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Tuesday 05/05/2020 early start to jokes (and I'll try and not miss out words, spell correctly and quality check what I have typed.🙂) First one for the blokes - What's worse than ants in your pants? ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Uncles! The worst time to have a heart attack is during a game of charades. I think it's wrong that only the one company can make the game Monopoly. I want to die peacefully in my sleep, like granda. Not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his car.

I am not sure if anyone would be interested but I have a copy of the Evening Chronicle for the 7th May 1945. Here is a picture of the front page.

Alan, I know all the people you mention. You may know Norman Hills died in his early 50's I believe, with a heart problem as did Robin. Davey Bower is gone as is Mick Maguire. I grew up in the same street as Bob Pattison(big paddy). Bob's brother John was my mate and was also called paddy or padsa. Yes Alan Maguire is the oldest in the family. Dave Aisbitt was/is known as Dazzy. I think anyone around our age was known to us around the station. A radio program I listen to on Saturdays from 4 to 8pm is all 60's stuff so well worth a listen for us as kids growing up in the 60's. It's Gold radio and is on Sky channel 0121. It's also available as an app for phones and tablets and is available online. A google will find it very quickly. It brings back a lot of memories. Phones and tablets do not sound so good because of the poor speakers they have. It's on 24hrs a day when they have a mix of older music and often only an advert every 30 mins, so good. They may play 60's music from 10pm the rest of the week.

Noo - that was the farther in laws gnome. This Wilf :-

The history of the house and Longridge family has a few gaps. I've tried to fill a few by looking at the census records through the years: What happened to Hollymount House and Michael Longridge? 1851, approximately one year after the house was sold to Michael Longridge and two years before he left Bedlington Ironworks, Hollymount is not mentioned in the census either as an address or an area of Bedlington. The 1851 census is somewhat sparse in details, in particular with addresses. However, there are two of the Longridge family living in Bedlington: William Smith Longridge, born 1819, occupation “Iron Master” is registered, along with many other households, at the address “Bedlington Iron Works”. He is 32 years old but appears to have his own household. He is not registered as the head of a family but as having “No family”. In his household are registered 3 other people aged between 23 and 26 years: one “house servant”, one “housemaid2 and one “dairymaid”. William’s neighbours are, on one side a “spade and shovel maker” and on the other a “clerk in the wagon works”. Not far from the iron works, somewhere in the east end of Bedlington, the enumerator has registered Robert ?Berwick? (almost unreadable) Longridge. Robert is a 30 year old “engine maker”, born in Bedlington and married to Elizabeth Selby Longridge, Elizabeth’s place of birth is given as “Africa. Mauritius”. They have a one year old son – Charles B Longridge – also born in Bedlington. Residing with the family are three other persons: one cook, one nurse, and one housemaid. Could this residence be Hollymount Hall? What relation is Robert to Michael? Michael Longridge is not registered in Bedlington. I found him registered at 24 Westgate Street, Newcastle. His occupation is given as “Retired Iron Manufacturer”. Apart from Michael and his wife there are two of the couple’s children registered here: Mary Francis 25yo and Henry Gordon 23 yo mining engineer. Also resident is one male servant aged 22y. Did Michael have two homes? 1861 the census records “Holly Mount” (2 words) as “Uninhabited”. Where are the Longridges? Michael died 1858. 1871 “Holly Mount House” is registered, but not to a household of Longridges. The head of the household is 76 yo labourer,George Henderson who shares the address with his wife 59 yo Julia, his daughter Catherine an 18yo housekeeper, Robert Willis his 38 yo son-in-law (engineer) and John Bailey his 89 yo father-in-law, a retired miner. It seems the house has passed its golden days. It may or may not have anything to do with this but one James Holmes, 29 yo greengrocer (possibly the same JH noted as the occupier of Hollymount House in the sales advert of 1875) is living just across the road next door to the Black Bull with his wife and three children. Just a thought. 1881 Hollymount (house or area unknown) is found in the enumerator’s description of the district (p2) and now, with more detail in the register, we can see that It is situated between the end of Walker Terrace and Spring View/Coach Road. However, Hollymount is not taken up as an address anywhere in the register itself, the entries proceeding direct from Coach Road to Walker Terrace suggesting that the name Hollymount house no longer exists. At the northern end of Walker Terrace, where I would have expected to find Hollymount House, I found instead two “lodging houses”. Two households possibly in the same building. The usual system of indicating this with pen-strokes is missing in this particular district of the census. The residents of the first lodging house are the keeper, his wife and one child together with 4 male lodgers while in the second lodging house we find the keeper, his wife and seventeen lodgers. The address is given as “Walker Terrace”. Has Hollymount House now become a lodging house? It must be quite large with many rooms and it’s not Spring View because that is occupied by the local curate and his housekeeping staff. 1891 Hollymount (one word) appears in the area description but reverts to Holly Mount (two words) in the register where two households are registered. It appears, as I would have expected, between Walker Terrace and Coach Lane. (I also found a pub nearby, “The Bridge Inn”! Anybody heard of that one?) Resident in the first household is George Heddon, the 55yo retired Inkeeper (Innkeeper at the Clayton Arms, Bedlington station 10 years earlier), his wife, son and widowed daughter with her 3yo son Gordon. In the second household we have Henry Ridley, 49 yo his wife Mary and their five children aged 12 – 22 years. 1901 I can find no mention of Hollymount. 1911 Hollymount pops up again, this time as two buildings. a) “1block, 3 flats” housing 3 families of 3-4 people and b) “Hollymount Private House” housing 12 families of 2-7 persons. Well, that’s day 47 in isolation taken care of. I think I deserve a whisky!

Magic - this one 2008 just before we moved and I stopped gardening.

After man discussion with 4 children who as they grew older were always right and new more than me I would keep my cool in the house and go outdoors and and plant where I wanted, where I knew was best and if they started growing to stringy and going their own way I would nip the heads out and force them to grow the way I wanted then to. None of the plants and shrubs put up any discussion or argument - they just had to accept it. Relax in a garden seat with a pint and a fag, stare at the garden and think - see if yous would just listen and do as your told. These days they definitely all now more than me on about what the youth of today are on about.