| John Tyers |
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Before the school dinners started being delivered by the WRVS to St Martin's School, I used to meet my mother for midday dinner at the British Restaurant in Cheyne Lane located in the old sale rooms which is now Mr Pang's Chinese Restaurant. This was a government initiative to ensure war workers had an adequate midday meal; if I remember rightly one shilling or six pence for three courses! The lady in charge was a Mrs Lock who I can still envisage standing near the servery and casting a wary eye over all the diners while swinging a large soup ladle! Considering this was wartime, even so it was a bargain and overall a decent meal which did't count against your ration book. If you had a nationally run, subsidised system like this today there would be howls from some quarters that it smacked of Communism and the legitimate restaurants and pubs would complain of the dilution of their trade! Anyone else a former customer? If so what did you think of it?
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| joan |
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My husband remembers going there once, he had fell out with his Mum over his dinner, so went there for a change, where he got the 1/6d from he doesn't know. He would only be about 9 at the time. Lots of carrots on the menu, (so that you could see in the blackout) Didn't help his eyesight - wears glasses now.
Bet he got a good hiding when he got home, he always says he had one most days.
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| John Tyers |
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I don't know which was best (or worst) the BR or the original school dinners at St.Martin's School which cost 5 old pence per day; they sold you five tickets per week 2/1d. Not much in the way of meat and the menu consisted of quite a lot of cheese potato. The salad was noteworthy by what you might discover hiding in it. Insects or worse!
The WRVS used to deliver the food in containers by an old green van and the teachers, even the headmaster, used to serve the meals. As I was a mate of a lad whose mother was our dinner lady, I used to get roped in with him to help with the washing up, a skill I seem to have since kept up! No 'leccy dishwashers in those days!
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| john freear |
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I remember the BR.I also remember what was there before it(unfortunately) It was like a woolworths in a sense called "The Supply Stores" Sometimes I would spend my pocket money there but allowing that at that time I was 6,7 or 8 years old my memeory for detail is lacking in this instance (not so for all memeories!!)
My friend and I were at the Bluecoat School at the top of All Saints St. just before The Green Hill. It was war time, our mothers worked at Cascelloids consequently were not at home to prepare a mid day meal so we would take our 6d (old sixpence) and get our dinner. My memory of these meals were that they were good. After dinner we would go and play in the meadows. Allowing we had no watches we had to guess the time. Some of us won, some didn't and got the cane. (tough)
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| John Tyers |
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I don't really remember the Supply Stores in Cheyne Lane other than the Manager was a Mr Buglas I think from Leicester. My mother had various household items from there and when she would reminisce about those "good" old days I would usually counter with the old chestnut: "You can't fault British workmanship, mother's yardbrush from the Supply Stores was bought in 1933 and other than five new heads and three new handles its as good as the day it was bought!".
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| Joan Stafford |
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Hi John! I can beat that. I had a sweeping brush as a wedding present almost 52 years ago. And it is still going strong, with the same head and same handle, so there!!!!And it gets used a lot. Hope it sees me out, better put it in the will, don't want the kids fighting over it.
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| john freear |
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Loved your reply particularly the bit about the brush!!!!
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| John Tyers |
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Hi Joan! Did'nt quite know how to take your comment "it gets used a lot!" referring to your ancient yardbrush. Hope you are not squaring Geoff up with it!
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