Chapter 2

This time the inspiration came from a real puppet book, found in the camp library, called "Wooden Stars" by Douglas Fisher.  It had just been published  and contained constructional details of a South American lady, Carmenita, by the puppet-master, Waldo Lanchester, quite unknown to me then.  I still had no ambitions of building a puppet theatre but was visiting the woodwork shop at the time to make a cartoon board for a concert party turn.  I suppose I was attracted to the woodcarving of the little figure.

Woodcarving is a slow and laborious process to the novice.  During the rest of my stay at Melksham I made no more than the body, arms and legs of 'Carmen'.  There being no small carving tools available, the head, hands and feet were beyond me.  The lesson on the poor workman blaming his tools comes later!  This masterpiece was dropped into the bottom of my kitbag and forgotten for the time being.

To the would be puppeteer I hasten to add that if you are contemplating making a puppet show do not be put off by the time factor. Elaborate joints are not always necessary and there are many simple methods of construction that still result in excellent finished products. There is a tendency, however, for the beginner to start with the difficult and ignore the simple. This is shown by the fact that so many new puppeteers start with marionettes, thinking that other forms of puppetry are beneath their abilities.  Anyway, in 1947 choices were fewer than they are today. There were the Punch and Judy men, one of the few remaining groups of British puppeteers with a continuous record of showmanship from at least Roman times. It was unlikely, in those days, that without a relative or close friend in this elite field no-one became a true Punch 'professor'.

There were other glove puppets to be found in junior schools.  Suitable for children to make and play with but hardly worthy of an adult performer/craftsman!  Also, in those days, I knew nothing of rod and shadow puppets.  If only I had known of the table-top puppet ... or even the jig doll!

The cinema probably caused the demise of the great travelling marionette shows around the end of the nineteenth century. How much easier to stand at the back of ones tent theatre and turn a handle for an amazed audience than handling an amazingly complex group of wooden figures. Apart from one or two stalwarts who toured the halls, the art of the marionette was almost lost. For twenty odd years, marionettes collected dust or, worse still. became ashes. 

But there were the new marionettists. The model theatre had been an upper class toy since the early 1800's. In the 1920's, those who enjoyed these, scaled up and came to the rescue of the moribund marionette. They, however, were not entertainers in the old travelling tradition. They were artists, craftsmen, designers, writers and musicians capable of producing a high standard of puppet even if the entertainment was a little on the intellectual side.  Both George Bernard Shaw and C.S.Forester wrote plays for marionettes but these were very wordy with little action. Most entertainments were of the 'invited audience in the parlour' type and a far cry from the cold, hard world of the travelling fair and the seaside busker.

Walter Wilkinson tried it the hard way with a glove puppet booth from the late twenties. He just about scraped a living by walking with his booth (the Old Encumbrance) and camping during the summer. Coming from a moneyed family, he spent the winters in comfort and later,  income from his books assured him of a comfortable future.

Unlike the earlier, secretive showmen, all published material came from this later group, so beginners of my era naturally followed their lead. Not that I could be called a puppeteer yet. Carmen was not started with public exhibition in mind; she was simply an exercise in woodworking to which my grasshopper mind had become attracted.

The spare time spent during technical training had not been wholly concerned with wooden females, however; there were other pursuits that that occupied the mind.  In the Services, as in other walks of life, individuals are usually attracted into groups that have some common factor such as an interesting hobby, a mutual desire for strong drink or perhaps the masochistic pleasure of slithering about on cold and muddy sports fields. If there was anything common to our group it was diversity of character or perhaps we were outcasts who fitted into no other category. Our corner of the billet was known as the Native Quarter.

There was Roy. Tall and thin; given to arm waving and uttering idiotic cries for no other reason than sheer boredom and affecting a cretinous, slobbering, eye-rolling manner when talking to the pompous. He invariably took top honours in our weekly exams, could talk knowledgeably on any subject and loved to present an argument against his own beliefs. On one occasion when we were discussing the nature of the universe he calmly stated that any fool knew that we lived on the inside of a globe. So convincing were his assertions of the reduction of linear space towards the origin and the negative curvature of the space time continuum that to this day I have a sneaking suspicion that he was telling me true. We would discuss religion into the small hours.

There was Geoff. National Serviceman and artist. Completely and delightfully amoral, he could always top my highly exaggerated stories of chorus girls', dressing rooms with calm and doubtless true tales of artists' models' bedrooms in Chelsea. He decorated the interior of the dining hall with beautiful murals. On being offered five pounds for his efforts, he coldly refused it on the grounds that such a sum offended his artistic integrity; he would rather give his talents freely. He graciously accepted the second offer of twenty five (Our weekly wage was under two pounds).

There was Bernie. Also a conscript and a Scots Jew. Short and dumpy but an excellent horseman who was often invited to ride with the local hunt. Coming, as he did, from a well-heeled family, he rarely suffered the intense poverty that affected the rest of us from Monday to Friday.  Requests for a loan usually invoked the response, "My Jewish instincts tell me to make money and my Scottish ones advise me to keep it!". Not only was he very generous but also very popular in our group.

