Weekly Sparkle by The Daily Sparkle

The Cedars Weekly Sparkle The Reminiscence Newspaper

11th - 17th April 2011 TODAY IN HISTORY

IN THIS ISSUE Let me introduce you to the magazine! Here’s what you can expect to find: • Today in History, day by day, and what happened! (pages 1 to 4) • The “Way We Were” columns (pages 5 to 6) • A man’s point of view! (pages 6 to 7) • Readers’ Letters, “Over to You” - write in and we’ll print it! (page 8) • Your quizzes - have fun! (page 9) • A final singalong to enjoy! (page 10)

On 11th April, 1957, it was announced that the British Government intended to give Singapore its independence. Both countries signed a agreement but the new constitution did not take effect until January 1958. Singapore became the Republic of Singapore - a city state island. It lies off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula. It is one of the world’s 5 busiest ports. Singapore always sounded so exotic. Noel Coward and other celebrities often stayed at Raffles Hotel. It was a very glamorous place for cocktails and dancing til dawn.

TODAY IN HISTORY

On 12th April 1961, Russia sent a man into space and brought him safely back to earth. He was Yuri Gagarin. His spaceship orbited the earth for nearly 2 hours, travelling at seventeen thousand miles per hour! Can you imagine travelling at speeds like that?

On 13th April, 1964, Sidney Poitier was awarded an Oscar for his part in Lilies of the Field. He played the part of a builder. The nuns at the convent where he was working believed he had been sent to them by God to build them a church.

The Russian’s success spurred the Americans on to work all the harder, and to do something even more daring. The ‘Space Race’ was in full swing at the start of the 1960s. Yuri Gagarin’s historic flight put Russian in the lead - at least for a while!

Sidney Poitier was the first black person to win an Academy Award. He made other successful films. Two of the best known are To Sir With Love and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? In 1999 he was added to Hollywood’s list of Greatest Male Stars of All Time.

TODAY IN HISTORY

On 14th April, 1970, an explosion on board Apollo 13 caused one of the most critical situations in American Space history. The lives of the three astronauts on board were put at great risk. The explosion happened in the fuel compartments of the space module. The dangerous situation arose 56 hours after lift-off. This resulted in the loss of Apollo 13’s main power supply. It meant that oxygen and water reserves became critically low. Those brave men must have felt thirsty as well as anxious. (Thankfully, they made it safely back to Earth, 3 days later.)

TODAY IN HISTORY

On 15th April, 1953, a young American airman called Mr Leming was awarded the George Medal for bravery. He was the first foreign person to receive a George Medal in peacetime. He was presented with the medal for rescuing 27 people in East Anglia. There were dreadful floods there in January that year, with hurricane force winds and storms. Mr Leming went out alone in a rubber dinghy in the pitch black, and saved people clinging to the rooftops. After several hours in the raging storm he collapsed with hypothermia but fortunately survived.

TODAY IN HISTORY

On 16th April, 1964, the Great Train Robbers appeared in Court. There were 12 of them in the gang and they had stolen £2.6 million from the night mail train travelling from Glasgow to London 8 months previously. It was the biggest ever robbery in Britain. The train driver was very badly hurt. Members of the gang received some of the longest prison sentences in British criminal history. Seven of them received 30 year sentences, but 2 them escaped. Ronnie Biggs was free for almost 40 years. Charlie Wilson was recaptured in Canada in 1968.

TODAY IN HISTORY

On 17th April, 1969, a young Irish woman called Bernadette Devlin became Britain’s youngest ever female Member of Parliament. She was 21. Until 1918 women didn’t even get to vote. And then it was only given to the over-30s at first. It would have been hard to refuse them the vote after all the work they did in World War 1. Nancy Astor was the first female MP and she was a Viscountess, not a 21 year old Irish lass. Nowadays there are lots of female MPs in every party and a good thing it is too!

THE WAY WE WERE

I loved it when full skirts were fashionable. Of course I had a waist then and wanted to show it off. The skimpy frocks I remember wearing as a child were often made out of someone else’s cast offs. I’m not complaining, because my mother was a wonderful needle-woman and she worked wonders really, with amazingly little go on. The thing about flouncy gathered skirts was that they just felt so luxurious. They swished and rustled and felt so feminine. If you were making your own, getting the gathers to look even was a bit tricky, but well worth it.

THE WAY WE WERE

Why do so many people call flan ‘quiche’ these days? Flan was a perfectly good word. We had egg and bacon flan, or egg and tomato flan. I used to make a lovely cheese and onion flan too. I suppose calling it ‘quiche‘ made it sound exotic. No one knew how to pronounce it did they? Calling it by a French name made it sound less plain and homely, so cafes and restaurants could charge more for it. As far as I’m concerned, a flan is a flan. They say ‘real men don’t eat quiche’. My Stan didn’t like flan either.

THE WAY WE WERE

DO YOU REMEMBER?

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“Lipstick, powder and paint, is you is or is you ain’t? so the song goes. Where would be if we didn’t have lipstick? The Egyptians had cosmetics centuries ago, so it’s hardly a new idea. Can you remember when you bought your first lipstick? It’s not just about how it makes you look, but it’s about how it makes you feel. Being smartly dressed to go out didn’t feel complete without lipstick to give the finishing touch. Pink always made me feel healthy and ‘girl-nextdoor-ish.’ Bright red was for really glamorous occasions.

