Fathers Tuck Shop

A Memory of Idle.

Yes, I remember it well and went in almost daily. During the war, around 1941, we went to live at 56 Albion Road, an old cottage for Millholme and Holmes farm, it was condemned and since demolished. It was just below Cordingley and Carris engineers. I first went to Church School and later to Thorpe School and the playground backed onto the shop. The shop was directly opposite Radio Rentals and a plumbers merchants. I too remember, with great affection, the Salvation Army playing on the Green, opposite the Swan public house. Mrs Woodhead was the landlady,...'Chubby' Woodhead's mum. I remember the Pedley brothers and Ronnie in particular. Also Billy Hey and his brother, Tommy and John Ross, the Pickards, Freddy Steel, Milton Anderson. We used to go to the YMCA club at the top of Town Gate. When I came out of the Airforce, about 1950 I was the manager of the Queen's ballroom, underneath the Idle Working Men's Club. I have written a book and it contains a great deal about those times and mentions the shop. The paper back will be published in about three weeks and it's called "Poverty to Paradise". The Kindle version is available now and if you google 'Amazon Books' you can read the first few pages. I write a great deal about the old village, The Queens, Working Men's club, Keighley's butchers on the Green. Collecting fire-watchers fish & chip suppers during the war from Fishers, Garnett's and Croft mills. Air raids, poverty, schooldays and doing paper rounds for Whitfields newsagents on The Green. it's all in the book. You could say it was written for people like yourselves. You may remember me I became a well known boxer and later a Redcoat and then entertainment manager of Butlin's Filey. God Bless you and good luck x x