Birthday Memories

Today, April 29th was my mother's birthday, had she still been with us she would have been 92 years old. I thought that as a sort of memorial to her today I would show you some photographs of her early life. I've been delving into the old photograph box and found some interesting ones to share with you.

The first one shows Mum as a little child. She is the one on the seat clutching the basket. With her is her elder sister, Gladys. I'm guessing she would be about three on this photo.

Below is a school photo of Mum. Again I'm not sure how old she would have been on this photograph, possibly ten or eleven. She passed a scholarship exam to go on to a higher education school but my grandparents couldn't afford to buy the uniform and equipment needed so she left school at 15 and got a job in the offices at the local Co-op but my grandmother, for some reason, didn't approve of the Co-op so my Mum had to go and work in the cotton factory - a good 4 miles a day walk (each way) from where they lived. Mum did that walk every day until she was 21 years old.

On her 21st birthday she bought herself a bicycle and used it to get to work. She used to laugh when she told the tale that one morning she went round a corner rather too quickly and ended up in a holly bush. Here she is with the cycle at the front of the family home.

I've absolutely no idea when the photo below was taken but I'm guessing late thirties early forties, perhaps a pre-wedding photograph or one for my father to take away with him when he was called up for duty during the war. Unfortunately there are no wedding photographs of my mum and dad as the person they asked to take them didn't do a good job and none of them turned out. I remember her wedding dress though and I also remember her cutting it down for me to wear in a school play; I think that must have been a hard thing to do.

The photo below is dated 1940, Mum and Dad had been married a couple of years then; he was in the home guard but was later called up into the Royal Army Medical Corps. Being a baker and confectioner he served as a cook in the army.

As you've probably gathered I didn't appear until much later, in fact 12 years after they had married. I think they had given up hope of having their own child and had looked into adoption but then I came along; here I am below with Mum and Dad at the seaside, looking very serious and itching to get down to the beach.

I'm guessing that the photo above was taken in Summer 1954, so I would be 4 years old. It couldn't have been 1955 as by then my father was very ill with leukemia and he died in the autumn of that year. Mum and I were alone for a while until she married again and we moved on to a new life.