The fish and chips trip, was prompted, when my Dad, did not have enough money to go on the booze. The order would depend just how much he could rustle up, including what he would take off my Mum.
Eleven pence (11d.); Piece of Rock Salmon and threepennyworth 0f chips.
One and a penny (1/1d.) ; Piece of Huss and Threepennyworth of chips.
One and six (1/6d.); Piece of Wing of Skate and threepennyworth of chips.
All for Dad of course.
Dangers of the night; This trip in the 1950s, would be a late night, (winter as well), walk, from the top of Black Hill in Preston, to New England Hill, at Preston Circus.
He preferred his food from Rolf’s up above Clyde Road junction, but Bostocks, on the other side and lower down, would take pity on me, especially when it was really cold and or wet and I was bedraggled or frozen. The little bag of scraps they would give me, with a few chips thrown in, meant that he got Bostocks grub and would say in his selfish and arrogant ignorance, as we watched him eat them. ” Ah you can’t beat Rolf’s for quality”.
Getting back to dangers of the night;
This was a long and lonely walk for a young child in the dark, taking in the whole of the length of Preston Park, in it’s route. Many the night I had to run the gauntlet of the ‘Blue eyed Beauty’, as my Sisters called him, he lived in flats near Lovers Walk and today, would be a candidate for a Childline call.
Yes, the ‘Old Man’ knew, but he had to have his chips.