The team worked together like dancers, turning ever so gracefully from furnace to chair, swinging the long irons with the white-hot tips which they dipped into buckets of water before blowing and working them into lovely long-stemmed wine glasses, ready for the polishers and the engravers to add the finishing touch.

‘Time for a break, me boyos,’ my dad announced when he saw me coming. ‘Ah, there she stands, my beautiful little Kate,’ he said. ‘A sight for these poor sore eyes, if ever there was one. Is she not like an angel from heaven? Have you ever seen such a lovely creature, lads?’ He broke out into song. ‘ She was such a lovely creature , boys , that nature did intend/To go right through the world my boys without the Grecian bend'

I paid no attention to his singing and his praises because I felt so embarrassed in front of those men. I handed over the lunch box and the billycan.

‘Sit down there, me little darling,’ he said, pointing to a bench some way off from the furnace, ‘while we have our break and then you can take the empty can home.’

‘Alfie, run and fetch me a gallon of water like a good boy for haven’t I a terrible thirst on me. I could drink the River Irwell on my own.’

Alfie, a young twelve-year-old, grabbed the brown jug and ran off to get the water.

‘Alfie’s going to make a bloody good glass-blower one day,’ Dad remarked. ‘He’s a smart lad.’

‘Never mind about Alfie,’ said Shaun, the teaser. ‘What about your own son? Young Danny’ll soon be ready for work, I’m thinking. You could teach him yourself, Mick, for what you don’t know about glass-blowing isn’t worth knowing.’

‘No, no,’ Dad said decisively. ‘I’ll not have any lad of mine in this business. There’s the question of health. Look at the damage we’re doing to our eyes looking into that furnace and the molten glass all day. I think I must have more cataracts than Lake Victoria.’

The men laughed. Maybe they were nervous ’cos they all had trouble with their eyes.

‘Sure, they should give us them protective goggles to shade our eyes,’ said Shaun, ‘but our firm’s too bloody mean.’

‘They’d be no good anyway,’ Dad said. ‘For they’d soon get misted over and we wouldn’t be able to see what we’re doing. Apart from the damage to our eyes, there’s the bits of glass we pick up into our joints. And since we went over to lead crystal, God knows what poisons we’re taking into our lungs. No, I’d like my lad to get a job where he can breathe God’s clean air.’

‘Then he’d better move away from Manchester, Mick,’ said Fergus O’Leary, one of the team. ‘Perhaps a job back home in Ireland?’

‘Ah, there’s no work to be had in Ireland. Do you think any of us would be here if we could get a job there?’

‘But you must agree,’ said Shaun, ‘the money here’s good and well-paid jobs are not easy to come by.’

‘That’s my cue for another song,’ Dad laughed and he broke out into the tune of‘Mountains of Mourne’.

Everyone roared at Dad’s singing. I was that proud to see my dad was so popular.

‘Ah, the money’s not that good, Shaun,’ Dad went on, ‘especially when we think what the bosses are making. I read in the paper that a mill in Salford is celebrating the jubilee by giving its two thousand workers the day off and a pound each. They must be making big profits if they can afford to give all that away.’

‘That’s more than Manchester and Salford are doing,’ said Fergus ‘As far as I can see, the councils are giving themselves a big feed in their town halls and a bit of a tea to the needy and the destitute old people - but just for the day, mind you. The rest of the year, they can bugger off and starve. When it comes to this jubilee, I’ll be staying at home. All this talk about the British Empire and the Queen’s loyal subjects! Slaves conquered by the British is more like it. Besides, she’s not the Queen of Ireland as far as I’m concerned. Today every true Irishman should be wearing not red, white, and blue, not even green but black like the patriots in Limerick.’

‘Ah, it’s only a bit of fun and excitement and the kids love it,’ Dad said. ‘The decorations on the town hall in Albert Square are something to behold, so I’m told.’

his lips and drank greedily. His Adam’s apple rose and fell as he noisily gulped the water down. The drink triggered a fit of coughing.

‘There. What did I tell you?’ Dad exclaimed. ‘Hasn’t the water brought up the stuff I’ve been breathing. Here I am forty-four and sometimes I feel like seventy-four. No use complaining though. I suppose we’ve got to thank the Lord and His Holy Mother that we have jobs at all.’

