Announcement in the Chatham Standard 18th March 1958
Library arranges space talks
The adventure of space travel must be a subject of the utmost interest to all of us today, and the go-ahead Gillingham Public Library, which from time to time organizes and arranges well-informed speakers on subjects of public interest has made sure to obtain an expert on the most-talked-about topic.
And not only in this instance has the Borough Librarian, Mr. Norman Tomkinson, arranged for a man with first class knowledge to speak at Gillingham, but he has booked a hall in anticipation of a larger-than-usual audience.
The speaker will be the secretary of the British Interplanetary Society,
Mr. L. J. Carter, who, I understand, has already received applications for seats on the first flying saucer, or whatever it may be, to the moon!
Mr. Carter, who will be speaking at the hall at Upbury Manor Secondary School on Gillingham's Great Lines this Wednesday night will be illustrating his lecture. Admission is free.
Wednesday 3rd February 1960
E. E. Smith, Castle View, Stagshaw Road, Corbridge, Northumberland, writes:
The recent alleged rudeness of the Minister of Transport to the delegation of public-spirited people from the north of Scotland who had travelled more than 500 miles to protest against the closure of certain railway lines shows only too clearly in what contempt our Whitehall "mandarins" hold genuine public grievances. Let us sincerely hope that "Gauleiter Marples" will be badgered by many more such delegations in the future, from every part of Britain, so that in time he MAY come to realise that:
East Kent Gazette/Junior Gazette column. Friday 3rd February 1961
Sunday, 29th January: Went sea fishing with four pals. I'll say it was cold! so much so that it was an hour after I got home before I could wag my tail. It was frozen stiff just like a piece of iron piping. Everyone laughed when we came in but their tune soon changed when I showed them a huge bass, weighing nearly 5lb, which I caught. They were hardly able to credit it. Nor was I, to be honest. Beginner's luck perhaps.
Monday, 30th January: Got mixed up in a party for old folk by mistake. But they were ever so nice and made a great fuss of me. When the chairman (a woman) announced that I would say a few words I just turned tail and beat it. Still, they were a nice lot.
Tuesday, 31st January: A man stopped me in the street and asked if I were the famous talking dog, Bingo. I told him not to be daft because every dog can talk (some humans, of course, don't understand us) and, in any case, I was just a very ordinary chap, but had a lot of young friends. Someone told me later he was a man from a circus trying to get me to join up. Nothing doing. I'd be scared stiff of the lions and tigers.
Wednesday, 1st February: Met a poor little lady "sausage" dog out this morning and she was crying her eyes out. Some officious man had pinched her bone and said she should not be eating it on that particular piece of green. Managed to find the bloke and after showing him my rather fierce-looking teeth and giving him a great big growl or two he relented and gave me back the bone. I don't think I've ever seen a "sausage" dog look quite so happy before when I gave it back to her. She made me blush by giving me a smacking kiss right on my nose. What would my poodle girl friend have said had she seen it? It doesn't bear thinking about.
Thursday, 2nd February: Boss decided my basket was getting too old and small for me so he bought me a new one. It's a smasher, lined all round inside to keep the draughts off me, and I've got it in a corner quite near the fire.
Pays to be good sometimes, doesn't it?
East Kent Gazette/Junior Gazette column. Friday 14th April 1961
Saturday, 8th April: Now I believe in fairies. Why? Because I've seen them for myself. Went out with a Fox Terrier pal and explored some woods. In the middle was an open space, and in the centre of that was what appeared to be a large ring of lush grass greener than anything else. My pal said it was a fairy ring, but I scoffed at him. Anyhow, we were tired, so dug ourselves two nice beds from the old leaves and off we went to sleep. It was dark when I woke up and the moon was shining. I heard some quaint noises and looked. There, dancing round and round that big ring in the wood, were hundreds of the littlest people you have ever seen and they all looked so lovely and happy. My pal woke up with a snort and a bark and in a second all the little people had vanished. Was I annoyed with him! I'm going back there again sometime by myself.
