The past is a lay-by off the A6
By coincidence, my fellow Flickrite and peerless photographer and commentator Fray Bentos has just posted a photograph of his youthful father, observing how properly attired he was even at leisure. I can certainly make the same comment about my own father, as this is a holiday snap of August 1955 - a very hot summer, some of you might remember. This was actually on the final hours of our holiday: we are returning from two weeks with my grandparents in Colwyn Bay, for me an anticlimactic return to Grimsby, where I will be stuck for a full year before the next annual holiday. This was the first occasion we hired a car. Connoisseurs will identify it as a split-screen Morris Minor (with small rear window). It was a two-door model, light green and I remember its registration of GTL101. We are parked in a lay-by off the A6, having just passed Buxton. We had had a long slog via the A57, stuck behind a pair of slow-moving Pickfords tankers - Scammells, as I recall. My father looks relaxed here, but the tranquility is about to be disrupted by the 5-year old Yours Truly, who threw a tantrum when my parents tried to make me pose for a photograph by the car. I will not be posting THAT photograph on Flickr: it goes far to show why my parents decided enough was enough with me as their only child. GTL101 also misbehaved later into the marathon journey: the fanbelt broke in Gainsborough. But I recall us dropping into a garage in the town and we were soon back on the road with the fanbelt duly fixed. All this, so clear in my lasting memory, was nearly 60 years ago...
The past is a lay-by off the A6
By coincidence, my fellow Flickrite and peerless photographer and commentator Fray Bentos has just posted a photograph of his youthful father, observing how properly attired he was even at leisure. I can certainly make the same comment about my own father, as this is a holiday snap of August 1955 - a very hot summer, some of you might remember. This was actually on the final hours of our holiday: we are returning from two weeks with my grandparents in Colwyn Bay, for me an anticlimactic return to Grimsby, where I will be stuck for a full year before the next annual holiday. This was the first occasion we hired a car. Connoisseurs will identify it as a split-screen Morris Minor (with small rear window). It was a two-door model, light green and I remember its registration of GTL101. We are parked in a lay-by off the A6, having just passed Buxton. We had had a long slog via the A57, stuck behind a pair of slow-moving Pickfords tankers - Scammells, as I recall. My father looks relaxed here, but the tranquility is about to be disrupted by the 5-year old Yours Truly, who threw a tantrum when my parents tried to make me pose for a photograph by the car. I will not be posting THAT photograph on Flickr: it goes far to show why my parents decided enough was enough with me as their only child. GTL101 also misbehaved later into the marathon journey: the fanbelt broke in Gainsborough. But I recall us dropping into a garage in the town and we were soon back on the road with the fanbelt duly fixed. All this, so clear in my lasting memory, was nearly 60 years ago...