Where were you in '73

[Mick F]

Winter 62/63 was 6ft drifts that lasted for six weeks where we lived. Didn't thaw until early March.
I'd just turned ten not long before the snow fell, and we never had a day off school. They all stayed open, all the children got there and all the teachers too.

Can't remember the summer of '63, other than I was in short pants, and had been all through the winters as well. Chapped legs with wet welly slap!

[Morzedec]

Cher Cyril Hearn, bonjour,

The autobiography: did that some years ago now, but it wouldn't pass the censor - far too much panting and groaning, he said - so I responded by asking if he had ever tried to cycle up Gunnislake Hill with just a three-speed on.

1953: well, yes, i was there (as Max Boyce says), and already cycling. Back and forth across the Berkshire Ridgeway each day, to get to and from school - we lived out in the middle of nowhere in those days.

I can't (quite) get back as far as 1943, but I am looking forward to cycling in 2030 (there is one current record that I hope will one day be mine, if I am lucky enough to survive until then).

Happy days,

[thirdcrank]

1963:-

Most of this will have been covered on this forum before, probably more than once.

That year began with the big freeze. The River Wharfe at Wetherby was frozen above the weir as far upstream as the old boathouse in the park. There were quite large groups of people skating just above the weir and two of us had the daft idea of seeing how far we could ride. We did get a few hundred yards covered when the ice began to creak ominously and we retraced PDQ. That must rate as one of the most stupid things I've ever done.

I did A level that Summer.

Loads of cycling in those days and during the long holiday, two of us went youth hostelling for a couple of weeks in Scotland. The nadir - as in the complete and utter pits - was staying overnight at Glencoe SYHA. Among other darker moments, we had our food stolen. There was a big school party there under the incompetent leadership of one adult in a kilt. In the morning after a night sleeping on the floor because of an inadequate number of bunks, the kitchen was completely taken over by the clown in the kilt who sticks in my mind as being called Hamish. The warden must have had personality problems and stood in his office flicking the air with a bra. Having had little to eat, we were keen to get going to get some grub on the road, but the warden insisted that we clean the kitchen, where Hamish had burnt every available utensil. In the meantime, Hamish and his terrors were away on the coach.

My wonderful teacher of French suggested I might benefit from what has more recently become known as a gap year, and arranged for me a placement as English language assistant at the Lycée municipale et moderne mixte in Bagnols-sur-Cèze in the Gard Département, not far from Avignon. Only eleven hours "work" a week, full board and about £12 a week in my hand (remember that was 1963) In many ways, that was the best time in my life, especially once I'd joined the bike club. That period of my life made me realise that I wasn't going to follow in the wheel tracks of Brian Robinson and also that I didn't want to go for the more down-to-earth alternative of teaching French.

I ended 1963 by coming home for Crimbo and also travelled down to Brighton for an (unsuccessful) interview at Brighton University. I stayed at Brighton YHA overnight and I'll note in passing that the building was called "Blackboys."

[lbomaak2]

1963: the year of my first cycling accident. Well, actually it was a scooter accident: I was 5 and hadn't yet learned to ride a bike.

Riding my scooter along the pavement, and was spilled by uneven paving stones. My right arm landed on the kerb. One of the girls next door found me lying there, crying, and took me home. "Mummy, I nearly broke my arm." Mummy took a look, and decided that the "nearly" in that statement was wrong, took me to hospital, where a radiographer got very annoyed because I kept on moving the arm while he was taking the X-ray.

Anyway, it all healed up properly, and no lasting ill effects.

[lbomaak2]

I ended 1963 by coming home for Crimbo and also travelled down to Brighton for an (unsuccessful) interview at Brighton University. I stayed at Brighton YHA overnight and I'll note in passing that the building was called "Blackboys."

Blackboys Youth Hostel was in the village of that name, east of Uckfield (so at least an hour's bike ride from Brighton). And Brighton University wasn't Brighton University in those days!

[thirdcrank]

Just checking if anybody was reading

It was, of course, the University of Sussex and calling it Brighton was laxity on my part. It was in Brighton in those days and the only thing going for me when I went was that I had previously read Brighton Rock.