Sunday, 9th April: The Missus buttonholed me this morning and said: "Bingo, it's time you started training." For a moment the penny didn't drop, and then I remembered. During the summer months I shall be going on a journey to the moon. In fact I hope to make several trips and hope thousands of you will be there to see me on my way. I'm not saying any more just now, but want to ask you all to be on the look-out for me when the fetes and shows come along. In the meantime I'd better do what I'm told and put in a spot of really hard training.
Monday, 10th April: As I feared, the training has started, yes, seriously.
A tough looking chap called this morning and I was handed over to him. He got me out on the grass and put me through two hours of the stiffest physical exercises I've ever had, and at the end of it made me run really fast for two whole miles. I feel whacked tonight, but the Boss says the man is coming back again every other day. He let me into a secret, the bloke is one of the toughest ex-sergeant-majors the Army has ever had, and was one of the original Commandos. Poor old Bingo!
Tuesday, 11th April: Was taken to a real circus today. You've all seen those high-wire experts on television. Well, they actually got me right up there this evening and I thought it was great until I suddenly looked down and saw all the tiny faces miles down below. My tummy just turned over and I nearly fell off the seat, but one of the trapeze girls just picked me up in her arms as if I were a featherweight and the next thing I knew was that we were flying in space. Then she put out a hand and grabbed the bar on the far side. It was thrilling, but once was enough for me!
E. E. Smith, Castle View, Stagshaw Road, Corbridge, Northumberland, writes:
The recent alleged rudeness of the Minister of Transport to the delegation of public-spirited people from the north of Scotland who had travelled more than 500 miles to protest against the closure of certain railway lines shows only too clearly in what contempt our Whitehall "mandarins" hold genuine public grievances. Let us sincerely hope that "Gauleiter Marples" will be badgered by many more such delegations in the future, from every part of Britain, so that in time he MAY come to realise that:
1 - Rudeness does not pay when one is a public figure.
2 - London and especially Whitehall is NOT the only part of Britain that matters.
BINGO's DIARY
Saturday, 28th January: Watched our football team beat Foxhound Wanderers 9-0. Must admit that dashing black Labrador who has taken my place as centre-forward is the real thing. He got seven of the goals, and, boy, how he hits them! The famous Dixie Dean of old has nothing on him. His name is Billy and I just had to congratulate him after the game, and he was pleased, I could see. Sunday, 29th January: Went sea fishing with four pals. I'll say it was cold! so much so that it was an hour after I got home before I could wag my tail. It was frozen stiff just like a piece of iron piping. Everyone laughed when we came in but their tune soon changed when I showed them a huge bass, weighing nearly 5lb, which I caught. They were hardly able to credit it. Nor was I, to be honest. Beginner's luck perhaps.
Monday, 30th January: Got mixed up in a party for old folk by mistake. But they were ever so nice and made a great fuss of me. When the chairman (a woman) announced that I would say a few words I just turned tail and beat it. Still, they were a nice lot.
Tuesday, 31st January: A man stopped me in the street and asked if I were the famous talking dog, Bingo. I told him not to be daft because every dog can talk (some humans, of course, don't understand us) and, in any case, I was just a very ordinary chap, but had a lot of young friends. Someone told me later he was a man from a circus trying to get me to join up. Nothing doing. I'd be scared stiff of the lions and tigers.
Wednesday, 1st February: Met a poor little lady "sausage" dog out this morning and she was crying her eyes out. Some officious man had pinched her bone and said she should not be eating it on that particular piece of green. Managed to find the bloke and after showing him my rather fierce-looking teeth and giving him a great big growl or two he relented and gave me back the bone. I don't think I've ever seen a "sausage" dog look quite so happy before when I gave it back to her. She made me blush by giving me a smacking kiss right on my nose. What would my poodle girl friend have said had she seen it? It doesn't bear thinking about.
