The country was in the throes of change and our street was in a state of excitement. In October 1948, Nye Bevan brought his wonderful National Health Service into all our lives. At a stroke, the worry about the cost of being ill was removed from the working classes and the poor.
The women gathered on the pavement and discussed this latest bit of news. Cissy Murray, who lived in the last close at the far end of the street, was the main spokeswoman on the subject. This was mainly because, although she didn’t realise it, her husband Will was the street’s hypochondriac as well as being bone lazy. Poor Cissy, with her round dumpling face and thick spectacles which must have been rose-tinted when she married her husband, had but one aim in life – to look after Will. According to her, he had a chest condition and this seemingly made him incapable of switching on the wireless let alone doing a job of work.
Mrs Doyle used to be annoyed by this. ‘She runs after him too much,’ she claimed. ‘She even lights his fags for him! Eh blame it on her no having any bairns. Believe me, if she had a half dozen kids running around her feet she wouldn’t have time to buzz around a big healthy man.’
‘Aye but that doesn’t stop him haring off to Watery Willie’s every night for his pint,’ said Lizzie, who was also perplexed by Cissy’s meek behaviour. ‘Eh mean, Eh’m no a nosy person but Eh can’t help but see him from my window when Eh’m washing my dishes.’
The clutch of women agreed with her. None of the women in the street had a great or easy life but, compared to Cissy, they were well off. They all felt sorry for this poor, put-upon woman whose face wobbled like a blancmange every time she shook her head. Cissy had a penchant for gingham and most of her wardrobe seemed to consist of garments made in this checked fabric. It also, according to the street grapevine, was very much in evidence in her house.
‘She must have bought a whole roll of it before the war. She’s got it made up in her blouses and pinnies as well as her bedcover, curtains and tablecloth,’ said one sage who seemed to know the house’s contents by heart.
Cissy was a woman of many words, never believing in brevity if she could help it. She much preferred a hundred-word statement when half a dozen would have been sufficient. What I liked about her was her wonderful way of mixing up words. I had never heard of Sheridan’s work, but I know now that Cissy was a dead ringer for Mrs Malaprop. As she stood in the midst of the women, discussing Nye Bevan and the free health service, she remarked, ‘Will has tae watch he doesn’t catch bronchitis because his chest gets all congenital. Still, we don’t need to worry now. Eh can call the doctor out without having to run down tae Dickson’s pawnshop to hock my wedding ring for the five-bob doctor’s fee.’
Everyone was of one mind. It was certainly a wonderful scheme. The women’s faces were still pale and weary because Mr Strachey had lowered everyone’s hopes for an end to rationing. But at least our healthcare was now assured, thanks to the visionary genius of Mr Bevan. After all, didn’t we all know about the terrible death toll from tuberculosis, that awful sword of Damocles that hung over entire families in the overcrowded tenements?
Then there was Minnie. She suffered from chronic asthma and was forever being found gasping for breath on the strip of drying green at 108 Hilltown. During a really bad turn she would send for the doctor but her medicine was usually purchased from the chemist under her own diagnostic instructions. I remember how shocked I had been on a rare visit to her damp and dismal single room when I saw her bedside cabinet almost covered by a huge assortment of medicines.
Now the general consensus was that the sun had set on these bad conditions. We were urged to sign on with a doctor of our choice and Mum had no hesitation. After work one evening we were going to sign on with Doctor Jacob’s panel. Before the new legislation he had consulted from his home in Nelson Street but in anticipation of an influx of new patients he had opened a surgery in Victoria Road. The premises had been a shop in a previous life but now the big display window was covered with a net curtain to screen his patients from the curious and prying eyes of passing pedestrians.
The medium-sized, square room was spotlessly clean and had rows of pale varnished chairs around the four walls. The floor was covered with the ever-popular and highly polished dark-green linoleum, the same as in the Royal Infirmary and Duncarse Home. When I saw it I wondered if this lino had perhaps been bought, like Cissy’s gingham, before the war. Had it been bought in bulk by the Medical Association? There was that antiseptic aroma in the room as well, a mixture of Dettol and carbolic soap, and on this particular night there was also the smell of people.
By the time we arrived the place was already crowded with a good cross-section of Homo sapiens, from the old and infirm to the young couples with a brood of runny-nosed, wet-eyed children. All were eagerly waiting to sign on the panel and receive their free health care. We took our seats between an old man with a deep, hacking cough and a weary-eyed mother with a crying and fractious baby who, judging from his howls, needed either his bottle or his bed. Mum whispered quietly, ‘Eh hope we’re no going tae be here all night. Eh’ve never seen such a crowd in one room before.’
