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and twiddle your thumbs…”
Well that was certainly the rallying call to thousands of Scots, in the summertime when the weather was high throughout the 1970s. No more deep-fried Mars bars and tartan custard for a week or two, those refugees for fun-and-a-half piled onto coaches and headed South East to stand and tan in the Whitley Bay sea-fret, plodging through empty pop bottles to a seaside white noise of screams from the Waltzer, the piercing hiss of the Jets, ‘Fancy Pants’ by Kenny and ‘Bye Bye Baby’ by the Bay City Rollers.
And rising way above this clamour of sound, wafting over The Links to where red flags warned flappingly of the perils of wading-in deeper than up to where you last had a good scratch, was that forever dull 'hairball at the back of the throat' voice, calling out the numbers from Duncan's Bingo.
Welcome to ilovewhitleybay.com (but watch where you're standing). Long before a fortnight in Lloret de Mierda could almost be had for the price of a one-way ticket to the Toon (in the old turquoise-and-oil diesel trains with their once-plush ‘First Class’ compartments, floors greasy with chip papers and a-soot with upturned back-of-the-seat ashtrays), Whitley Bay was indeed a thriving seaside town with a focal Pleasureland that truly was.
“Well we sang 'shang-a-lang' as we
ran with the gang...”
For this local who spent a childhood in and around the Spanish City, the well-kept parks and greens, the beach stretching all the way up to St Mary’s Island (a coastal landmark which will forever suggest the fantastic places you might see in a Rupert book) and, a little further out of town, the endless farmers’ fields and abandoned railway tracks for Chopper bike journeys to the verdant glades of Holywell Dene and beyond, the sunny 1970s were surely The Golden Age of Whitley Bay™.
There always seemed plenty to do. (Wasn’t everyone brought up on the Just William and Oor Wullie books up to and around that time — having adventures, building go-karts, making dens?) Far more mischief was to be found around Whitley for a bunch of pudding basins in Winfield trainers and jumpers with stars on than just sitting on the wall outside the local VG, spitting on the pavement and looking dejected. We were kept in parental check, which usually meant returning home to the business end of a thick Kays catalogue.
“I used to cry, but now I hold my
head up high...”
ilovewhitleybay.com will hopefully be of interest to anyone kind enough to take a hazy look back to three decades ago at how wonderful our Whitley Bay was; a time of pageboy haircuts, Belvedere pork pies, the lovely sweet smell from Welch's factory, and cheesecloth from Topaz.
If you ever attempted to get drunk on cans of Top Deck shandy, sneaked in through the Playhouse fire doors to watch Grease for free, rode a bike over a bowling green or trespassed on the golf course when it was snowing, you will break out in acne again at the all manner of crazy things which will be added to these pages in time. But, at the mo and for the noo, any memories or photos submitted for the use of will be as welcome as an extra Flake in your cornet.
“It’s just one of those things you put
down to experience...”
Now being as a tribute to summers gone (and getting into trouble as a kid), this site will do its best not to not get all political and become a commentary on why, for example, our beloved Spanish City was given the bum’s rush in favour of building a new school when an adjacent lovely old red brick school was pulled down to leave a gaping wasteland.
So, before I do get carried away and maybe say something that ensuing legal advice may force me to retract, let’s just blame it on the boogie and all join our salt-and-vinegary fingers in the collective hope that something truly sensational is being discussed away from the public gaze; that our town may be brought back to being once more a bustling ideal of top-notch seaside resortdom, as sort of promised.
Now where’s me bucket and spade......
'70s Party Time
The author aged 9 (left) at the
11th birthday party of one of our
benevolent sponsors (Clin, right), guzzling pop and stuffing our faces with cake way back in November 1975. Other kids not shown.
Notice Clin on the roulette wheel.
We had just been to the very nice Astley Arms for some posh nosh (first time I ever had potato croquettes anyway).
Parents could keep their car-keys-
on-the-orange-shagpile parties
over in Birtley. We were just as capable of having fun as the next bloke. More Arctic Roll anyone?
Below shows the 1977 Jubilee
street party in Cliftonville Gardens. Hey — there's Clin again, in the specs and purple jumper! Whilst
this lot were putting their lives into their own hands by eating other people's sandwiches left out in the sun, I was in the North Shields
Infirmary having sprained my arm that morning whilst out walking
our Barney (dog). I wouldn't have been invited to this party anyway
as I lived in Brighton Grove. Well that upside-down wooden chair looked like he was having fun.
White Dogs' Dirt
I've kept this hidden away down
here just in case anyone is having
their tea......No self-respecting
'70s tree would be seen dead
(until Dutch Elm disease made hundreds of trees chopworthy) without a neat pile of the chalky white stuff on the little soil
rectangle at the base of its trunk. Now what made it white, I reckon, was a combination of drinking seawater and being fed cheap dog
food like tripe mix and Chappie.
Said to be unique to the region,
legend has it you could slice it
with your boyhood penknife and
the words 'Whitley Bay' would be
running through like seaside rock.