Thursday, 2nd February: Boss decided my basket was getting too old and small for me so he bought me a new one. It's a smasher, lined all round inside to keep the draughts off me, and I've got it in a corner quite near the fire.
Pays to be good sometimes, doesn't it?
East Kent Gazette/Junior Gazette column. Friday 14th April 1961
BINGO's DIARY
Friday 7th April: Was I glad to get home this afternoon! That fishing trip was a washout in more ways than one. Our boat nearly got swamped, we caught nothing and got thoroughly wet. Lucky some small person had left a little bucket in the boat, for it was the only thing we had to bale out the water with.Saturday, 8th April: Now I believe in fairies. Why? Because I've seen them for myself. Went out with a Fox Terrier pal and explored some woods. In the middle was an open space, and in the centre of that was what appeared to be a large ring of lush grass greener than anything else. My pal said it was a fairy ring, but I scoffed at him. Anyhow, we were tired, so dug ourselves two nice beds from the old leaves and off we went to sleep. It was dark when I woke up and the moon was shining. I heard some quaint noises and looked. There, dancing round and round that big ring in the wood, were hundreds of the littlest people you have ever seen and they all looked so lovely and happy. My pal woke up with a snort and a bark and in a second all the little people had vanished. Was I annoyed with him! I'm going back there again sometime by myself.
Sunday, 9th April: The Missus buttonholed me this morning and said: "Bingo, it's time you started training." For a moment the penny didn't drop, and then I remembered. During the summer months I shall be going on a journey to the moon. In fact I hope to make several trips and hope thousands of you will be there to see me on my way. I'm not saying any more just now, but want to ask you all to be on the look-out for me when the fetes and shows come along. In the meantime I'd better do what I'm told and put in a spot of really hard training.
Monday, 10th April: As I feared, the training has started, yes, seriously.
A tough looking chap called this morning and I was handed over to him. He got me out on the grass and put me through two hours of the stiffest physical exercises I've ever had, and at the end of it made me run really fast for two whole miles. I feel whacked tonight, but the Boss says the man is coming back again every other day. He let me into a secret, the bloke is one of the toughest ex-sergeant-majors the Army has ever had, and was one of the original Commandos. Poor old Bingo!
Tuesday, 11th April: Was taken to a real circus today. You've all seen those high-wire experts on television. Well, they actually got me right up there this evening and I thought it was great until I suddenly looked down and saw all the tiny faces miles down below. My tummy just turned over and I nearly fell off the seat, but one of the trapeze girls just picked me up in her arms as if I were a featherweight and the next thing I knew was that we were flying in space. Then she put out a hand and grabbed the bar on the far side. It was thrilling, but once was enough for me!
Wednesday, 12th April: My sergeant-major instructor this afternoon. He tried to get me swinging on some ropes he's rigged up in the garden about 10 feet above the ground. It was dead easy and I told him: "This is kids stuff, you want to get me up to 70 or 80 feet." That made him boggle a bit, but I never let on about the circus yesterday.
Thursday, 13th April: Out helping the "Bob-a-Job" lads today. Found one small Scout, the littlest chap I've ever seen, trying desperately hard to clear a load of heavy junk from someone's garden. I found a wheel barrow and a bit of rope. Helped the lad put the stuff on the barrow and then, with the rope round my chest, helped him to move it easily to the corner, where it had to be dumped. It is a shame, though, the jobs some people expect these small lads to do and, bless their Scout hearts, they do it all so willingly, and for a measly bob. Blimey, our dustman would have wanted about 10 bob to shift that lot!
