A Bill Nelson Miscellany

That photograph was taken around 1983 in the kitchen of Haddlesey House where I lived at that time. The Dalmation is Wallis. She was a wonderful dog with a good pedigree, bought as a supply from Harrods pet department in London.

Incidentally, the shirt I'm wearing once belonged to my father who bought it when we were on holiday in the mid 1950s. I still have it though it's too small for me now I'm afraid. 😕

The high waisted trousers were by Kathrine Hamnett whose clothes I often wore back then. The pine table under the tablecloth in front of me is actually here in my studio right now...it holds my computer and printer and various other things. One of the few objects I've managed to hang on to since those days.

Was wondering about the mention of Captain Kangaroo in the lyrics of 'King of The Cowboys'. Did you watch some of our 'Captain Kangaroo' programme whilst BBD was touring the states?

... or ...

Was the television programme 'Captain Kangaroo' aired in Britain at the time?

... or ...

Is this a different Captain Kangaroo referred to here :

Here comes Champagne Charlie

Here comes Captain Kangaroo

Sliding in and out of corners

Twisting at each turn of the screw

This Bill Nelson Micellaney thread is fun and I'll try to add to it myself from time to time. Here's an obscure photograph of me in The Midnite Kreepers playing on a balcony above the foyer of the ABC Regal Cinema in Wakefield in the 1960s. We played as people came into the cinema to see the new film of 'Dr Who and The Daleks', starring Peter Cushing as Dr Who..

I'm on the right of the photo; in dark glasses and polka dot shirt. The drummer for this gig was Barry Houghingly, a very talented drummer who went on to have a career playing and singing on cruise ships. The rhythm guitarist is Ron Oldroyd who, for this gig, was made up like a Frankenstein monster with ripped shirt and bolts drawn on his neck. Not entirely sure what Frankenstein had to do with Dr Who though!

I actually still have that poster for the Dr Who movie that you can see behind us in the photo'. The cinema manager used to let me have the posters when the film's run ended and I used the blank backs of them to draw ads for my bands on. Unfortunately, I drew on the back of that one with felt marker pens which bled through to the other side, thus ruining the original Dr Who poster. I don't know which would be worth more these days, the Dr Who poster or my drawing on the reverse!

I played at the Regal Cinema several times, with The Cosmonauts', (my school band,) 'Group 66', 'The Midnite Kreepers' and 'The Gibson Trio' and 'Gibson Four.'

'The Midnite Kreepers' at The Regal Cinema, Wakefield, mid 1960s.

I've probably posted this photo' in an old diary entry but here it is again. This is a photograph of R. Broughton and Son's shop on Waterloo Road, in Hunslet, Leeds, taken in 1973, just before the shop was demolished, along with the entire street. My father, Walter Nelson, worked as manager of the shop in the 1950s and '60s and the shop's owner, Harry Broughton, (the son referred to in the shop's title,) who had taken over the business from his late father, became a friend of our family. Harry more or less left the running of the shop entirely to my father.

As a kid, I can remember travelling to Leeds on Saturdays with my mother to do some shopping, then at the end of the afternoon going to Waterloo Road to meet my father when he finished the day's work at Broughton and Son's shop.

Waterloo Road at that time. was thriving, with shops on both sides of the road. The Leeds red and cream trams rattled up and down the street between them.

Broughton and Sons' shop sold electrical goods, radios, televisions, etc, but also stocked Dinky Toys and Hornby Dublo Trains and Meccano sets. It had a dark, dusty interior with old wooden counters but was a treasure trove of stuff. My father would bring me a Dinky toy home every weekend and Christmas would see gifts of train sets and Mecanno sets magically displayed on our living room carpet on Christmas mornings.

A little further down the street was a small newsagents shop where my father would buy magazines for mum and himself and comics for me, every Friday evening. He would read car magazines such as 'Autocar' and 'Do It Yourself' magazines plus 'Practical Wireless', a radio and electronics publication that contained circuit diagrams for various electronic projects. Mum would get 'Woman' magazine and 'Woman's Own' magazine, to 'Woman's Weekly.' I would be given an entire raft of comics, Beano, Dandy, Hotspur, Topper, Eagle, Beezer, Lion, Radio Fun, TV Comic, Film Fun, etc, etc. I looked forward to reading them every weekend, they were a welcome escape from the week's school work.

When this photograph was taken in 1973, my father had retired due to ill health and the shop and the street had fallen into decline and was set for demolition. In the photo' you can see the sorry state the shop was in, no longer occupied or trading but boarded up. But the yellow and dark red 'Broughton And Son' sign is still visible, as is some of the descriptions of what the shop sold. (The yellow and red livery was also used on the shop's pencils, one of which I am fortunate to still have from my father's time there.)

The area is unrecognisable now apart from an old pub, ('The Garden Gate,') which was saved and now enjoys listed building status. The rest of the area has been converted to a housing estate and bears little resemblance to how it once was. /such is the passage of time...

R. Broughton And Son's old shop in Waterloo Road, Hunslet, Leeds. Photo' from 1973, just prior to demolition.

In 1993, whilst living in Tokyo, I had to leave Japan for a while so that I could renew my visa. I'd lived there for six months, which was the maximum time I was allowed to stay without 'checking out' and then re-applying for another visa for a further six months. In that first six months I'd been living with Emi in her Tokyo apartment. So, we decided to take a brief holiday break in Bali, Indonesia for ten days so that I could then come back to Japan on a new visa and live in Tokyo for another six months.