‘You’re right there, Mick,’ said Shaun. ‘Pity the poor jobless people on outdoor relief. I read today in the Evening Chron that the authorities in their generosity are going to raise their money from six shillings and sixpence to seven and six a week in honour of the jubilee.’

‘And that extra shilling is not permanent but is only for one week,’ added Fergus who seemed to have ‘it’s only for one day’ on the brain. ‘I’m sure Her Gracious Majesty the Empress Victoria will be pleased when she hears her destitute subjects are to be given such a magnificent sum to keep body and soul together. Especially when we hear that she’s to spend a few million quid on her own celebrations.’

‘There I go again,’ he spluttered. ‘God knows what stuff is in my lungs. If someone were to blow into my gullet, I’m sure they could shape a couple of fine glass ornaments down there.’

‘Mam said that you were to come straight home at dinnertime, and no going into the Lord Napier with your mates,’ I said.

‘Of course I know what day ’tis. Do you think I’m the village idiot? ’Tis Tuesday, is it not?’

‘I don’t have a calendar with me, Kate, but if I’m not mistaken ’tis Tuesday, June the twenty-second, eighteen ninety-seven. Am I not right, boys?’

The ‘boys’ signified their agreement with grunts, mumbles and laughter. They loved these little games Mick played with me each time I came to bring his snack.

‘Ah, well now, Kate. Let me think. I suppose you thought you’d catch me out with that one. Have we not been talking about the very thing. ’Tis the diamond jubilee of Her Gracious Majesty, Queen Empress Victoria.’

‘No, no, Dad,’ I said, exasperated. ‘It’s even more special than that, and you know it. Stop teasing me.’

‘Teasing you, begorrah. There’s only one teaser in this place, young lady, and that’s Shaun there whose job ’tis to tease the furnaces.’

‘Well, would you believe it?’ Dad grinned. ‘Here’s me with a daughter who’s nearly middle-aged and I didn’t even know it. I suppose you’ll be wanting some kind of present.’

‘Your wish is my command,’ he said. ‘Right, lads, you heard what she said. A flip flap the young lady said but I think we can do better than that.’

Fergus, the gatherer, walked swiftly over to the furnace and thrust the long tube into the molten glass. With great

skill, he drew off a glowing bulb and handed it across to Dad in his chair. I gazed fascinated as he swung and rolled the long iron to and fro making the fiery gob of metal change shape with its flip-flap noise. When he was sure the shape was right, he dipped the glass into a bucket of water, raised the tube to his lips and blew.

Fergus handed him a pair of tongs and, using these, Dad shaped the cooling glass into the body of a cat. He detached the animal and took it to the leer, the long cooling tunnel.

‘Now, that should be ready in a couple of days, me darlin’ Kate, and I’ll bring it home to you then, that is if the polishers and the engravers don’t smash it with their clumsiness.’

He saw the look of disappointment on my face and he said, ‘But I suppose you’ll be wanting something now since it’s your birthday today and not in two days’ time.’ He turned to the young apprentice. ‘Alfie, run up to the engraving department and see if they have that special thing ready - the one we made last week.’

‘Here’s a special something for a special somebody. Dad said, handing me the box.

Watched by the workmen, I opened it. There in its custom-made cardboard holder, I found the most beautiful glass swan. On the side of the bird, the engravers had inscribed a birthday message:TO KATE LALLY ON HER ELEVENTH BIRTHDAY JUNE 22 nd 1897

‘Oh, Dad,’ I said. ‘This is the best present I’ve ever had. I’ll look after it for the rest of my life.’ I kissed my dad on

the cheek and gave him a tight hug. ‘I love you, Dad,’ I said. An unusual thing for me to do and say because we were not the kissing kind.

‘That kiss and the hug are the only reward I need,’ he said, eyes glistening. ‘Now run along home with you. We’ve got work to do.’

‘All right, Dad. But don’t forget we’re going to town this afternoon for the big parade. And, Dad, Sanger’s Carnival are setting up their fairground on the Rec. Do you think we could . . .’

‘Ah, go along with you, you young madam,’ he laughed. ‘We’ll see about that later today.’

I left the factory floor and hurried home. I had to get ready for the afternoon and our little family outing.