Read Online Owning Up: The Trilogy by George Melly - Free Book Online
Authors: George Melly
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precise, as they swung past. Yet this didn’t stop me laughing when Alan had fallen asleep one Sunday after lunch and was snoring and Fred suggested that the noise he was making was ‘ooorghh-cadetzzz’.
Alan had been a Lieutenant in the 1914–18 war and a casualty too. While demonstrating he use of poisonous gas the wind had changed and, as a result, throughout the twenties and thirties he was in and out of a nursing home for major operations on his intestines. The scars on his stomach were as complicated as a railway junction but he never complained. The nursing home was in Gambia Terrace and overlooked a rather romantic graveyard in a steep valley of sandstone with the Anglican Cathedral rising slowly on the other side. Gambia Terrace was, like much of inner Liverpool, respectable Georgian architecture and, like the whole district, had already begun to ‘go down’. In the late fifties John Lennon had a chaotic flat there. It was close to the Art School which was itself round thecorner from the Liverpool Institute where Paul McCartney did less and less work as the two became involved with Rock and Roll. The Cathedral, of which my father had seen the foundation stone laid by Edward VII, was completed only very recently.
Between operations Alan worked on the Cotton Exchange and later for a large store called Owen Owens, but it was not until middle age that he was fit enough for long enough to pursue a steady career. He joined a firm that manufactured children’s clothes for Marks & Spencer and eventually became a director. He was also involved in managing the Basnett Bar, a seafood restaurant near the Liverpool Playhouse much used by the theatrical profession and the slightly raffish set which included Brian Epstein. When the Basnett Bar was pulled down he became a partner in a restaurant in Chester and still goes there most days at lunchtime to welcome guests and check that everything is ‘as it should be’. Alan has always been a meticulous believer in things being done correctly.
His other great passion was and remains The Ramblers, an amateur football club for Liverpudlian public and grammar schoolboys founded over one hundred years ago. He, as the longest serving member, was elected honorary President for the centenary year at the age of eighty-four and had to make a speech at the dinner, a task which occupied and obsessed him for three years before the event. He was especially worried that he might leave someone out from those who had to be thanked. But on the night it was a triumph, and he was much moved by the warmth of the applause. He was given a record of his speech on cassette but, while he was on holiday in the Isle of Man, it was stolen by a burglar. Happily, it was not the only copy and could be replaced. I believe that the Ramblers’ centenary dinner was the high spot of Alan’s life, all of it spent, with the exception of the 1914–18 war, holidays and trips abroad, within a quarter of a square mile.
Fred would never have spent three years worrying about a speech. He was a brilliant public speaker, much in demand for golf-club dinners. He never improvised, however, but would rehearse and time himself until he sounded entirely spontaneous. He had an equal talent for composing verses set to popular tunes for special occasions, which he and Alan would perform together accompanied by Fred’s ukelele. At my parents’ wedding reception they scored a great hit with Fred’s version of ‘It ain’t gonna rain no more’:
This afternoon at three o’clock
Our hearts were beating fast.
My brother turned to me and said
‘We’ve got her off at last.’
It was Fred who had been instrumental in my parents’ meeting. He had invited Tom home to tea after a rugger match and Tom had fallen in love with my mother immediately. It was not Maud’s first engagement. Just after the war she had almost married a rich man called Jack Eliot Cohen, but had broken it off because he had no sense of humour. The
Alan had been a Lieutenant in the 1914–18 war and a casualty too. While demonstrating he use of poisonous gas the wind had changed and, as a result, throughout the twenties and thirties he was in and out of a nursing home for major operations on his intestines. The scars on his stomach were as complicated as a railway junction but he never complained. The nursing home was in Gambia Terrace and overlooked a rather romantic graveyard in a steep valley of sandstone with the Anglican Cathedral rising slowly on the other side. Gambia Terrace was, like much of inner Liverpool, respectable Georgian architecture and, like the whole district, had already begun to ‘go down’. In the late fifties John Lennon had a chaotic flat there. It was close to the Art School which was itself round thecorner from the Liverpool Institute where Paul McCartney did less and less work as the two became involved with Rock and Roll. The Cathedral, of which my father had seen the foundation stone laid by Edward VII, was completed only very recently.
Between operations Alan worked on the Cotton Exchange and later for a large store called Owen Owens, but it was not until middle age that he was fit enough for long enough to pursue a steady career. He joined a firm that manufactured children’s clothes for Marks & Spencer and eventually became a director. He was also involved in managing the Basnett Bar, a seafood restaurant near the Liverpool Playhouse much used by the theatrical profession and the slightly raffish set which included Brian Epstein. When the Basnett Bar was pulled down he became a partner in a restaurant in Chester and still goes there most days at lunchtime to welcome guests and check that everything is ‘as it should be’. Alan has always been a meticulous believer in things being done correctly.
His other great passion was and remains The Ramblers, an amateur football club for Liverpudlian public and grammar schoolboys founded over one hundred years ago. He, as the longest serving member, was elected honorary President for the centenary year at the age of eighty-four and had to make a speech at the dinner, a task which occupied and obsessed him for three years before the event. He was especially worried that he might leave someone out from those who had to be thanked. But on the night it was a triumph, and he was much moved by the warmth of the applause. He was given a record of his speech on cassette but, while he was on holiday in the Isle of Man, it was stolen by a burglar. Happily, it was not the only copy and could be replaced. I believe that the Ramblers’ centenary dinner was the high spot of Alan’s life, all of it spent, with the exception of the 1914–18 war, holidays and trips abroad, within a quarter of a square mile.
Fred would never have spent three years worrying about a speech. He was a brilliant public speaker, much in demand for golf-club dinners. He never improvised, however, but would rehearse and time himself until he sounded entirely spontaneous. He had an equal talent for composing verses set to popular tunes for special occasions, which he and Alan would perform together accompanied by Fred’s ukelele. At my parents’ wedding reception they scored a great hit with Fred’s version of ‘It ain’t gonna rain no more’:
This afternoon at three o’clock
Our hearts were beating fast.
My brother turned to me and said
‘We’ve got her off at last.’
It was Fred who had been instrumental in my parents’ meeting. He had invited Tom home to tea after a rugger match and Tom had fallen in love with my mother immediately. It was not Maud’s first engagement. Just after the war she had almost married a rich man called Jack Eliot Cohen, but had broken it off because he had no sense of humour. The
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