George played with his Dinky car, running it up and down his arm and making ‘Vroom! Vroom!’ noises. I had no Dinky car to play with so I contented myself by studying my fellow patients. It was a strange situation because, although we all faced one another across the small room, no one looked directly at anyone else, preferring to keep their eyes firmly on the floor or on some distant spot above our heads. As I gazed around the room some people shuffled slightly under my intense stare, turning their bodies away with an impatient fidget.
Mum noticed this and gave me a hard dunt with her elbow. ‘Will you stop staring at folk? Eh don’t know how many times Eh’ve had to warn you about this. Folk don’t like to be stared at.’
Because she sounded cross I decided to transfer my attention to the various posters that decorated the walls. ‘Do not tell the doctor his job. He will prescribe what he thinks you should have,’ said one epistle, no doubt aimed at the army of well-meaning but tactless people who had been used to years of self-prescribing and considered themselves diagnostic experts. How Grandad would have hated a doctor lecturing him about his weird and wonderful home-made cures.
‘Do not ask for aspirins, cotton wool, etc,’ stated another poster bluntly. Obviously now that everything was free some greedy people were hoping to stock up their medicine cabinets overnight.
As the minutes ticked by, one of the toddlers began to cry noisily and this high-pitched howl echoed around the room. The harassed mother tried to pacify him by sticking a gigantic dummy in his mouth but this failed to stem his outburst. A couple of hefty-looking workmen, still dressed in checked shirts and cement-grimed dungarees, glanced impatiently towards the surgery door before resuming their scrutiny of the evening papers, turning the pages with rough, callused hands.
Then Big Bella burst in through the door. She stood in amazement. ‘Good grief! What a crowd!’ she exclaimed as her glance swept around the room.
She spotted us sitting quietly and came over to squeeze into George’s seat while he sat on the floor. ‘Eh’ve got this awfy pain in my belly,’ she said, holding her hand over her abdomen and indicating the source of pain to all and sundry, ‘so Eh just said to myself, “Bella, you have to sign on with the doctor, so go along and do it and, while you’re there, let him have a wee keek at your belly”.’
She suddenly turned to Mum. ‘What are you lot here for?’
Mum, who would sooner have died than let the entire waiting room know of any ailment, whispered her reply. ‘We’re down to join the panel but, if the queue doesn’t move soon, Eh’ll come back another night.’
Bella gave a deep sigh and surveyed everyone in the room. For one terrible moment Mum thought she was about to ask them for their symptoms but she merely called out in a loud voice, ‘How long have you been waiting?’
‘About quarter of an hour but nobody has moved in or out,’ said Mum.
Bella looked at her with amazement. ‘Are you sure the doctor’s in there?’ she bellowed.
A suppressed ripple of laughter came from the two workmen.
‘Well, all Eh can say is this – whoever is with the doctor must be at death’s door.’
This statement brought another wave of laughter and amused looks before the door opened suddenly, almost as if the unfortunate patient had overheard Bella, and the doctor poked his head around the door. ‘Next please!’ he called out, looking calm and composed in the face of the large crowd.
‘Well, now that he’s seen this crowd maybe he’ll get a move on,’ said Bella, with a satisfied smile.
This prediction was true because the room quickly emptied. Soon we found ourselves in the consulting room. This small room looked on to a dingy grey pend which made it dark even with the light on. The dimness wasn’t helped by the enormous dark roll-top desk which dominated the space and almost dwarfed the doctor. Undaunted by this desk, the doctor sat and looked at the three of us. Mum explained her reason for the visit and he painstakingly wrote out all our names while still managing to talk in his usual staccato fashion. ‘Now, if you are ill, this is my surgery timetable. Every evening from four o’clock till seven o’clock. Except for Sunday.’
When he was satisfied that we had ingested this information he rolled down the top of his glorious desk and saw us to the door. It was almost seven o’clock when we emerged into the dark street and there were still about another six patients to see, including Bella and her sore belly.
‘Eh don’t know when he’ll get home for his tea,’ said Mum, who was dreading the climb up the steep hill and the chore of making our own tea.
Later that evening, Lizzie and Margaret were relating their own experiences of joining Doctor Nelson’s panel. ‘It was bedlam! By the time we arrived, there must have been forty folk waiting,’ sighed Lizzie, plunking herself down with a cup of tea from Mum’s endless supply.
