Tony's memories

"I remember putting a bunch of biro pens down a knot hole in the wooden floor boards over by the window where da used to have the bird. I remember wondering when they were knocking the flats down if anyone ever found them. The holders were all of different colours.

Then there was the time that I was sitting out on the window sill and Da grabbed me so I wouldn't fall off into the street - I'm not sure if Andy Sweeney helped him.

I remember Mrs. Bracken cutting butter from a large block and slapping two paddles together to shape it into a block.

And then there was the marble. I was pretending to swallow it, unfortunately, I really did and Da was slapping me on the back while I was upside down trying to get it to come up, during the commotion the neighbor below came up and he had a knife in his hand (he was probably cooking dinner) it was a big knife! I thought he was going to cut me open to get the marble out!!!!"

Tony
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Tony's memories reminds me of those pens. One of them was mine, one that wrote in red ink and the first time I ever had a pen like that. I could've killed him for dropping it into the knothole!

The time he crawled onto the windowsill (the outside!) when he was a toddler. Although I remember it, my memory is more of Ma in a panic and afraid to approach him in case he thought it was a game and moved further out to the edge of the sill, and Da on the ground under the window trying to talk softly to Tony in an effort to get him to move back from the edge. I think it was Andy who kept talking to Tony while Da flew up the stairs, walked ever so softly to the window and between him and Ma they managed to grab Tony, saving him from almost certain death if he's fallen.

Mrs Bracken owned one of the shops that were beside us. The butter Tony remembers is back when shops were allowed to sell butter off the block. Mrs Bracken used to keep these wooden paddled in a jug of water, and when someone wanted to buy butter she'd use them to shape the butter into a block before wrapping in in a piece of greaseproof paper for you.

The marble! I'll leave that one for Marie to talk more about. He put that marble in his mouth because she dared him to. The doctor in the hospital said that nature would take care of it. Now that I think of it it can't have been a very entertaining for Ma and Da keeping an eye on nature! As far as I know the marble might still be there! If you ever find it, let us know Tony.

Marie's memories are next... do come back for those.

Gardiner Street. In the flat.

Last time I left you waiting to be invited inside our new flat. Well I'm going to take you inside now, in just a minute. First I wanted to remind you of the layout as you approached our flat from inside the house. Sorry about the quality of the picture, but if you look carefully you'll see the small square window that I mentioned, the window in our toilet. As I said earlier, the big window above it was just there to let in natural light, and to the left of that window is one of the 2 windows that were at the back of our flat... the kitchen part... no sitting room or anything like that. And I mentioned that there was a door leading to our landing. My Ma loved this door because it could be bolted, so I suppose she felt more like we had our own privacy at last with having the two doors, as well as the fact that the halldoor was a locked one. One of my memories as you approached that landing door were the stairs. Two flights, one from Judge's landing leading to the landing that had our toilet and the final flight leading from the toilet up to the flat. But one thing that sticks in my mind is how clean Ma kept these stairs. They were bare wooden stairs, no covering of any sort, and they were white as can be. They were white because Ma scrubbed them regularly. I can see her now going out with her basin of scalding water, her big bar of red carbolic soap, a cloth of some kind and a scrubbing brush with stiff bristles. She took pride in how clean she kept that stairway, and even as a kid I used to feel guilty about walking on them if I'd been out playing and my shoes were dirty.

Well there you have it again... an introduction to the approach to our flat.

So now gentle reader it's time to come inside.

Look to your left as you come through the landing door and there you see one door. It's painted a sort of dark green and has a keyhole and a shining brass knob. It wasn't a bright brass knob when we moved in, quite blackened in fact. But Ma soon had it shining like new.

But I digress. We open the door and there straight in front of us is what was known as the coal hole. In fact this was a ceiling height press, not unlike a walk-in wardrobe, even having small louvre ventilators in the doors near the top. It was called the coal hole because that's what it was used for... holding coal... if we had some. Why a hole though? Because in all of the old houses around there was a hole in the ground outside each house where coal was dropped through. But they were only really used when the aristocracy lived in the houses, but the name stuck... the coal hole... for wherever coal was stored.

This small hall is about 10 feet long by about 6 feet wide. To the right there are two doors, one for each bedroom. The door to the left led to our only other room... the kitchen. That door was always kept ajar for some reason. Probably so that we as kids didn't feel left out if we were in our room.

We walk into the kitchen and the first thing we see in front of us is a kitchen table. A wooden one, with two chairs. Ma kept that table whiter than white. It was scrubbed daily, and often several times a day with the carbolic soap. I remember that soap, it was a long bar, red in colour and no good for any other kind of washing apart from scrubbing because it was very hard to build up a lather. Sometimes Ma would cover the table with a table cloth, though it wasn't made of cloth, it was some kind of shiny oilcloth.

