One Man and his Motor ...

When C-H-M was a very small boy his favourite car was the Ford Anglia: I think it was the styling at the back that appealed. No other car had quite that shape. The Anglia, according to Wikipedia , was manufactured, in various models, between 1939 and 1967. So C-H-M was delighted to receive this photo of Dave Butler, looking dead cool, leaning in a proprietorial manner on his Ford Anglia at Ullenwood, taken by Becky Sanderson (Spencer) one evening in 1976. Even then the car was at least 9 and it could have been as old as 17 (as this model was first built in 1959) - almost old enough to merit a finds card.

Dr Ferris dips his madeleine in his tisane and writes: "I am delighted to see that Crickley Hill Man has now posted Becky's photo of Dave Butler (Dave Parr) on his blog: I first saw this excellent picture at the reunion in July. Unless I'm mistaken, 1976 was Dave's last year at Crickley, having been present each year since the early 1970s, and being particularly famed for his party dj-ing. For some curious reason John Parry always used to refer to Dave, even to his face, as 'the hippy', even though, as you can see in the photo, he was not hippylike at all.
After I finished at university I went on what was then called 'the digging circuit', an all-year-round series of excavations on which the peripatetic could obtain paid digging work. Having worked in the west country for five months, in February 1977 I moved to Nottingham to work for the Trent Valley Archaeological Rescue Committee (TVARC) and was delighted to find that Dave was by then working there. The diggers lived in Brewhouse Yard, just under the bluff on which Nottingham Castle stands, and drank each night in the excellent pub 'The Trip to Jerusalem'. I stayed with TVARC until April that year; Dave had already moved on by then and I didn't encounter him again until the reunion on July 4th."

Crickley Hill Man, by a coincidence of Koestlerian proportions, paid a visit to 'The Trip to Jerusalem' a few years ago whilst spending a few days attending Nottingham Crown Court in the pursuit of some felons and ne'er-do-wells who had defrauded the general public. Still a decent establishment then.

The man himself writes: "Ta for the heads-up C-H-M. Unfortunately, I had to scrap the car in 1978 after I had a run in with a farmer whilst working on a Roman Villa at Long Bennington (I was still with the Trent Valley Rescue Group). I believe I drove the car with 8 other drunken diggers in the back from the Air Balloon one evening (the Anglia was built like a light tank!!). I now drive a modest Ford Ka but I can still get a ton out of it easy. [Surely you mean "I find, on occasions, that, with encouragement, my current vehicle will nearly attain the National Speed Limit"? Ed.] It was so great to see my old digging mates again in July but I wish I could have spent more time reminiscing with them. I didn't get to talk much to you all but it was nice to chat to 'hippy' John(?) and my old mate Iain Ferris. We must all do this again in 2010."

We will, we will ...

There was no "Collated" button on the Savage Gestetner duplicating machine ...

In these days of image scanning and digital printing one forgets that it is only a very few years since the time when there was no easy simple and quick method of duplication: photocopiers did not exist, let alone digital photocopiers.  For an account of the history of duplicating machines, see here or a linked list of duplicating processes, here. 

Nowadays, no-one thinks anything of pressing a few buttons to specify number of copies, single-sided, double-sided, collated and stapled.  People even get slightly exasperated at having to feed the copier with paper, toner and staples.  Press the button, and off to the pub while the print run chugs through.

Well, it wasn't always like that, as Dr Ferris recalls:

"Crickley Hill Man has recently posted some excellent abstracts of information from one of the interim reports on the excavations put out in the early 1970s. I recall that during the 1973 season Richard Savage asked for volunteers to assist in collating and stapling one of the runs of interim reports one evening at Ullenwood - probably the 1972 interim you have been abstracting. A number of us volunteered for this task, not realising quite how long it would take and that we would be missing out on the chance of even last orders in the Air Balloon. 

