Great-grandmother Kath Watson has recorded how the privations of war on the home front made the Hanley Wakes funfair an unforgettable summer treat. She shared her memories with Alan Cookman

T HE seaside beckoned in vain for children growing up in the Potteries during the Second World War.

As the third of seven children whose father was fighting overseas, Kath Watson accepted that a holiday on the coast was out of the question.

"Our holiday was Hanley Wakes and the big fairground along Regent Road," she says.

"Very few people could afford to go away in Wakes Week, and our day at the fair was our annual summer treat," says Kath.

A 75-year-old retired gilder from Brackenfield Avenue, Bentilee, she vividly recalls the excitement of that special day in early August.

"When I was eight or nine, my mother would make a picnic of jam and bread and a bottle of water, and perhaps some tomatoes bought from a neighbour with a greenhouse.

"This was in the early 1940s and with the war on, there was very little of anything.

"Off we'd go, the youngest in the pram with the picnic, walking along Leek road from Abbey Hulton, calling at our grandmother's house in Ivy House Road for a short stop and a drink.

"Grandma gave us sixpence to spend, and then we'd be given another sixpence by our other grandmother, so we had a whole shilling to spend between us.

"When we were walking along Regent Road, we could feel the excitement and hear the music and laughter getting louder as we got nearer to the fair."

The children were given a penny with which to try and win a goldfish, a bat with a ball attached by elastic, or a fairy doll.

"I never went on the rides, but I loved watching them and hearing the people laughing and screaming on the bumping cars," says Kath.

"I remember walking round the fair, looking at the sideshows.

"There were colourful clowns and dancing girls trying to entice people in to see their show, and there was a woman with two heads and another woman with a beard."

The sound of the hurdy-gurdy man playing his music box added to the atmosphere, and outside the boxing booth a weedy-looking character inviting those who were brave enough to step inside.

"If they did go inside, they faced a giant, and had no chance of winning," says Kathleen.

"My brothers took me up some steps on the outside of the Wall of Death where we could look over the side and watch the riders practising.

"It was scary. It looked so dangerous that I couldn't stay and watch. I wonder if they still have them today?"

In the air was the smell of "blacked potatoes" cooking on hot coals in old-fashioned ovens.

Later, the children and their mother would adjourn exhausted to Hanley park to enjoy their picnic and listen to the music coming from the bandstand before starting on the long walk back to Abbey Hulton.

"By the time we got home we just wanted to sleep and dream of our wonderful holiday treat," says Kath.

She and her husband Ron now have two children, four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

"I am keeping a written memoir of Wakes Week and other childhood experiences for the benefit or our grandchildren and great-grandchildren," she said.