To the left of this room there was a sideboard and next to that was the sink. This was a huge sink, very deep too. I never heard anyone call it a sink though. It was always called a trough (pronounced throw) and above it a single tap delivering cold water. Between the sink and the window that you see in the photo there was a short wooden draining board. This draining board was used by us kids as a place to sit so that we could look out the window. That was because it was just far enough back from the window that we couldn't fall out (four stories high remember) but close enough so that we could see out clearly. We used to get Kelloggs corn flakes and at that time the packet had cut-out photos of big American cars. I used to stick those photos on the wall over the draining board, and at the time we were finally leaving that flat I remember that one or two of the cars were still stuck to that wall.

To the right of that window was the fireplace. Dad used to paint the bricks surrounding it signal red and he'd paint the mortar between in white. It looked good to me. Across in front of the fire there was a fender that as a kid you could sit on. But that has a painful memory for me. One part of that fender was held together with copper wire and I sat on it, and a piece of the wire stuck through a rather tender area for a boy. I was taken to Temple Street Childrens hospital where I was taken care of, and my parents were assured that someday I really could be a father, despite the injury. Some people actually pay to be pierced there now! But enough about that.

To the left of the fireplace was another window just like the one in the photo. Dad used to buy cage birds in the bird market on Sundays and their small wooden cages used to be stood on the windowsill and hung on nails outside. It used to be nice hearing the birdsong of linnets, red polls and goldfinches. A lot of people did that back then, and some even bred birds in their flats. But Sundays were special for me becuase Dad always brought me to the bird market on the South side of the city and they were wonderful outings for me. I'll talk about them at some time later.... and about the open air markets that we used to go to on the way to and from the bird market. As a matter of interest that bird market is still in business and is supposed to be the oldest in the world.

The window I've just mentioned met a wall to the left. Standing against this wall there was a dresser. This was a kitchen dresser, the type that held dishes, cups etc and had two drawers for cutlery and presses below that held pots and kitchen cleaning stuff. I remember it as being painted blue and white. The cups used to be hung on hooks fixed to the edge of the shelves, and the very top of the dresser was reserved for stuff that Dad didn't want us fooling about with, and as it was too high anything he put up there was safe. Or so he thought! One day, he must have been out or no one was paying any heed to me, I climbed up the dresser and took down a hand drill. and bored a neat hole in the floorboards. Wasn't an expert job but good enough... till someone spotted what I was up to and my career as a carpenter came to an abrupt end.

That wall I'm speaking of was where any pictures that we had were hung, and at the farthest end from the window there was a niche in the wall, covered with a curtain. This was the wardrobe.

Then we come to the wall that led back to the entrance door. Ma and Da's bed was here, along this wall. I suppose they didn't have a lot of choice about where to put their bed because there was only two bedrooms and the family at that time was two boys and a two girls. Then again the second of the two bedrooms was very small and I doubt if their bed would have fit in there anyway.

The room was lit by one lightbulb hanging from the center of the ceiling. Oh I remember in Summertime how sticky fly catchers were hung from the ceiling and down beside the bulb. I hated those fly catchers, you'd always see a fly trying to extricate itself from whatever sticky substance covered the ribbon that hung from the ceiling.

Dad took great pride in keeping that flat looking cosy and hospitable. He always seemd to be painting or wallpapering, and Mam would be scrubbing and dusting. I suppose they were proud of their home and they made a great team in keeping it looking good.

The floor was covered in lino, though I remember it being called oilcloth and even for years after we left that flat Ma used to polish the lino and get us kids to put on old socks and slide on it. We made great lino polishers, bringing the lino up to a shine you could see youself in... and if you weren't careful when walking on it you might have gone skating and broken a leg.

Over on the sideboard in pride of place was our radio set. A big one with a 'magic eye' which had something to do with the tuning of the radio but all I ever saw was a green light changing shape, but it kept me interested, though I never found out for myself why that 'magic eye' was there. Oh the radio wasn't ours! It was rented. Radios were very expensive then, so people rented them from a firm called Brittans, now long gone out of business of course. But I remember that a woman used to call each week for our payments which I think was about 1 shilling a week. If you missed three weeks they came and repossessed it. If that happened no problem. You simply went back to Brittans and rented another one under a different name! I think the collector eventually got to know all of the names we used because there came a time when we could no longer rent from her firm and we had to change to another one.

Next time I want to talk about what we could see when we looked out of the windows, and I also want to talk about life in that street. I also want to post some memories that my brother Tony has sent to me and also some that Marie has shared too, and there's lots more to come.

So do drop back... we have a lot to get through... including the fact that we had a ringside seat for the fights that took place in the street after the pubs emptied at the weekends.... I think you'll be entertained... and have a laugh too.

Oh, before I go. I must say that my abiding memory of living in Gardiner Street, the memory that always comes back when I think of us living there is of our Mam singing. Yes, she was a happy woman, and I remember her songs too. I'm going to upload some so that you can hear them too. Bet some will remember all or some of them.

See you again soon.

Gardiner Street -- at the back.

I know that I left you on the landing outside of our door, but before inviting you in and introducing you to life in our home I thought I'd bring you up a bit closer to the flat and how the building looked.... from the back.

This isn't a very clear picture, but I'll do my best. In fact the picture only shows half of the building. If you could see slightly to the left (out of picture) you'd see the chimney housing for the fireplaces in each flat. You can see part of it here. And then to the left of the chimney housing you'd see more windows, because each flat had two windows at the back and two at the front. The windows at the back were arranged one each side of the fireplace.

