Tag Archives: Betty Lock

Betty Coates-Evans: Free Time Pantomimes, concerts, 1950s,

Mrs Hans Hamilton front right and Sam McDonald with cast from Guides and Brownies including Mollie Mallett and Effie Pitman centre stage

Mrs Hans Hamilton front right and Sam McDonald with cast from Guides and Brownies including Mollie Mallett and Effie Pitman centre stage :photo Mary Lord

We’d start about 6 months before the performance and often practise and rehearse 6 evenings a week. We’d give performances at Wilberforce Hall in Brighstone for 2 nights, 2 nights at West Wight School – there was a good stage there, 2 nights at Yarmouth at The Con Club.

Mrs Hans Hamilton used to write the words and play the piano too. Although she was one of the rich people in the town she worked really hard for the community. If she told you what to do, you did it! She didn’t stand any nonsense but it was such fun.

Effie Pitman was usually the Principal Boy – she had such good legs – , with Mollie Mallet.

So many people were involved. Barry MacDonald’s father used to play the drums for us, Malcolm Mallet the butcher, and Raich Doe( harbour master) used to build the scenery for us.

Betty Coates Evans b 1938

Audience at Con Club, 1950s : Free Time

Audience at Con Club, 1950s : Free Time photo Carol Corbett

Guide and Brownie Pantomime at the ‘Con Club’ 1950s

Betty Coates-Evans: Shops, Holdings

Holdings sweet shop, the Square.

Holdings sweet shop, the Square.

My first job when I left school was working in the sweet shop, which Mr. Holding bought in 1952. It had been Kelseys but he modernised it. He owned the whole block at that time. There was still a barber’s shop in a room at the back of the Town Hall, and a toy and souvenirs shop next to the sweet shop. It’s been a cafe, gift shop, ice cream shop and now it’s a Delicatessen. Betty Lock

Kelseys, which became Holdings sweet shop, the Square.
Queen Elizabeth II visit 1965 Square Kelseys confectioners

Queen Elizabeth II unveils plaque on Town Hall 1965. .Kelseys confectioners seen in background: photo Terry Henderson

 

 

 

Pat Burt: Free Time, Brownies and Guides 1940s

Pat Burt, Heather Doe, with Mrs Hans Hamilton at Guide camp 1945

Pat Burt, Heather Doe, with Mrs Hans Hamilton at Guide camp 1945

Mrs Hamilton used to take us into Thorley Copse, in the middle there where the paths cross. We used to have fires in there in the copse. It was used by the public then,but it may have been owned by Thorley Manor.  We used it all the time rather than Mill Copse.   We used to pick primroses; just the flowers, we never took the plants.

We couldn’t go camping during the war so the only Guide camp I went to, was in August 1945. Mrs Hamilton took us camping at St Helens.

Annette’s not in the photo, she dropped out of guides because she started work at 14 so she was probably working. Pat Burt nee Adams b 1929

Betty Coates Evans: Schools days

When I went to Yarmouth School we had two classrooms with coal-burning stoves, and outside toilets.

Most of the children lived locally although a few came from Thorley.

We were used to the high tides in the winter. The sea came over the wall and half the playground flooded and you couldn’t use the toilets.

The land at the back of the school, now the car park, was an open rubbish dump. There were always flies in the summer.
Betty Coates Evans nee Lock b 1938