Free Pie 'n' Mash and Prefabs by Norman Jacobs Page B

never went back to him, hoping in time, without his autograph to remind me, he would simply fade from memory.
    I still have my autograph book with all the teachers’ signatures in it, including Mr Moore, Mr Wills, Mr Evans and Mr Bristow. There are many others, most of whose names I have long since forgotten. But, annoyingly, even though he is not there, one of the teachers I still remember the most, as can be seen from this chapter, is the one I hoped to forget.

CHAPTER THREE
RADIO FUN, CASEY JONES AND JACKETS FOR GOALPOSTS
    W hen I wasn’t scoring at cricket matches or attending drama classes, I used to play with my friends after school. Before we got down to this, however, there was the important matter of looking in on Reg’s on the way home. Reg’s was a newsagent situated at the corner of Millfields Road and Powerscroft Road and was my supplier of comics. Starting with The Dandy, my weekly purchases grew to include The Beano, The Topper, The Beezer, Radio Fun and, finally, Junior Express.
    The Dandy was home to Korky the Cat, Keyhole Kate, Hungry Horace, Black Bob and, of course, the one and only Desperate Dan with his cow pies. The Beano included among its characters Biffo the Bear, the Bash Street Kids, Minnie the Minx and Dennis the Menace. Both magazines had been going since before the War but The Topper and The Beezer startedduring the 1950s so I was in at the start. Each one celebrated their inaugural edition by giving away a banger. This was a popular free gift at the time, which consisted of a triangular piece of card with paper partly stuck to the inside. The card was held at one corner and then with a sharp flick of the wrist the card would open out and the paper inside would make a mini sonic boom as it flipped out. As they were made of thin card and paper, they never lasted very long, but they were fun while you had them.
    The Topper ’s front-page star was Mickey the Monkey, who was forever winning prizes in competitions, quite often a sandcastle competition, but not always. He would make the biggest, the brightest, the loudest and the best of whatever it was and he was always presented with his prize by the Mayor, who was naturally shown wearing his official chain. Most strips ended with the line, ‘You win, Mickey.’ This was repeated so often in the comic that it became a popular saying in our house, so that, whenever anyone won at cards or a board game, we would say, ‘You win, Mickey.’
    Radio Fun was a good source of ciggies as they often gave away free sets of cards depicting wireless personalities and sports stars. The comic itself featured strips based around leading radio personalities of the day such as Arthur Askey, Cardew ‘the Cad’ Robinson and Jewell and Warris. Junior Express ’s most popular character was Wulf the Briton, who started life as a gladiator in Rome but later returned to Britain to lead the heroic struggle against the Roman invaders.
    If the weather was fine, we would play outside. I was very fortunate living on a big field as we were able to play football orcricket, according to the season, very close to my home. Football meant throwing our jackets down to make the goalposts, the captains picking their teams and then play would commence. Although there were arguments, of course, about offside, the ball being too high, going for a throw-in and the rest of it, because we were all friends these never really got out of hand. If there were only three or four of us, we would play in front of the prefab and use the two trees to the side of the path as our goal and generally we played ‘Three and in’. Someone was designated the goalie and the other two or three had to put the ball past him. When one boy managed to get three in, he would then go in goal. Sometimes we played ‘tackling’, other times ‘passing’. If we played ‘tackling’, it was every boy for himself; if we played ‘passing’, then