And there was Andy the Cockney spiv. "Anyfink yer like for a price, Guv". We never went short on coke for the billet stove with Andy. On demob. he intended to do a postal scam. Invent a secret business scheme, print off a few thousand and advertise, "Millionaire business man wishes to share his good fortune. Send no money. Just sixpence to cover P+P."  A clear profit of three pence per punter (versions of this sort of scam still drop through the letterbox but now it is usually, "ring this number"). He either retired to his luxury yacht or spent time in jail.

Two things we did have in common was lack of female company and the complete inability to ballroom dance; a sure-fire way to hold a girl. The solution to both shortcomings was found at the Trowbridge Community Centre on Tuesday evenings where we would tread on female toes to the strict tempo of Victor Sylvester on gramophone records. Here, following my one and only blind date, I became mildly involved with a tall, languorous young lady named Elvira.  This passionate but short-lived affair was followed by a slightly longer, cooler but more romantic episode with Joy, a petite and vivacious red-head. I believe I was chosen as an escort to the annual works dance to be one up on the many unescorted young women. I was soon left for a sophisticated and elderly gentleman of about thirty. Finding myself with a group of her female friends and being an impoverished airman in the position of having to pay for drinks all 'round, it was refreshing to find one who chose shandy from among the gins and brandies.  It was love at first sight on meeting Kath.

I had been a secret admirer of a well known film star beauty of the day, Patricia Roc, of whom I had a signed photo and to whom Kath bore a striking resemblance. Please do not think that I am so shallow as to simply fall for a pretty face; Kath had a great figure, too!  It was some time before I learned that all three girls worked in the same department (of the War Agricultural Committee offices). Kath smiled a secret smile when referring to their office discussions but revealed nothing.

Note Unknown to me until after she died, Kath had been writing about our meeting. Having recently discovered it, I am going to include her version here.

Dec 1947. The back gate banged and my sister, Mandy, propped her bike up in the back scullery and called through, "I saw that R.A.F. bloke up in the town, I told him to come on down."  "Oh, No, just look at the mess I'm in."  She came into the kitchen and viewed the cardboard, paints and general paraphernalia I'd gathered to make props. for a concert my guides were putting on the following week. (Kath was a Guide Lieutenant at this time). She grinned and pointed out the window.

A blue-uniformed figure was cycling up the path around the field. "Hello," I said, "I didn't expect to see you, I'm up to my eyes this afternoon." He looked a bit disappointed at my ungracious greeting and asked me what I was doing. Well, my girl, this is it I thought, it was fun meeting this young man at the ball and dancing and flirting. That was Saturday evening with me trying to keep up with my girl friends. If he wanted to see me away from that he'd have to know me as I really was and I wasn't sure he would be around for long once he knew. So while Mandy put the kettle on the fire (There was no gas or electricity and water came from the well) I told him of my absorbing interest in the Guides, quite apart from Church and other activities.

He didn't appear to be listening, he was already re-drawing the trees and castle I had been preparing for a sketch, "The Tall, Tall Castle."  "Would you like me to do these, I'm not bad at this sort of thing?" I thankfully relinquished the paint, brushes and scissors and have done so as often as possible ever since. Apart from the now presentable scenery, he also made me a large wooden key and a ratchety thing that made a lovely creaky, door opening, sound.

I had met Ted at our Staff Christmas Dance. I was working for the War Agricultural Executive committee. It was to be formal dress and all the girls in the office had spent weeks preparing suitable outfits. The thrill of our first long dresses had pushed to the back of our minds the need for a partner. Joy, a vivacious red-head was determined to find a partner and informed us she had invited Edwin (Ted), one of the R.A.F. lads who came to the Rec.

Most of us went to the recreational centre. On Tuesday evenings there was a dance class and on Saturday an informal dance night. My family lived on the outskirts of Trowbridge, ,a mile of partly tarmacced road that soon became a muddy track leading under the railway bridge, through the five-barred gate and around the field to the house. (They were given the farm house when the Supermarine factory in Southampton was bombed but more of this later).

The standard of RAF training was excellent. Each wooden hut in a long row represented one week of the course: oxygen, air cameras, gun sights, bombsights, automatic pilots, engine and navigational instruments, etc. In the big hangar workshops we learned soldering, brazing, welding, working metal to a thousandth of an inch, heat treatment and making a couple of our own tools. The hangars also contained real aircraft fuselages for 'hands on' experience. 

Anyone who failed the weekly test simply dropped back and repeated that week and this was extremely humiliating. Such a process certainly sharpened the mind!

Kath and I met just before Christmas 1947 just as I was finishing my training. This gave me promotion from AC2 (Aircraftsman 2^nd class) to AC1 and a little more money. A chance of staying closer to Kath presented itself when I heard that there was a shortage of instructors.  I volunteered for a post and became a temporary corporal instructor with yet more pay. I went on a three week ITC (Instructional Technique Course) and was given my 'week'.

I enjoyed teaching the intricacies of the Sperry A3 autopilot and gyroscopic instruments to students only a few months my junior. There is something of the actor in all teachers and it appealed to me. A few months later, when the permanent staff was up to strength I lost my corporal's stripes and was sent off to Mildenhall in Suffolk to await an overseas posting.