‘It was the same at Doctor Jacob’s surgery,’ said Mum, ‘although Eh don’t know how many folk were there.’
‘Forty-seven,’ I told them proudly, ‘Eh counted them.’
Mum gave me a look that said no medals would be forthcoming. ‘Aye, you would,’ she stated sourly.
As the weeks went by, the health service continued to be the main topic of gossip in the street, especially with Cissy, who folded her ample arms across her gingham-clad bosom and regaled all and sundry with a catalogue of Will’s recent trials. ‘He took this awfy pain in his chest and the doctor was really worried about him but what a red face Eh got when he gave this loud coarse-sounding burp and it was only indignation he had.’
Poor Cissy seemed peeved by the trivial nature of the illness, more so because of the promising initial symptoms. She was still sounding off. ‘Another thing Eh’ve heard is that there’s queues for free teeth and specs so Eh said tae Will maybe he better get seen for his specs and set of falsers.’ It would seem that Cissy knew the health service inside out.
The women looked askance at her, no doubt wondering how Cissy could prise Will free from his chair in order to get his teeth out.
Mrs Doyle had heard another piece of disturbing news. ‘Eh’ve heard that folk are coming back on holiday from Canada and Australia just looking for free teeth and specs.’
The women were angry at this news and shook their heads. ‘Bloody cheek!’ said Mrs Farquhar. ‘It’s our health service and it’s no for the likes of them who scooted away from the poverty gey quick. What Eh say is this, if they’ve got money to jaunt back here from Canada, then they can pay for their own teeth and specs.’
Cissy, who was becoming slightly miffed now that the subject had moved on to the brass-necked emigrants, butted in, ‘Well, that may be the case but, when the doctor came out to see Will, he had this muckle black bag that was full of everything under the sun. What a job he had tae put his hand on what he was looking for! So Eh told him, “You’ve too many departments in your bag, Doctor. You’ll have to get something smaller!”.’
As the women laughed at her innocent words, Will’s voice bellowed from the open window, ‘Ciiisssyyyyy!’
She unfolded her arms and looked flustered. ‘Och, for heaven’s sake! What does he want now?’ she cried, scuttling across the road.
After a few minutes she reappeared. ‘Will just wanted me to switch on the wireless. Said he felt a construction in his chest. Eh’ve told him tae take the two sets of tablets the doctor left that didn’t cost us a tosser but does he thump?’
After she left to make Will his afternoon cup of tea, one of the women passed a comment, ‘Take his tablets? Eh’d take the toe of my boot and gie him a hard kick up his erse.’
This caused great amusement among the women who all agreed with the idea.
We seemed to be living in exciting times. The street was finally moving into the twentieth century and benefiting from some of its new technology. Electricity was being introduced to the houses but only if the tenants were willing to pay the connection charge. The street was divided in its opinions. Mum was doubtful but only because of the cost. The papers had reported the story of a prefab tenant who had received a bill for the staggering sum of £19.9s.9d which had sent shock waves through the street. Mrs Farquhar didn’t want it and Mum was of the same opinion but Lizzie tried to persuade her. ‘Just think how labour-saving it’ll be. No more hunting for mantles that only last five minutes. You’ll just have tae switch it on and “Hey Presto!” instant light.’
As a result of this logic Mum relented and we were soon connected to the new system, along with three-quarters of the street. To be honest, we didn’t like it. The harsh, yellow 150-watt glare probed every corner of the kitchen including ones that the soft light from the gas had skimmed over, making the kitchen a space of semi-darkness. Now this bright light showed up all the scratches on our old furniture. Mum shook her head and hoped we would soon get used to the new-fangled light just as we had done with the cream-coloured distemper. And that was another thing – the cream walls and the harsh light were a disaster together.
As usual, Cissy had the last word on the new system: ‘What Will and me don’t understand is this – where does this power come from? If it’s in the wires like everybody says it is, what’s to stop us all from getting elocutioned?’
She stopped for a moment to visualise the terrible spectre of electrocution before continuing, ‘No, we’ve made up our minds. We’re keeping the gas because it’s safer. Mark my words.’
As things turned out, Cissy was lucky in not paying for the power line to be put in because, less than a year after its installation, Mrs Farquhar dropped a bombshell on a shocked street. ‘Eh’ve heard that the houses are to be knocked down,’ she announced.
