A Penny for the Guy?
Created | Updated Nov 1, 2009
A Penny for the Guy?
"Muuu'um!" I shouted down the corridor from the bedroom.
"Can we make a guy? It's payday tomorrow!"
Mum was all for a quiet life, especially during the half-term. Keeping four of us occupied and out of mischief was no mean feat. She patiently went through all our out-grown, non-pass-downable clothes. Then she rummaged through some of Dad's old castoffs.
First we sorted out the best ones for the outer garments; Dad's old khaki trousers, one of my brother's old shirts, a sweater, tie and younger brother's out grown fleecy jacket with matching deerstalker hat. Oh, and a pair of wellies and gloves.
Then we stuffed our guy with the left-overs. Mum gave us an old pillowslip - that was for the head. We spent hours with paints, chalks and crayons. What a splendid fellow he looked!
Finally, we put 'him' together. A stitch or two here and there for security. We had a fantastic guy, all of 5' 10" tall, and fully proportioned.
We put him into my bedroom, out of the way for the night.
The next morning was beautiful, a bright and crisp autumnal morning. The four of us were raring to go!
"Ssshhhh! Your Dad's in bed." said Mum.
"Can we go out now, Mum?"
"No. You'll wake your Dad and he's been on nights!"
Apart from the two girls who lived in the flat downstairs, we were the only children who lived down near the docks of the Manchester Ship Canal, at Ellesmere Port. It was all great fun living there, except that parents are highly atuned to the voices of their children which used to echo around the area!
At midday we were given hot soup for lunch to keep us warm, then we wrapped up well and carried our guy downstairs, around the house, and out through the front double gates. From the quiet roadside we could see the office where the dockers, stevedores and other employees of the MSC would collect their wages from the man behind the hatch window.
We struggled to carry the guy (did I mention it was heavy?) to the end of the path as some were opening their pay packets.
Four little 'angels' stood in their way; 'Have you got a penny for the Guy, please?'
Who could resist us? We did very well until the queue ended. Where to next? The canteen of course! So we staggered back across the road and stood at the bottom of the steps for those coming out of the canteen. Pushing the younger brother and sister to the front, little hands out stretched, it never fails!
We are on a roll here! So we go further up the road, over the wooden swing bridge, to stand on the corner of Criddles, where we could also catch those returning to King's Flour Mills (sadly,neither exist anymore). All was going well until one refused to pay anything, the men from Criddles loading bay called him some names and then, grabbing him, they swung him upside down and shook him! Loads of coins dropped from his pocket and the men grabbed up the money and pushed it into our collection tin! Grinning widely, we grabbed the guy and dragged him home as fast as we could, just in case the man came after us!
Well, we laughed loudly as we went around the house, plonking the guy up against the wall that surrounded the steep steps to the front door. We then remembered that Dad had been on nights, so crept up the stairs to the flat.
'Too late for that,' said Mum. 'You're Dad's been called in to cover the 2 til 10 shift. He's been watching your antics!
Have you noticed how, in our case, four innocent faces can suddenly look so guilty even though they don't know why? Well, that took the wind out of our sails for all of..... Five minutes!
For the rest of the afternoon, we separated out the all the coins. Lord, we had loads in those days; there were a couple of half-crowns, some two-shilling coins, the most were shillings, sixpences, thru'penny bits, pennies and half-pennies. After tea, Mum and I started to count the money into manageable stacks, then putting them into £1 stacks. I could hear Mum muttering to herself and then more loudly:
'Flippin' 'eck!', or words very similar, 'You've got over ten pounds!'
I went off to bed dreaming of us having fireworks like those that used to be shown at the beginning of Sunday Night at the London Palladium! It was many years later that I learned that Dad's pay at that time (approximately 1966), after the rent and other deductions had been removed, only came to between £16 and £18 per week. No wonder Mum was excited.
