Memories of Childhood
by John Appleby

~ 8 ~

The area north of the church was known as the Moor, and part of this grassy common fronting the sea was partly occupied by the golf course. Here the tweeded gentlemen could be seen teeing off, shouting "fore" and paying small boys to fish lost golfballs from a nearby pond, then trudge back to their ancient motor cars. It was a favourite place to walk, up the coast, with the skylarks above, and the sighing song of the sea on the right. It was a grand place for ball games, foot races, flying kites, brass band concerts, and the "shows" - the fair with great hissing, oilsmelling traction engine, powering dozens of glaring naked light bulbs above the stalls booths and swings, and the deafening pipe organ music.

At the other end of the village, between the Aged miners cottages and the Needles Eye, lay a tract of grassy land. A track led down to the burn which flowed past the sea scouts hut in a curve, to reach the sea via the Needles Eye. Across the burn, the track climbed up to the quarry then petered out into a pathway through an area of gorse bushes, to arrive at green clifftop fields. Over the course of time and the onslaught of the sea, parts of the cliffs would collapse into the sea. This would cause the farmer to move his fences back to make way for a fresh track along the clifftop. High above the sea, it gave a fine view South to the mouth of the river Wansbeck and beyond to the coal port of Blyth, and on occasions, St. Marys lighthouse at Tynemouth.

The aforesaid tract of land afforded a place where, in spring, people could haul their heavy homemade mats to be beaten with sticks amid a years accummulation of dust. The posts I think must have been permanent, and people brought their own clothes lines. In the long summer evenings, one or two old pensioners would take their ease on a bench beside the gable wall, blinking in the sun. We boys scoured the allotment fenceline in search of dicarded tar felt and other combustibles, to light forbidden fires.

From this tract of land my brother and me and other boys looked down on the terrifying sight of two boys surrounded by the incoming tide. They had been engrossed in their rockpool pursuits and were trapped! Luckily their cries were heard, and two men waded out and brought them back to the sand. Some years later, when work began on the tennis courts project, I believe that a number of Roman coins were excavated.

© 2003 John Appleby, New Zealand

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