Her window overlooked the drying green of 96 Hilltown and the spare piece of ground that lay beyond this. This tract of land stretched from the Hilltown to Dallfield Walk, the same length as our street, which ran parallel to it. All through our childhood, all the children had played on this site. Foundations had been laid before the start of the war then lain derelict and abandoned for years. This had made it a wonderful place for all our games. Suddenly, this site was now the scene of frenzied activity.
‘The workmen are running around all day with their barrows and the rumour is that our street is to be demolished to make way for more houses,’ said Mrs Farquhar.
Cissy decided to find out the true situation, using the subtle ploy of giving a cup of tea to two men who appeared in the street outside her door. It turned out that the rumour was true and she relayed the information to the pavement meeting. ‘Eh saw these two men looking awfy superstitious like so Eh took them out a pot of tea and asked them what they were wanting.’ She had a worried frown on her round, placid face. ‘Well, the men were from the town planning department and it’s true what Mrs Farquhar says – the street’s to be knocked down and we’re all being transported to the new housing schemes at the back of beyond.’
Everyone gasped in dismay. Mrs Doyle asked Cissy if she was sure she had got the facts straight. Cissy was annoyed by this slur on her storytelling. ‘Of course Eh’m sure!’ she said confidently. ‘That’s what Eh’m telling you. The men were going round eyeing up the street but the plans are going ahead and right facetious they were about the whole thing.’
The ashen-faced women were too worried to laugh at her – all except Lizzie. ‘Do you mean they were officious, Cissy?’ she prompted.
‘That’s what Eh said,’ retorted Cissy who was becoming increasingly annoyed at this attitude to her fact-finding mission. ‘And another thing – Eh don’t think we can flit tae another house because of Will. No with the contraption in his chest.’
Mum was really annoyed. ‘Imagine moving us just after we’ve put the electric light in. One thing’s for sure, Eh can’t afford the big rents that they’re charging for the new houses.’
The new housing schemes, such as Kirkton and Fintry, were being built in the distant countryside on the rural edges of the city. It was true that these lovely houses had all the mod cons like hot water, kitchens and bathrooms, but at a greatly enlarged rent, far more than Mum could ever cope with. Most of the women were worried and hoped that Cissy had somehow got the facts wrong.
But she hadn’t. Within a few weeks, the tenants received official letters saying that demolition would start in a year and that re-housing would begin as soon as houses were available.
Meanwhile, in the midst of all this upheaval, it was announced that Dundee would host the Royal Highland Show at Riverside Park. The organisers were on the lookout for a permanent home for this show and this meant that the city was eager to highlight its assets and abilities. The site was dubbed ‘Canvas City’. We watched all the tents going up as we walked along the Esplanade, marvelling at the progress and purposeful activity. Mum was still worried about the planned moves from the street and she joked about maybe renting a tent at the end of the show.
Unfortunately, a week or so before its opening, disaster struck in the shape of a storm. Gale force winds whipped savagely under the unfinished tents, tearing them to shreds and leaving the site a devastated shambles. Weeks of work had been ruined in a matter of hours but the organisers put on a brave face.
‘We’ll be OK for the opening day,’ they asserted with supreme confidence.
Hordes of Dundonians, including ourselves, converged on the park to view the damage with their own eyes. It was total chaos. The remnants of scattered wooden beams from the collapsed stands lay over the grass while strips of canvas from the ravaged tents hung like cream ribbons on the broken fences. These strips of fabric flapped noisily in the wind like lines of tattered washing.
Yet the newly elected Lord Provost, Mr Richard Fenton, was unbowed when he stated the same as the organisers. Everything would be shipshape and ready for the opening day. And that was how it turned out.
As if to make up for the dreadful wind damage earlier, the weather was glorious. Sun-drenched days brought record crowds and it looked as if the city would succeed in becoming the host of this prestigious show every year. In fact, this wasn’t to be and the show finally settled at Ingliston, Edinburgh.
It must be said that none of this glory touched our lives in the street. Although many of us paid a nightly visit to Riverside, we were merely onlookers peeping at the fringes of high society, peering through the wire-mesh fence and imagining all the lovely fashions of the Royal party and the pomp and bustle of the visitors. It was an undisputed fact that the show was way beyond our financial means.
