Church Town

A Memory of Minehead.

In 1960 my home was just out of shot: next door to the house that is partly visible on the far right of the picture. I lived at number 18 Church Street, Church Street being the road that is accessed by turning right in the middle distance of the photo, at the bottom of Church Steps. The tree that can be seen towering above our neighbour’s house was a magnificent walnut tree, which is – sadly - no more. The cottage in the foreground (second from left) was our “corner" shop. It was my Saturday afternoon habit around that time to call in at the shop for a bar of chocolate, and also to post letters in the box that was set into the wall outside the shop. More often than not the chocolate I bought was either Cadbury’s Turkish Delight (the bars were rather smaller than they are today!) or mint flavoured Aero, then a new innovation. And the “letters” always included competition entries. I was a competition geek (not that the term geek was common then!) and entered many of the contests in magazines such as Girls Crystal, School Friend and Girl. For my efforts, which were sent on the back of a postcard, I sometimes even won !