Richard had the individual printed sheets laid out in huge piles on tables in the lecture room at the end of the mess hall and we had to move around the table picking up single sheets in page number order until we had a full report for passing to Richard for stapling, and then we had to start our circling route again and again and again and again until the hundreds of sheets had been totally cleared off the tabletops. It took about four hours and we were each rewarded with a free copy of the bound report. This struck me as really exciting at the time and I didn't regret missing out on all those undrunk pints of GL cider. So maybe Crickley Hill Man's copy of the interim when dusted for fingerprints will reveal the imprint of the Ferris dabs or those of Dave Butler who I think also volunteered for this Herculean task."

The report was available at the time from Richard at a cost of 25p plus 5p postage.  If we ignore the postage, a free copy of the report meant that Iain and Dave were remunerated in kind at the equivalent of a princely rate of 5¼ pence per hour.  Or slightly more than a 1973 first class postcard stamp, which was then 3½ pence.  Luxury beyond the dreams of avarice.  

Happy New Year!

An accident in a wheelbarrow race ...

Iain Ferris's piece here on the Sports Days has got Dave Butler reminiscing:

"Yes, Iain, I remember it well! The welly wanging sports, I think, were fixed in that you gave me "No wang" for my competition winning wang, as my left toe was 3mm over the wang start line. As for the wheel barrow racing, what can I say, again fixed! I was given a rather large American lass to 'wheel' and she came a cropper at the bend near the rampart entrance.

Also I was exhausted after 3 yards so it may be just as well she exited the barrow at an angle of 270 degrees to the horizontal. I, meanwhile, was recovering from heat stroke with a well timed slug of GL cider which miraculously appeared in the nick of time. Funny how these things happen, eh? Happy days!"

Plainly, we could have done with an electronic eye for the line calls, but it hadn't been invented yet. Presumably, Dave's co-competitor was recorded as given out LBW (Lost By Wheelbarrower) by the umpire? Good that the medicine bottle of GL was to hand in Dave's hour of need. I see from my web researches that it is still made but is quite hard to come by: some says that GL stands for "Gloucester Lager".

Dr Ferris writes ...

I enjoyed Crickley Hill Man's recent elegaic posting about his most recent visit to the Hill. I too have experienced similar feelings of tremendous and transcendent well-being when visiting Crickley on a number of occasions in the past few years with parties of students. Can one die from an overdose of nostalgia of this kind or would Crickley Hill Man recommend that I seek professional medical advice? (Seek psychological help, Iain - Ed. But keep on taking the hills)

  

Crickley Hill Man's recent mention of Cold Slad made me recall that when I first came to dig at Crickley I was told that this was the village of Slad featured in Laurie Lee's 'Cider With Rosie'. It was only in 2002 or so that I learned that this was not the case and that Laurie Lee's Slad was in fact close to Stroud, though still in Gloucestershire. I wonder if Crickley Hill Man or any of his dedicated readers have laboured under this same misapprehension? (Like you, I was misled into believing that Cold Slad was the Laurie Lee one - you just disabused me of the notion.)

  

I note in Dave Butler's recent posting on Crickley Hill Man's blog that he had not remembered the names of the three cooks he referred to as having done the dig catering. I recall that 'the Chinese cook' was Aileen (or Eileen), while the 'two Geordie cooks' were Ken and Dave who did the catering two seasons' running.  (Ken Fussell is now in South Africa here)

Dr Phillpotts recalls Tony being the cook in about 1972.

Sandwich update ...

Dr Phillpotts's note on the sandwiches: "As I recall the leftovers from the cooked breakfast could also be used for sandwich fillings at some periods. Sausage sandwiches were relatively popular; cold bacon perhaps less so. Sometimes the accounting in the sandwich manufacturing division was a little too tight, or failed to account for new arrivals, resulting in a shortage and emergency dashes back to Ullenwood for more supplies."

Dave Butler writes: "All I can remember of the lunchtime sandwiches was you could have any combination of cheese and branston pickle. Also, I seem to recall a Chinese cook one year who became a good friend and two Geordie chefs and an end of dig party that got slightly out of hand and cars were covered in eggs!! Savage got me to clean the camp and de-louse all the mattresses AGAIN! Afterwards, the pig farm smelt like roses. I believe that was the exceptional summer of '76 when we all melted."  Ah yes the sweet smell of the pig manure when spread across the fields...