Another of our favourite walks was in Camperdown Park, which was officially opened by Princess Elizabeth after the estate had been gifted to the city. When we made our first visit to it Mum couldn’t get over the idea of so much land being owned by one family, that of Admiral Duncan. Still, that didn’t stop us enjoying our trips up the long drive towards the white mansion house that wasn’t open to the public. I had gazed into all the rooms through the large windows and had been duly impressed, but not as impressed as we were by the monkey puzzle tree. George and I were fascinated by this, never having seen anything like it before. One day we were gazing up at it when an old man appeared. Mum said he might be a gardener in the park as he seemed to know all about the tree.
‘Aye, the monkeys can run up it but they can’t get back down because of the spikes,’ he told us. ‘That’s why it’s called the monkey puzzle tree.’ Whether this was true or not is something I have never found out but we loved the story at the time and I still love it now.
The summer was now just a happy memory and autumn was turning all the trees to russet and gold. ‘It’s really peaceful in this park,’ said Mum. ‘It makes you forget your worries, even if just for an hour or two.’
Our final walk that year was on one very frosty morning. The trees were sugar coated in white rime and there were hardly any other visitors. As we set off back down the drive on our way home I remember we left three trails of footprints on the frosty path. In our childlike fashion, both George and I thought they would remain there forever, along with the wonderful monkey puzzle tree.
There was no holding back the tide of change and as the year drew to a close the families from the street were leaving one by one. The Farquhar family moved to Kirkton, the Doyles to Beechwood and Margaret and George to Fintry. Tenants like Mum, who required a cheaper rented house in one of the older housing schemes, had to wait patiently until one became available. The folk from 108 Hilltown watched the mass exodus with peeved faces, gossiping bitterly about it. ‘It’s all right for some folk to get brand new houses, with hot water and a bath, but what about us? When will our houses get knocked down?’
As far as I was concerned, I wished it was their houses on the demolition list instead of ours because I was missing my pals. At one point, there was a vain hope that the street would get a reprieve but that didn’t materialise and Mum soon got a key for a ground-floor flat at Moncur Crescent.
It was the first week of January 1950 – a new decade.
I walked down the Hilltown that evening to look at the beautiful display of glittering Christmas trees in the front windows of the houses at Shepherd’s Pend. Each house was trying to outdo their neighbour with the seasonal fairy-light show.
Mum was worried about all the costs of moving but Big Bella, who had a huge circle of relations, came to her rescue. She arranged for a cousin, twice removed, to do our flitting. This cousin owned a battered old van but he was cheap and that was the selling point. Lizzie, who was still in residence in the street, came with us, as did Bella.
We walked through the large and empty rooms of our new abode, hearing our footsteps against the bare floorboards. The big windows overlooked a small garden with a gigantic bushy hedge then onwards to Dens Park football ground where scores of supporters would congregate every second Saturday.
We inspected the kitchen and bathroom with naive eyes, turning on the hot taps which, to our disappointment, gushed forth freezing-cold water. Mum said that the fire had to be lit before the water would heat up. This was news to George and me, who thought it came from some underground hot reservoir.
The kitchen was large, almost double the size of our old one, and it had a bare look. Mum said she would never be able to furnish it so we had to make do with the two large sinks, wooden draining board and cooker. High on a shelf sat the gas meter and underneath was a wooden coal bunker. Grandad’s furniture lay in a small and sorry huddle in the middle of the living room, looking forlorn and scratched in the shafts of wintry sunshine that pierced through the smeary windows. Mum looked very unhappy at this new prospect in our lives but Bella, in her usual jovial fashion, made her laugh. ‘For heaven’s sake, woman! You’re no moving to the moon. Eh’ll be up to see you every week and so will Lizzie.’
Before moving away, each family had stated the need to keep in touch with one another but, even as the words were being said, they all knew instinctively that this was just a wishful dream. Mum and Lizzie were now saying the same thing.
‘Now, Lizzie, no matter where you get your house, we’ll keep in touch.’
‘Of course we will,’ agreed Lizzie.
Then Lizzie departed with Bella – two of Mum’s oldest friends. The van drove away and we were left alone in our new domain. Mum looked as if she wanted to cry but instead she began to place the furniture around the room. The only thing was that there was too much of the room and not enough of the furniture so she ended up by putting the kettle on to make some tea.
I think we knew that this mass movement from the street had broken all the old chains of friendship and the camaraderie created by the sharing of hardships through the lean years of the war. This applied even to the communal trip to the tar boiler when any of the children had the whooping cough – according to an old wives’ tale, the fumes from tar helped to cure this disease.
From now on we were on our own. No doubt new friends would soon fill the vacuum left behind from the street but one thing was sure. From this new decade on it would be new voices from a different street we would hear.