Malcolm Wheatman, 82, of Kendal, recalls holidays in the 1930s and 1940s
LIKE many people, my father had a week’s annual holiday and we went away, as many working Kendal people did, to Blackpool, a popular destination in the 1930s and 1940s.
It seemed like an adventure to me, starting as we waited for the Ribble bus in Strick-landgate. The upholstery was more plush than the regular service buses.
Miles before we got there it was fun in the on-board family atmosphere to see who was first to catch a glimpse of the Tower.
A landmark on the way was a luxury bungalow with an enormous picture window with a white grand piano. I dearly wished I lived there, not merely because Blackpool was just down the road.
On the prom we sometimes met Kendal people we knew, so it felt like a small world.
Blackpool had many amusement arcades and I longed for one in Kendal. When they eventually came, my interest had gone.
I never went up the Tower, but on wet days my favourite place was the building itself.
Throughout, there was the Victorian equivalent of pay TV, large glass-fronted penny-in-the-slot boxes displaying, usually, horror scenarios where skeletons left their graves or sinister figures enacted dastardly deeds in gothic houses.
All were operated by whirring electric motors and black-painted string.
One was different, a two-horse race operated by two people furiously turning handles, each having inserted a penny. After the race, a penny was returned for the winner.
The splendour of the ballroom, where tea dances were popular with Reginald Dixon at the famous Wurlitzer organ, contrasted with other rooms such as a terrace decked with indoor tropical garden trees and plants.
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