大象传媒

Notes extracted from my family history records..

War broke out when we lived at 11 Stainbeck Gardens, Leeds. My Wartime Identity Card was issued as of that address. my father, FRANK, dug a pit for an Anderson Shelter, so that it was half underground and then covered with soil and turf. That was in 1940. His Diary details his work on it... The only time I remember being in it [I suppose the Alert had sounded] my main memory is of Mum opening a tin of "Smiths Crisps", and I've never seen a tin of "Smiths Crisps" from that day to this!
Then there was the episode of the Messerschmidt 109... One had been brought down or captured more or less intact, and it was being used as a focal point for raising funds to build Spitfires - or so I vaguely seem to remember. Anyway, it was on display in Leeds City Centre somewhere, and Dad took me along to see it on Sat 14 Sep 1940 [FRANK's Diary Entry reads: "To town with JOHN to view damaged 'Messerschmidt 109', and bomb damage]. There it was, complete with it's black crosses [I don't recall swastikas], with a queue of small boys waiting to be lifted into it's cockpit by their fathers and the airman in charge. It came to my turn!... and the airman said no more, closing shop. The disappointment has never been forgotten... Ah well...
Train of thought: Messerschmidt - air-raids - blackout - fireworks!...
November the 5th without fireworks? I don't remember what happened in later war years, but that year [1939 I think it must have been], FRANK brought home some "Indoor Fireworks"! I seem to remember most of them gave off coloured or bright light when set alight in a saucer. Great!

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