An American Granddaughter Remembers

A Memory of Heston.

My grandparents, Fred and Rose Organ, lived at 67 West Way. My mother, Betty Eileen, and I came from the United States to visit on holiday in 1955. I was 6 years old at the time. I went to Heston School for a short time. Pop worked for the London Transport as a bus driver. I would ride my bike to Hounslow to meet him at the bus garage. I had a friend across the street whose name was Janet. Her back garden was full of wonderful strawberries which we would eat until our cheeks bulged. My mother was a bus conductor on Pop's bus. Nan would take in foster children and there was a boy named Lawrence who lived with my grandparents while I was there. Pop had a shed, which he built, in the back garden, he called the 'Wendy house'. I would spend many memorable happy hours playing in that shed. Pop was very special to me and he would take me to the garden to water the plants, and to the cinema in Houslow called the Odeon, which was where my mother worked during the Second World War. Once, during an air raid, Pop was told the Odeon had been bombed. Pop got on his bike and raced to the Odeon only to find out that my mother did not work that night. After a sigh of relief, he realized he was in such a hurry to get to the Odeon, that he had forgotten to put on his trousers! He stood there in his long-johns!
My mom worked at Job's Dairy helping to deliver milk from the horse-drawn wagon, when she was a child. Pop was an air raid warden during the Second World War. I remember his air raid shelter in the back garden.
My mother and grandparents have passed on but the memories are as vivid as if they happened only moments ago. Did you know Fred and Rose Organ? I remember putting three penny coins in the gas meter under the stairs. My grandmother was a wonderful cook. I am 60 years old now and have a granddaughter of my own. I live in Kentucky, USA and I am a school secretary. I miss England and so often wanted to move there. I long to read a Beano comic, or a Bunty magazine. I miss bangers and mash, fish 'n chips, all-sorts, jelly babies and a licorice sherbert. So many happy memories I have to share with my granddaughter. Thank you, Heston, for so many memories. God bless.

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