5th July 1963 Rosaleen Claridge, of 5 Sherlock Mews, Baker Street W.1.
writes in the Marylebone Mercury
CALYPSOSir, Our Mr. Prime Ministerhopes you'll not denyHe grows greater daily:for mirrors can't lie.A confident fellow to lead aRat Race.And make all decisionsabout Atom Base.Yes a powerful fellow is he... you'll see!Our Prime Minister sayshe knowHis Minister fooled him.Man! :was a poor show.For final disclosures nomatter how grim.He must not be blamed-for no-one had told him!And a powerful lot that maybe... you'll see!Our Prime Minister insistshe must stayAs head of his Party, whomust all obey.Of Tory rebellion shouldthere be a trace,A major upheaval it seemsthey must face.And a powerful headachet'will be... you'll see!Our Prime Minister withHeart Ace in handA "No Trumps" has calledand that call it muststand.But should his opponentstheir cards carefullyplace.He'll yet "go to bed"fondly clutching his Ace.What a powerful changethere will be... you'll see!
5th July 1963 G. R. Miles of 5 Mansfield Street. W.1.
writes in the Marylebone Mercury
Spare a moment for burning issues
Sir. While we're all licking our lips and enjoying a Roman holiday provided for us by the Press, while all the ruling caste are being cut down to size, can we spare a moment for the issues that really matter?
Will the journalists, so unjustly and so stupidly imprisoned by decline and fall politicians, now attack real problems. We are glad that the Press has taught those who hate a free Press what the price is, but would be happier if attention were drawn to the perseverance of crypto Fascism by people in the Government.
Take the new Public Order Bill. What is it but an attack on the freedom of those who strive to stop racial incitement. Under section 1 of this Public Meeting Act it would become easier for magistrates to penalise the opposition of racialism than to penalise the Fascists themselves. Hecklers would be the offenders rather than those inciting. The penalties proposed would be felt by those whose racial background is attacked. The inciters won't be penalised.
The public should oppose this cunning bill, which under the guise of good order paves the way for Fascism and the destruction not only of Jews and the enslavement of coloured people, but for the loss of life and freedom of working people and the gagging of middle-class criticism.
This Act will also be used to stop any protest against the nuclear deathmongers. The penalties are designed to make opposition a millionaire pursuit in terms of fines. Yes, behind the salacious, the gravediggers are still at work on our liberties. Enjoy the cause célèbre, but it's nothing new in history, but watch and defend your liberties more keenly than ever.
Friday 2nd August 1963
Mr. R. F. writes from London, W.4: A BULLDOG named Winston Churchill was recently taken to court because its face frightened people. The magistrates dismissed the case, but I don't think people should give dogs human names. A neighbour with whom I did not get along once pointedly named his dog Bobby, which is what my closest friends call me. I retaliated by buying a goat and naming it Henry after my antagonist! After that a truce was called when he renamed his dog Dusty.
Friday December 6th 1963
Teenage giant, six-foot-two Ian Cheeseman, of 12 Beechings Way, Gillingham, Kent, has long had an ambition to join the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders at Stirling Castle, and be a kilted soldier.
So he arrived at Stirling Castle last night, all set to do so. But he didn't manage it - although the Argyll's are always ready to recruit a keen youngster.
The trouble is that Ian is only 14 years of age - and when the officer who interviewed Ian discovered this he had no alternative but to refuse his application. Ian, it was eventually discovered ran away from home on Monday and made his way to Scotland. His parents were eventually contacted through the offices of the Stirling and the Gillingham police. Ian is now in the Cultenhove Children's Home at Stirling waiting for his parents to come north and take him back home.
His father Douglas served in the Royal Artillery during WW2. Ian also has a young sister, Janice, waiting for his return to Gillingham.
The story picks up, not much more than five years later, and Ian, now grown even taller, met a Miss Rosalind Vellam of 1 Penshurst Close, Rainham, Kent. They then married before the Spring of 1970. Miss Kay Vellam, Rosalinds' younger sister was a pupil in attendance at Upbury Manor Secondary Modern school, Gillingham, from the year 1967. Kay also has another elder sister, Deborah, and brother Peter, being the youngest. The Vellam family had moved from Birmingham to Gillingham at the time when new housing was being built off Bloors lane, Rainham, in 1965.