I must be mistaken about the name of the YHA although I'm mystified about how that might have happened. I used to covet the stamps in my YHA cards and they have often been a reminder of happy times (or misery, in the case of Glencoe.) Thanks for putting me right.

If a future thread resurrection involves 1966 I'll mention going to Barnard Castle YHA and driving round Bradford trying to sell ice cream when Ken W was uttering his famous "They think it's all over ......"

While I'm on, here's a picture of skaters on the frozen River Wharfe in 1963. The accompanying notes say that the Wetherby Silver Band played to accompany the skaters.

River Wharfe 1963

[Mick F]

1963 ........................That year began with the big freeze.

Sorry to cut out bits, but in the interests of accuracy .....

1963 began DURING the big freeze.

We in Wrightington, Lancashire didn't have a white Christmas, but the snow came down a few days later accompanied by hard frosts, then more snow and more snow, and those frosts continued for months.

I might have only been ten years old, but it all made a huge impression on me, and I've never forgotten it.

[al_yrpal]

In 1963 my Citroen Light15 with its unusual front wheel drive was the only vehicle in the apprentices hostel that could get anyone the 11 miles to college. The snow was very deep and it glided over it

Al

[brooksby]

Just checking if anybody was reading

It was, of course, the University of Sussex and calling it Brighton was laxity on my part. It was in Brighton in those days and the only thing going for me when I went was that I had previously read Brighton Rock.

I must be mistaken about the name of the YHA although I'm mystified about how that might have happened. I used to covet the stamps in my YHA cards and they have often been a reminder of happy times (or misery, in the case of Glencoe.) Thanks for putting me right.

If a future thread resurrection involves 1966 I'll mention going to Barnard Castle YHA and driving round Bradford trying to sell ice cream when Ken W was uttering his famous "They think it's all over ......"

While I'm on, here's a picture of skaters on the frozen River Wharfe in 1963. The accompanying notes say that the Wetherby Silver Band played to accompany the skaters.
frozen river.jpg

Is that photo the river where it passes the Ings?

(1963 is before my time, I'm afraid - grew up in Boston Spa and Collingham in the seventies).

[merseymouth]

Hi all, The main assembly plant car park at Halewood was down a steep ramp, exit likewise. So when a decent fall of the white stuff came all hell broke loose!
Quite amazing the number of vehicles that couldn't get out, the vast majority. My brother worked there, so was faced with the issue, no problem for him though? Surprisingly his Bond Mini-car, yep one of those you had to kick-start under the bonnet, would just glide out with ease .
Front engine, front single wheel drive, couldn't pull the skin off a rice pudding, but never had any problem.
In later years my own Fiat 126, rear engine, naff all power would do likewise. Brilliant . Who need power? MM

[Philip Benstead]

Winter 62/63 was 6ft drifts that lasted for six weeks where we lived. Didn't thaw until early March.
I'd just turned ten not long before the snow fell, and we never had a day off school. They all stayed open, all the children got there and all the teachers too.

Can't remember the summer of '63, other than I was in short pants, and had been all through the winters as well. Chapped legs with wet welly slap!

My school run out of coal we had no school for 6 weeks. I remember the pavements were lifted up by the frozen ground.

[thirdcrank]

... Is that photo the river where it passes the Ings?

(1963 is before my time, I'm afraid - grew up in Boston Spa and Collingham in the seventies).

It's not one of mine, but one on the leodis Leeds archive.

The frozen part of the river where all the skating took place was just above the weir as in this streetview.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Wet ... d-1.384816

It stayed frozen for a long time and there were often more people on it than in the pic. I've no idea how anybody worked out what weight the ice would support: perhaps nobody really bothered. We rode upstream from there, towards the left in the streetview round the bend to the park. The stretch of water by the park used to have a reputation for catching swimmers unawares with fast-moving underwater currents, the point being that in warm weather the river running by the park was inviting for anyone wanting to cool off.

PS What I'm referring to as the park is accessed from Linton Road. I've no idea what's down there now but in those days there was a place where you could hire rowing boats etc. There were some broad concrete steps in the river bank to access the boats.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.92956 ... 384!8i8192

That's the entrance from Linton Road