Nottingham

A Memory of Nottingham.

I was born in Nottingham in 1947 and left when I was 19 to join the RAF where I stayed for 25 years. I have some happy memories of the place - the Palais on a Saturday and the boat clubs near the Forest ground where they used to have live music in the early and mid '60s. Looking back they were death traps and there would have been very little chance to get out alive had there been a fire. It's a miracle that there wasn't one as everybody smoked like mad. I went to the Ellis school and I noticed in a recent visit to Bar Lane that the old school building which was used from 1928 had been demolished. I used to hang around on Vernon Park in Basford with the blokes I went to school with. We had some laughs and I can still remember most if not all of their names. I don't have any real family ties there any more but do go up now and then to see the Forest play and have also taken my youngest son and grandson to see the Test Matches. Now and then I do get a bit nostalgic for the place although from what I understand it is a far different Nottingham to the one I grew up in. Even so, I still wish the place well as you only ever have one home town (except if like my 4 kids you moved around so much that you don't have a home town on the sense that I understand it). I am still a Forest fan and will be until the very end which I hope is many years hence. Good old Nottingham!

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