Monday 13th January 1964
Mods, Pam and Jacky from Battersea, London S.W.11 write:
We have always classed ourselves as Mods but now strange creatures seem to have taken over from us. In a well-known dance hall last week, we saw boys in kilts, wearing eye make-up, dancing with girls in trousers. These so called Mods should find themselves another name: we suggest "Exhibitionists." We must close now. We're taking our boy-friends to the pictures!
Wednesday 26th February 1964
The "King and Queen of Blue Beat" met for the first time yesterday. The "King" -26 year old Jamaican Prince Buster stepped off the plane at London Airport from Paris. The "Queen," 19-year-old Brigitte Bond, and a crowd of Mods were there to greet him. The Blue Beat is the latest dance craze to sweep Britain. It is based on the off-beat rhythm of the West Indians.
Prince Buster is here for television and a month's concert tour.
He said: "I sing West Indian blues. My record 'Wash, Wash' is No. 1 in the Jamaican charts. "It will take this country by storm. We will oust the Beatles. They are good boys and have harmony, but they need my rhythm." Brigitte has made several records, including "Blue Beat Baby."
Thursday 26th March 1964
Mrs E. Berthwick, Hayes End, Middlesex. writes:
I WISH the manufacturers of motor scooters would design a helmet exclusively for Mods and publicise it as such. (Apparently it is not the done thing for Mods to wear crash helmets.) If it were made in some ghastly colour, with a distinctive badge, I am sure one or two Mods would wear them and the others would follow suit.
My brother was killed on a motorbike many years ago. A helmet would have saved his life. I am sure there are hundreds of mothers, like me who never get to sleep at night until we hear the familiar pop, pop, pop of the scooter coming round the corner.
Friday 3rd April 1964
HAZEL MERRY, 26 year-old star of Western Theatre Ballet's showpiece production, "Mods and Rockers" tells me that fans have been besieging the company for information about the with-it Mod "gear" especially designed for the dance. "My next part is as a model in a new ballet for BBC 2," she said "I'm getting ready for another avalanche of requests from fashion fiends."
Saturday 6th February 1965
Saturday 6th February 1965
Dixon Scot writes:
HAIRDRESSERS don't like being called barbers, so I always call them barbers. Often when I'm passing a barber shop I feel like sticking my head in the door and shouting, "You BARBER!" just for the hell of it. It would be a satisfying thing to do for no other reason than that barbers shouldn't be allowed to get off scot-free for all the suffering they inflict on mankind.
The desperation of those Glasgow businessmen who tried to fly a barber up from Bournemouth to get their locks decently shorn last week is understandable.
If they had found a good one, no expense was too great in the capturing of him. Never did I have the luck to find a good barber in twenty-six years of offering my defenceless head for their destructive attentions.
As a boy I used to sneak home along back streets to avoid people's stares after being newly jerry-cropped into something resembling a pineapple. Just when my hair had got back to normal, and I could look girls in the eye once more, the demon barber pineapple-topped me again and the dawning realisation that life might always be like this cast a doomy gloom over my countenance that I have not managed to shed to this day.
When I was older and Service barbers vented their spleen on me, I took to wearing a Balaclava helmet, even in the tropical sun. Though it became commonly supposed that I was covering up some dreadful skin disease, this was preferable to the humiliation of exposing my tattered mane.
Later, as a man about town, barbers did me the formal honour of asking,
"How would you like it, sir?" before slashing me bald in the most unlikely places and then holding up a mirror to inquire, with grim humour,
"That all right sir?"
It was obvious now that barbers hated my hair, attacking it like primitive tribesman just because they didn't understand it. So, in 1956, I stopped going to the barbers and took a wife instead. I had courted her with great subtlety.
