My Teenage Years

A Memory of Edgbaston.

Living in Bearwood (posh end of Smethwick) I pushed my bike then Lambreta Scooter up and down the Hagley Road between 1956-62 as I served out my engineering apprenticeship at Bellis & Morcom, Ledsam Street, Edgbaston.  Good days, went on to join the Merchant Navy 1961-66 as a sea going engineer sailing round and see the world ... changed my life for ever.

Edgbaston was just as the picture shows in 1949 still relatively quiet from today's traffic.  Edgbaston became special to me, not only did I meet my wife at the Tower Ballroom in 1957 (still together and now living in Weybridge, Surrey) where we bibbed and bobbed every Tuesday and Saturday night.  It was also known that I drank the odd pint of beer in the Holly Bush Pub to loosen me up before striding off down to the Tower.

Some years later we spent our wedding night at the Norfolk Hotel on the Hagley Road (1962) before flying out to Jersey, it was the first time we had flown ... wow.

My other pleasure was watching county cricket at Edgbaston and if lucky catching an overseas touring side, remember Eric Hollis and all that.

At that age, you went to work, if lucky you went to college during your working time and hopefully made something of your life.
Terry King