You'll remember that I mentioned Mrs Fox who lived in the ground floor with her family. Well that small square window that you can see just above the wall o four backyard was their toilet window. Above that window and on each toilet landing you can see a bigger window. These windows were over the toilets and served no other purpose than to allow natural light in to the staircases. So even on the darkest nights, although there was no electric lights on the stairs or landings, some light came through those windows and helped you to see where you were walking in the dark. We were lucky. In many of the other houses in the area the people had to use some kind of torch or a candle to light their way upstairs after dark. I remember seeing people twisting newspapers tightly and setting fire to them to light their way up the stairs.

The next window up, the one that the frame looks like a cross was that of the Valente family. This family owned a chip shop around the corner on Summerhill and were considered to be wealthy by their neighbours, because of owning that shop. The Valente's were a very nice family and if you bought 8 pence worth of chips in their shop you'd get enough to nearly feed a family of four -- and indeed it often did! In the shop they had these big deep friers and they'd scoop out the chips onto a double sheet of newspaper, shake salt and pepper over the chips and then fold over the newspaper, making a sort of parcel of the chips. I can smell the chips now as I remember, and the sharp tangy smell of the vinegar. You'd hold the parcel of chips under your coat against your chest to keep them warm as you made your way home on a cold night, and there'd be a smell of vinegar off you for the night.

One evening old Mr Valente died. The wake was held in their flat and all of the neighbours attended, as did anyone else who heard about the late Mr Valente, because back then a wake was like a party with free drink and food, usually big fat ham sandwiches. Sometimes a wake could go on for two or three days. Us kids always made sure to drop in to pay our respects mostly because we were given lemonade and either cakes and biscuits, a nice treat. So death had no real fear for us as kids, it just meant a free treat.

Something my father said after Mr Valente's wake sticks in my mind.

Unlike the tradition of the day when those who died were laid out in a habit, usually brown, with religious symbols stitched onto it, and the late lamented's hands were joined as if in prayer with rosary beads strung through the fingers. Mr Valente was laid out in his best suit and shoes, fully dressed, looking as if he was off to a dance rather than a grave.

My father and his friend's Andy Sweeny and Tommy Munster came up to our flat after the wake and a discussion ensued after my father remarked sadly, "What a terrible waste!" I remember Tommy Munster nodding and agreeing with Dad, saying something to the effect that Mr Valente, the poor man, would be sadly missed. My Dad said he didn't mean that! What he meant by the 'terrible waste' was that Mr Valente was off to his final resting place and along with him was going a lovely suit, new shirt, tie and shoes! Andy agreed and said you'd have got a lot on them on them in Jack Rafter's pawnshop!

So Mr Valente went off to his final rest, the best dressed corpse you'd ever see!

Above Valente's window is that of the Judge family. If the photographer had stood back a few feet you'd have been able to see the piece of wasteground where Mr Judge used to park his taxis. He had two of them. That meant he was wealthy like the Valente's also! We hadn't a penny, but we lived among a better class of people! And in a better class of house too.

One day I was standing on the running board of one of Mr Judge's taxis when he came along toward me. I thought he was going to complain to me about touching his car, but no, instead he asked if I could wash the car. I was delighted and said I could. So he gave me a bucket of water and some cloths and left me to it. That made me feel important, and I told any other kid that came along that I was too busy washing the car to go and play. I had thoughts above my station! And that was to get even worse. A while later Mr Judge came down and examined the car that I'd just washed, told me I'd done a great job (that alone would have made my day) and then he gave me a shilling! A shilling!! I couldn't believe it. I remember wondering just for a moment if he was fooling, but as soon as I realised that he wasn't I thanked him and as I started to run to show off my new fortune to my Ma, Mr Judge called and asked me if I'd wash the cars another day for him. With that kind of pay I'd have lived in the cars and caught the dust before it even had a chance to settle on the shiny bodywork!

Ma was delighted when I showed her the shilling and send me off with the usual admonition, "Don't spend it all in the one shop, now!" I don't remember all that I bought, only that I bought a Flash Bar (chocolate with a toffee center, priced 2 pence -- leaving me 10 pence) and a Lucky Bag for another 2 pence. And I got great mileage out of telling my pals that "Oh yes, I work for Mr Judge, washing the taxis." God, Jimmy Doyle was dying with jealousy!

Mr Judge's daughter married a chap named Paddy Weafer and the day that my brother Tony swallowed a glass marble (at the instigation of my sister Marie), there was panic because Ma thought that Tony was going to choke. Next thing Paddy arrived in our flat with a knife in his hand, looking for Tony. But that's Tony's and Marie's memory so I'll leave that one for them to share.

And above the Judge's window, at the top of the house, that's one of ours. You'll notice that the Judges and the Valente's toilet is on the same floor, but ours is all to itself on the next floor. Very posh! And if that window of our flat could tell tales, including a couple of stories about those drainpipes that ran beside our windows! But they're tales for me to tell. And if you come back I'll tell you, and more too.