大象传媒

I was evacuated at the age of 12 from Shoreditch Central School, London to Burnham Market, Norfolk in 1939. I returned to Islington, London in 1942. The teachers from my school in London decided to take a farmhouse and to train us ready for a working life when we left which, in my case, they certainly did. I found evacuation a traumatic experience but, being observant, I realised that it was the last time I would see village life as it was. The "add-ons" was the turning of a cowshed into a picture house mainly to entertain the troops who were also billetted around - they called it the O-so-cosie! Every time I see Dora Bryan I also see her in her younger days on the screen in Burnham Market advertising ice-cream. After paying a penny entrance fee there was not much chance of buying ice-cream even if there was enough to go round. Health and Safety would have had a fit as the seats were pressed up against the wall with no gangway! The talkies were most primitive too. In the three years I was there I never saw a doctor or a dentist and there were no books either. At school we were read to with one book which the teacher had. "Pride and Prejudice" was read to us completely cutting out any reference to Lydia and Wickham which would have needed an explanation which was never done in those days. I was amazed when I got home to read the full book as you may imagine. It was also water from the pump and indescriable toilets but we survived even if it marked us for life.

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