The holiday in Bali was magical. A totally different culture which I loved. We stayed at a hotel called 'Tang Jung Sari' which was right on the beach and was not like a usual hotel but more like a compound consisting of individual bungalows surrounded by their own private gardens with high hedges. Monkeys cavorted in the trees overlooking our bungalow's garden and the bathroom shower was located out of doors where you could bathe naked with no-one to see but the monkeys!

The hotel had a Gamelan music foundation which taught Gamalan and traditional Balinese dancing to local children and we were able to listen and watch their lessons. During our stay we visited various sites on the island, including ancient temples which were truly breathtaking. The whole thing was like a dream, a totally unique experience. I actually got to 'jam' with some traditional Balinese musicians while I was there, which was a marvellous thing. Anyway, here's a photo' of Emi and I in Bali, looking very happy. I'll post more pics of that trip at a later date...

Back in the early 1960s, there was an American magazine called 'Spacemen.' It was an offshoot of 'Famous Monsters Of Filmland' magazine, both titles being the brainchild of the late Forrest J. Ackerman, a supremely knowledgable man in the world of classic movie science fiction, fantasy and horror.

I was a young schoolboy when I read my first 'Famous Monsters' magazine. It sometimes carried articles about science fiction movies, but when 'Spacemen' magazine was launched, that was a real thrill.

The magazine only survived for 7 or 8 issues, but I had most of them and was amazed to find articles on Metroipolis, Forbidden Planet, Flash Gordon and King Of The Rocketmen inside, complete with rare production photo's. I was very disappointed when the magazine folded.

Anyway, I still have one issue in my possession today, kept from all those long years ago, (though the rest sadly got lost somewhere along the way.)

So, here is a selection of some of the covers from 'Spacemen' magazine. Hope you like them!

Continuing on a science fiction kick: One of the very first Sci-Fi characters, (along with Dan Dare and Flash Gordon,) that I liked in the early 1950s was 'Red Ray.' He appeared in 'TV Comic', one of the weekly comics my father bought for me from the newsagent's shop in Waterloo Road, Hunslet. (See my post further back in this thread.)

'Red Ray' was from the planet 'Teevida' and came to Earth to enlist the aid of two British kids to fight the bad guys. In TV Comic there was an advert for a Red Ray club kids could join: 'The Space Rayngers' club. You had to send off a postal order to the value of one shilling and six pence and in return you would get a membership kit which included a 'Red Ray' badge, magic space glasses, magic space pencils and a 'passport to space.'

I was five or six years old at the time, (around 65 years ago now,) and a pupil at my very first school, 'The Collegiate' in Wakefield, (affiliated with Wakefield Academy.') I'd persuaded my mum to send off the money required to join the 'Red Ray Space Raynger's' club and every day, when she came to collect me from the Collegiate school, (which was housed in the old Orangery in Back Lane,) I'd ask her if the membership pack had arrived in the post yet.

Several days went by with no luck, then one day she said, 'yes', it had arrived and she produced it from her handbag and handed it to me outside the school gates. Magic!

I've never forgotten the thrill of that moment and fondly remember 'Red Ray' to this day. Here's the ad that appeared in TV Comic back then, along with a photo' of the tin and enamel club badges.

The Red Ray Space Raynger's club membership application form.

Two enamel Red Ray club badges.

As mentioned in one of my posts above, I had a Hornby Dublo Train set in the 1950s and a few Ian Allan 'Loco Spotter' books to do a bit of train spotting. So, here's a picture of a Loco steaming out of Wakefield's Westgate station in the '50s, heading towards Leeds. The building behind the engine is the Unitarian Chapel/church which was just across the road from my first school, the Collegiate, which was housed in the old Orangery in Back lane. The engine is just about to go over the bridge above Back Lane and the Orangery is just out of sight to the left of the photo. Wakefield town hall clock tower visible on the right of the picture. It was possible for us little kids to see trains steaming out of Westgatee station as they passed by the school's front grounds on the bridge above Back Lane.

Connecting with the above post, (a train of thought,) here's a modern day photo' of the actual Orangery that housed the Wakefield Collegiate School in the 1950s. The large window in the centre is the hall where I had my ballet dancing lessons. (Yes, a real life Billy Elliot!). Ballet was on the school's curriculum and I quite enjoyed it.

In later years I filmed part of the video for 'Flaming Desire' in that hall as a nod to my childhood ballet dancing lessons. The tall lamppost on the left of the photo is actually on the platform of Westgate Station and this is where I would see steam trains coming out of the station and passing by the school, back in the early '50s...

The second image is a scan of a receipt for the fee my father paid for a whole term's tuition at the school. The grand price of six pounds! Dad's wage back then would have been around eight pounds per week. The receipt is dated September 1954, so, on that date, I would be five years old, and three months away from my sixth birthday.

The receipt is signed by 'GB Shaw' who owned and ran the school. You can see that the word 'Academy' has been crossed out and 'Collegiate'; written above it. This is because the Collegiate was the infant branch of the Academy. I guess they hadn't got separate receipts printed for the Collegiate and just used the Academy ones. I don't know where the Academy was located though. It wan't part of the Orangery.

You can also see that 'examination fee' is crossed out and 'Dancing' written in. Examinatiions were not on the curriculum for kids of that age so, again, that would be more the territory of the Academy. The dancing, of course, was the ballet lessons I took. I still have the actual receipt in my archives. It's a bit fragile now after 65 years but it's a wonderful connection with my first school, my father and my infancy.

The Orangery which housed the Wakefield Collegiate School in the early 1950s.

The receipt for a term at the Collegiate School, given to my father after he paid the £6 fee for my tuition there.