"I love the way you run your fingers through my hair, darling." I murmured gently. "Now try it with scissors...." I bought her a gold ring and two pairs of scissors and what a sound investment that has turned out to be. Every third Sunday I sit amid the comforts of home in complete control of her every snip. "Leave that bit alone ... take an eighth of an inch off there ... thin that side ... GENTLY now...." Wives come a bit more expensive than barbers, all things considered, but I'm happy to think that the £22 10s I've avoided paying to barbers all these years is enough to send them up the pole.
18th June 1966 In the Belfast Telegraph: various readers letters..
R. F. McCance of 46 Malone Park, Belfast 9 writes
I should like to put on record my great satisfaction at the Prime Minister's very forthright speech on the damage done to the image of Northern Ireland by Mr. Paisley and his followers. I should, however, be really interested to know why Mr. Paisley's march was allowed at all on June 6th. No satisfactory explanation of this fact has been forthcoming: and yet the route the procession took, and the insults against the Queen, in the person of her representative, Lord Erskine, could all have been calculated beforehand by those in authority to hurt the maximum number of people of all shades of opinion in Belfast.
The riots in Cromac Street I heartily condemn: but no less do I condemn Mr. Paisley's incitement to hatred and his insults offered to so many established churches, including my own church, the Church of Ireland. I cannot but feel that, whatever the police may have felt about the maintenance of law and order, the Ministry of Home Affairs must have known about this demonstration beforehand, and yet permitted it to take place. Whatever the Minister may say about free speech in a democracy, free speech does not mean the ability to incite others to cause a breach of the peace, and to insult both the Crown and thousands of ordinary decent people.
The Prime Minister has the backing of a very great majority, both inside Stormont and without. He should not shirk the responsibility for charging Ministers who have shown their inability to measure up to their responsibilities: and in this way clearly demonstrate to the public that words will indeed be followed by action to keep Mr. Paisley and his followers within bounds in the future, no less than the extreme Republicans and their followers. The Prime Minister has my complete confidence and support, I regret to say that I cannot say the same about his Minister of Home Affairs.
OBSERVER Belfast 9 writes
Professor G. L. Huxley has underlined unwittingly one of the major points put forward by Rev. I. Paisley. This was, that the time had now arrived when Protestants would find it impossible to parade in Ulster- unless a stand was made now to assert these long established rights.
Professor Huxley wants to restrict and no doubt abolish among other things the Twelfth of July parades. He is certainly asking a lot for a resident alien, and this savours of dictatorship of a very high degree. Would he abolish in England the May Day parades- in case they should offend the employers- or the CND parades in case they should offend militant people.
It would seem Professor Huxley is distictly biased in his views - and particularly against one section of the community. Northern Ireland is quite as democratic as any other part of Britain- as the Prime Minister, Mr. Wilson, reminded Mr. Fitt recently.
Joe McCann of 80 York Street Belfast 15 writes
Before Easter I warned through your columns that Mr. Paisley and his followers were out to cause trouble and should be banned from our streets. Since then we have had the Carlisle Circus disturbances, the Cromac Street riots, not to mention the disgraceful scenes on the occasion of the General Assembly.
From his citadel of hate on Ravenhill Road Mr. Paisley has spewed forth his doctrine of bigotry and intolerance, and if the Government do not deal firmly with he and his mob- Ulster will be set alight. This malignant growth must be crushed at the roots before it has time to spread, otherwise the flame of freedom and democracy will be snuffed out here in Ulster. The eyes of the outside world are now focused on Ulster and the duty of the Government is clear. Paisleyism must be proscribed: the mad dog of Ulster must be tamed.
PRESBYTERIAN Belfast 5 writes
As a Christian it saddened me to read that one of the demonstrators protesting at the Assembly had used the words "bastard" and other unprintable words to ministers of the Presbyterian Church. If that be so I would suggest that Mr. Paisley should lead his demonstrators in a mass march to the Hill of Calvary there to kneel at the foot of the Cross and ask forgiveness for smearing the name of Jesus Christ by spreading hatred and bringing out the worst and not the best in people. They would then carry not hate slogans but "The Banner of Love"