Mildenhall was an almost deserted flying station awaiting re-establishment as a fighter to bomber conversion training base.  Unfortunately, the Americans were at nearby Lakenheath and their big transport aircraft would be competing for our air space so there was a further colonial expansion; Mildenhall was handed over to them.  They moved in before we left, much to the delight of our airwomen who would congregate at the American end of the dining hall purring for handouts of coffee, cream, sugar and other rare goodies from their well stocked servery.  In 1948 we were still on wartime rations.

It was not long before Kath and I realised we could probably live with each other's faults for quite some time.  I had a date for an overseas posting so we became engaged on the understanding that we would marry on my return.  Overseas postings were for two and a half years so it would be quite a wrench to be parted for so long.

Shortly before I left for the Middle East we spent a few days with my parents at South Harrow. Dad was clowning in Masoni's (Eric Mason) Magic Show at the Comedy Theatre, Haymarket, London.  Also on the bill were the John Wright marionettes. This act did more to whet my appetite for puppets than any other show. The manipulator was Martin Grainger and the combination of the technical beauty of the puppets and the skill with which they were operated was a joy to see. After the show we met Martin and were struck by his artistic dedication. He dispelled any thoughts I might have had in considering puppets as toys or parlour entertainment.

I did not realise at the time how unusual his method of presentation was in 1948. He wore a black outfit and worked in view of the audience as most cabaret workers do today. The one weak spot in the show was dad's clowning which we found embarrassing!  I was beginning to realise that versatile he might be but the quality was lacking!  It was shortly after this that Kath gave me the ultimatum, "Take after him and I leave!".

Following this encounter with a real puppeteer I took another look at the unfinished Carmen and for the first time began to think of the puppet as worthy entertainment. She would be a little over a foot (30cms) tall and the John Wright marionettes had been over two feet but there were possibilities. One day I might even make myself a puppet show. The fulfilment of such ideas, however, was put aside for some time as I was soon leaning, greenly, over the side of the troopship, Eastern Prince, en route for Port Said.

After a two week stay at El Hamrah, a transit camp in the canal zone near Ismalia, a Dakota flight carried us to Habbaniyah, a green and pleasant

oasis in a barren desert fifty miles from Baghdad, Iraq. We were to service the squadron of Brigand bombers of 84 squadron that protected our interests in the gulf.

Working in the desert had its adventures.  There was the time when on guard duty, I was ordered to shoot at an Arab who was fleeing from a break-in at the Armoury.  Luckily, the distance and a shaking  aim left him unscathed.

There was the time we had to dig out the remains of the Brigand bomber and its crew which had crashed in the mud of Lake Habbaniyah.

There was the time a group of us went 'out of bounds' to a local village cafe (an invite from a local Iraqi) to see the dancing girl. Expecting to see an erotic Hollywood style belly dancer, we were somewhat disappointed with the pair of eyes peering at us from within the shaking mass of veils and all enveloping clothing.

My contribution to culture during the stay was three-fold. There was the series of paintings for the Sergeants' Mess; copies of calendar pictures in a sort of gouache with poster colour on packing case plywood.

Flt. Sgt. Spanner is the big bloke, fourth from the left on the front row in the squadron picture above.

And there was the camp concert. This was under the leadership of Skeets Gallagher, a Liverpudlian and a born concert party organiser. We had opening and closing choruses, a Wilson, Keppel and Betty sand dance (me in that one), "Thanks for the Memory" (Bob Hope's intro. music) with mini sketches for each 'memory' and all the usual Air Force sketches and jokes. The closing chorus was in true concert party style:

So long, mighty glad we met you,

So long, mighty glad you came.

You've seen our show and we hope it pleased you,

We've got to go though we hate to leave you.

So long, we'll be back again with laughter, music and song.

So 'til then until we meet again,

To ev'ry one of you we say - SO LONG!

Complete with line-up, arm waving and over-done make up!

The long hours in the swimming pool began to tell and I contracted Otitis Media, an infection of the ear which put me in hospital. Not a serious complaint but it entitled me to repatriation after less than a year in the desert.

I was soon aboard the aging Empress of Australia. Unfortunately, it also resulted in me spending my twenty-first birthday in the R.A.F. hospital at Wilmslow, Cheshire. It was only a month though before I was given leave with a blissful reunion with Kath before posting to R.A.F. Lyneham, the Air Transport Station, in Wiltshire, just before Christmas, 1949. This coincided with the ending of the Berlin Airlift, the equipping of the camp with the new Hastings transport aircraft and the lull before the Korean war.

Note:  For music fans.  The Mantovani music that we danced to is still popular in the ballroom scene today - "Charmaine, Jealousy, Ramona, La Cucaracha, Peanut Vender" and the favourite 'last dance', "Who's taking you home tonight?", etc. And my dad was probably playing the same tunes in his part-time dance band in the twenties and thirties.  Does anyone still write a decent dance tune these days?

Also learnt:  Rudiments of woodcarving.  Acquiring useful tool skills and knowledge of materials.  Contact with a real puppeteer.  Acquiring experience in entertaining.