sixties memories

Hastings bus Maidstone & District and timetable memories from Sarah Harvey

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supplied by Sarah Harvey

Sarah Harvey… I have just acquired this model, probably more for nostalgia and the fact that I caught a lot of local buses like this when I was a kid. The Leyland Atlantean / Metro Cammell in Maidstone & District livery and displaying the Service No. 151. It was introduced in Hastings in 1961. The 151, alongside the 133 was one of the mainstay bus routes serving Hastings. I have also attached a page from the 1964 bus timetable. Not sure the 31 minutes end to end timings could be maintained nowadays 🤔Their rough equivalents to day are the 20 and 22 respectively. If you have lived in Hastings much of your life, did you ever catch one of these?

Peter Fairless… That’s brilliant, Sarah

Martin Richter… the 133 – a ha’penny from Bohemia to the town as a nipper 🙂 (but usually free!)

Geoff Peckham… Being a Bexhillian I rode the 156 or the 157 to and from school from Glyne Gap. My Nan lived in Turkey Rd where they turned round, so I used them to get there, and of course for trips to Hastings or the College. Well found, Sarah. x

Colin Bell… Oh yes, some fond memories here Sarah x

Tony Court-holmes… i loved Fremlins bitter

Paul Phillips… 151 was that the downs farm bus ..i lived Churchill Avenue 133 route and 157

Andy Gunton… Strangest train I’ve ever seen

Sarah Harvey… Oooo train-spotters / bus spotters, all part of the same family of species

Patrick Lewis… 151 and 133 frequently-our life line to downtown Hastings and St Leonard’s.

Sid Saunders… This was the first bus I drove in service at the start of my 34 years in Hastings in 1972.

Marcus de Mowbray… Many journeys between Sevenoaks and Maidstone on those!

Jim Breeds… The 133 from/to King’s Head near to where I lived was my mainstay, but the 151 was a reasonable substitute if I didn’t mind the walk from Down Farm estate to home.

Nigel Sherwood… Used to get 133 from the gas showrooms up to school at Elphinstone

Roger Carey… Living on the Ridge /edge of town, the main bus for us was the 155 circular route- for school and town trips. Remember seeing 133s on trips to Silverhill where my school mate Philip Till lived. Also the 76 which went down the (to me, then) incredibly long St Helen’s Road. In my very young years I thought the song “76 trombones” was about that bus and road!

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Remember horizontal & vertical adjustments on the TV and slapping it to make it stop?

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post suggested by Terry Thomas 1960’s https://doyouremember.com

image. http://www.kjq.us.com/kovrtv13/yourtvpicture.html

Marcus de Mowbray… Me. Now it’s just as bad, but replaced by picture break-up/pixelation and frozen picture!

John Gale… like last night, frozen picture ” no Internet connection ” on Now TV , when everything else in our house was fine.  Bring back the switch on the wall

Roger Simmonds… Me!

Alan Essex… Me too

Mick O’Dowd… Yes but at least the sound quality of the set was better than the “flatties” today.

Jerry Wright… I remember those days!

Will Cornell… But it usually got you back to the show within a few seconds. Today we have a thunderstorm overhead, the satellite signal goes out, and in an hour or two after all the resetting etc you’re back to the show. Oh wait, the show ended 90 minutes ago. Ain’t progress wonderful?

Jan Warren… Yeah, my Dad was a brilliant “telly whacker”!! Haha

Garry Wonfor… We had a telly with a coin slot in the back…. Always remember my Dad, desperately rifling through his pockets for a half crown bit after it pinged off half way through the horse race he had a bet on.!!!…… Christ, I’m old!!!!

Stuart Moir… So are all of us Terry the years just roll by

Dave Nattress… Definitely used to work for my Dad on our old tele.   Possibly back in valve days maybe a bang on the top of the cabinet shook up the connections enough to cure the problem.

Lyn Farkley Appleyard… Oh yes….I’d forgotten that. The tap in the top of the great chunky pretend wood TV…no remote lol

Nick Bloomfield… Worse than the lines though was the positioning of the aerial. The small ‘portable’ ones where only by standing on one foot whilst leaning out of the window and pointing it at the next door neighbours would it work. And that was only on every second Tuesday…

Alan Pepper… Now known as ‘buffering’ !

Nigel Ford… We had a cast-off Ferguson, from my Grandad I think, that had a little red plastic screwdriver with an aluminium shank that we put in a tiny hole and twisted to adjust it. Don’t know if it was 405 or 625 lines?…. well before 25 or 624, … Oh no that was Chicago later that decade!

Dawn… Aah yes, those were the days. Just three channels by changing them at the wall via Re-diffusion. No different now really. With all the hundreds of channels I constantly scroll through, I just end up watching the same three as I always have. Progress? I don’t think so!

 

It looks like Blackpool Illuminations in here! (Mark Grundy shared question)

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Colin Bell… Mine!

Leigh Mitchell… mine too, and if you left the door open…‘were you born in a barn?!

Ralph Winser… Mine too

Paavali Mears… Mine used to say switch em off it costs too much

Nicola Barfield… Mine now I say that lol

Julian Humphries… Regents street at christmas

Tim Harris… Have we won the lottery ?

Paul Kemble – Bielecki… My mum usually

Emma Quarry…. Yes I think so and say you look almost human when you were going out for the night

Leigh Kennedy… Or if you didn’t close a door behind you it was ” Were you born in a barn” !?

Patricia Burgess… Or what did your last servant die of

Lorna Brazier… Yep

Tim Moose Bruce… Or when it was too dark, “its like a cave in here.”

