大象传媒

I was 16 when war was declared & worked in a drapery shop. Previous to the outbreak of war the shop hours were long, 8.30am.to 7.pm. half day on Wednesdays, 8pm. on Fridays & on Saturdays the boss would keep looking out into the street until he was satisfied that there were no more prospective cutomers & it was usually 10pm. before he would close the door. There was a mad scramble for "black out" material & soon the shelves were cleared of all kinds of cloth that was black or dense enough to prevent light getting through. As the shop windows were large blacking them out was not practical so, to the joy of the staff, we started closing at 5.30pm. as did practically all the other shops. Soon the reps. (called commercial travellers in those days)had less & less to sell & the shelves grew more empty as the weeks went by. Our staff was getting depleted, too, with the two young men being called up for the Army, one girl joined the WAAF & the other went in for nursing & was later to become a Senior Sister. Life went on very much the same for me. The cinema's were still operating & my current boy friend & I went twice a week as was our usual habit. My Father died from a heart attack, at age 57 just before my 18th birthday & my mother was devastated. I had hoped to join the WAAF when I was 18 but my Mother, who was suffering from arthritis & depended on me to do the shopping & some of the housework, got me exempted from the services, much to my disappointment. I entered the local Fire Service as a night telephonist on a part time basis but was called up to do work in a munitions factory as soon as I was
18. I hated it at first but soon got used to doing three shifts & the money per week was great being about three times the amount I had been earning in a shop. I said a tearful farewell on the station platform to my boy friend who went into the Army & thus began a new chapter of life for me. From Joan Shovelton.