Mike Guy… Tim, it was the Black Hole of Calcutta in our house.

Robert Fisher… yes my father always said that

Mick O’Dowd… I think most people did!

Louise Taylor… My mum

Grant Young… Yep defo mine… or it’s like a summers day in here.

Tracy Birrell… Mine,or ,’It’s lit up like a Christmas tree in here!”

 

 

Two Sawyers Club Pett – 1967

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supplied by John Busbridge

John Busbridge… The Pub is still there but I don’t remember much about the Club?

Mike Mitchell… Remember it well from Sunday lunchtimes in the late 60s. The pub itself was a members-only club. Used to go there with my mum and dad. My sister and I were allowed in to play shove ha’penny

Sophie Ash…. Back in the day, Pett was a temperance village – hence the club status of the Sawyers. At least I think that’s the story.

Jan Warren…Interesting ……. I lived in Pett Level as a kid from about 1962-1967, it was the best place ever in those days, but now, sadly it seems to have been turned into a “millionaires Haven”??!! – we were all poor people there back in the 60s and it was so beautifully wild and unspoilt land, my parents had very little money so life was hard but my memories will always be of happiness and freedom in such a place that felt like a little “paradise” to me ………. I often used to walk through the village of Pett and remember The Two Sawyers Pub …….. and what was the other one on the corner, coming up from Chick Hill??? – I think its been a bikers meeting place for some years, – just say the name, I know it ……… shit, I know it??!!! so annoying ………….. ugghhhhhhhhh

Steve Amos… The Royal Oak?

Jan Warren… Yes, The Royal Oak, thank you

John Williams… Played in my band a few times I that pub

Eugene Hughes… Who remembers the flamingo? The one that migrated to the Pett Level lake every summer!

Dave Nattress… Definitely remember the Flamingo – used to drive across to the Pett Level pools from Bexhill and saw it several times. Early 70’s – maybe 1972 for a couple of years at least.

Eugene Hughes… It was there into the 80’s

Who remembers this toilet roll?

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supplied by Andrew Clifton

Andrew Clifton… Who remembers this bog roll?

Joe Knight… Smooth & ruff

Dennis Torrance… Bloody nightmare thanks won’t be using that again schools days

James Turner… It only pushed it about was not kind to the nether regions at all.

Jeff Belton… I do, didn’t use it, but came useful for tracing paper lol.

Glenn Piper… Unfortunately, yes, I do remember these

Jacqueline Marsh… Ouch yes I do!!

Aileen Mathieson… Tracing paper! Vey rough all it is good for lol!

Peter Brazier… Still got the Blooming scratches after 40 odd years! Devils Work That Stuff! Burn It! Burn It I Say!😂😂😂

Chris Jolly… IZAL The POINTLESS, USELESS, last resort paper..

Mark Gilham…  Invented by a major in the Boer War if I remember rightly..

Eric Harmer… Not Major Bumsore ?

Michael Wilson… A piece of Izal and a comb made a great homemade Kazoo when you were seven

Chris Meachen… Arse polish: totally evil stuff & completely useless..

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SMART Coffee meet No. 37 report

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Our 37th meet. Among the newbies were Sue Jones, Mark Harris and David Miller.  Sue was  talking about her memories of seeing Jimi Hendrix at the Isle Of Wight Festival. Mark & David both from The Likely Lads were reminiscing about their bands Beez Neez, Split Image and others. Mick O’Dowd had with him Phil Spector’s Back To Mono cd box set and the local mod compilation album Uppers On The South Down. Geoff Peckham had a very interesting  Beatles book ‘Revolution in The Head’ and was talking about a skiffle band he recently played with called Lonnigans and featured none other than Rod Davis, an original Quarrymen. Pete Prescott arrived with a bundle of albums and some interesting photos of Cliff Richard from the Time musical. He mentioned that Deep Purple’s Ian Paice lived in Hastings at one stage. Andre Martin and Sarah Harvey were looking forward to their shows on Carnival Radio  and Neil Roberts was talking about future gigs for his band Freak Flag.. Phil Gill had his guitar with him and working out some tunes with Roger Carey. I had with me albums of John Miles, Back Street Crawlers, Breaking Glass and Sharks. This is a small bit of what I can remember, anyone who wishes to add anything you were talking about, then please feel free to do so.

Lucy Pappas… One day I’ll get there! Not that I have any memorabilia, it was all thrown out years ago. Hope you had fun x

Mick O’Dowd… Another goodie Alan. Nice to see more newbies being baptised!

Mark Harris… Thanks chaps, enjoyed some good old reminiscing!!

Tony Davis… Sorry to miss it. There next time

Dave Nattress… I will take a Friday afternoon off work one day and get there!! Great to see the cover of the first Sharks album. Excellent album, not a bad track. Saw them do OGWT when they did World Park Junkies and Snakes and Swallowtails. Got it on vinyl and CD along with the second Sharks album, Jab it in Yore Eye, slightly changed line-up, but another really good album. I didn’t know anyone who knew of the Sharks!

Jan Warren… Hi to Neil Roberts and his band “Freak Flag”, great name, and I was just wondering if you got the name from (the great) Jimi’s lyrics in “If 6 was 9”? – as he mentions a “freak flag”!! – sorry, just wondering

Alan Esdaile… Well spotted Jan. I have not seen them live yet but they do play Hendrix and Cream, so I think you are right.

Jeanette Jones… Sad not to be there Glad it happened, & lots of folk got to enjoy themselves xxx

Iain Cobby… Hi Dave, must meet up with you at the next meeting. I too will take the afternoon off and we can catch up on old Damaris times. Been an interesting year for me.