Do you remember that advert for Golden Godwin? It was a ‘ladies’ drink’, like Babycham and Cherry B that my pals and I used to buy for our girlfriends but wouldn’t ever drink ourselves. It was always a dilemma when you took a girl out. You hoped she wouldn’t ask for something like a gin or tonic or a martini if you were on a tight budget. The most memorable thing about Golden Godwin was that the advert was a life-size cardboard figure of Diana Dors in a pale blue evening dress. The strapline was “I never say no to a Golden Godwin”

DO YOU REMEMBER?

Do you remember Bill Haley and Rock Around The Clock? He recorded it in 1954 with his backing group, The Comets. It was the first Rock ’n’ Roll record I ever bought. It was on Decca records. I remember playing it over an over again. In those days, records were the big 78 rpm type with two songs on them. The B side to Rock Around The Clock, was a strange song called Thirteen Women and Only One Man in Town. Although I played the A side to the point where my father said it would be worn through (He probably meant he hoped it would), I hardly played the B side at all. To this day I remember every word of Rock Around The Clock .

DO YOU REMEMBER?

Do you remember Douglas Bader? He was a hero in every sense of the word. I thoroughly enjoyed the film that was made about him. Reach for the Sky came out in 1954. It starred one of the best actors of the time - Kenneth More - playing Bader. Douglas Bader lost both his legs in a flying accident in 1931. He persuaded the RAF to take him back into the airforce at the beginning of the Second World War and he fought in the Battle of Britain. He was taken prisoner, and imprisoned in Colditz Castle. He made lots of escape attempts and his disability seemed to make him all the more determined.

OVER TO YOU

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Dear Mary and Jack I will be sorry if the BBC makes too many changes to Radio 4. It is my favourite radio station. I remember in my youth listening to Radio Luxemburg. You had to persevere with the tuning in. It was very crackly. I’ll never forget that Horace Batchelor and his football pools advert and the way they spelt out ’Keynsham’ (“that’s K.E.Y.N.S.H.A.M”) every time they gave the address.

Dear Mary and Jack So many younger people nowadays talk about going to the gym to keep fit. My husband and I never went to any exercise classes because we were keen rock’n’rollers. It was a very energetic dance! Being spun round at speed, picked up and thrown over Ted’s shoulder or jumping up from the floor took a great deal of practice and muscle-power.

Then there was Radio Caroline a pirate radio station. It always felt a bit naughty listening to that!

We thoroughly enjoyed our jiving sessions - first at the Youth Club and later at the local Palais. We even won a prize at Butlins one year.

Best wishes from David

Best wishes from Barbara

WORD SEARCH QUIZ

CAKES QUIZ Todays quiz is about cakes. Do you recognise them in the jumbled up words below?

Today’s challenge is a Word Search. Words across are all artists. Words down are colours.

1. AIOVCTRI PSENOG 2. DAMIEAR 3. EATD FOAL 4. ATEBTBRNEG 5. EOFCFE GEAATU 6. HOOCCEALT BONRWEIS

ANSWERS 1. VICTORIA SPONGE 2. MADEIRA 3. DATE LOAF 4. BATTENBERG 5. COFFEE GATEAU 6. CHOCOLATE BROWNIES

ANSWERS VAN GOGH, REUBENS, PICASSO RENOIR PURPLE, GREEN, BLUE, RED, YELLOW

SINGALONG

Do you remember Lonnie Donegan singing this? Now here's a little story to tell it is a - - - About an unsung hero that moves away your - - - Some people make a fortune others earn a - - - My old man don't earn much In fact he's flippin' - - - - Oh! my old - - -’- a dustman he wears a dustman's - - He wears cor blimey trousers and he lives in a council ---He looks a proper narna in his great big hob nailed - - - - He's got such a job to pull em up that he calls them daisy -----.

This is an old favourite. Is there a chorus? If no-one knows it, you might want to sing the verse twice. Pack up your - - - - - - - -in your old kit - - - , And smile, smile, - - - - - , While you've a lucifer to light your - - -, Smile, boys, that's the - - - - -. What's the - - - of worrying? It never was worth - - - - -, so - - - - up your troubles in your old kit-bag, And smile, smile, - - - - - .

ANSWERS

ANSWERS 1. must 4. skint 7. flat

2. dust 5. man’s 8. boots

3. mint 6. hat 9. roots

1. troubles 4. fag 7. while

2. bag 5. style 8. pack

3. smile 6. use 9. smile

The Weekly Sparkle Carer’s Notes The Reminiscence Newspaper • 11th - 17th April 2011 Each week, our writers Mary and Jack, bring their memories and reminiscences to life, in a variety of columns that are written especially for your residents. Use these pages to encourage your residents to relive their own memories. Ask questions, listen, reassure. Acknowledge each person’s contribution, as this is a great opportunity to give quiet people a chance to express themselves.

_________________________________ TODAY IN HISTORY • through the years

PAGE 1 • TODAY IN HISTORY • 11th April 1957 Background: Singapore is one of the wealthiest financial and business centres in the

world. Before its independence in 1958, it was a British colony. It was always regarded as a place of luxury and sophistication. Questions: Have you ever been to Singapore? Have you read any novels set in Singapore? What kind of music do you think the stars and celebrities listened to in the Raffles Hotel? Have you ever made cocktails? What did you use to make them with?

PAGE 2 • TODAY IN HISTORY • 12th April 1961 Background: The Space Race was well under way with both Russia and America

desperate to be the first to make significant progress and technical achievements. Yuri Gagarin was the first man to orbit the earth, although the Russians had sent monkeys into space to see what effects space travel would have on living things. Questions: Do you remember Yuri Gagarin’s famous space flight? Where did you hear about it? Did you see photographs or film footage of the event? How do you think he felt when he was about to take off?

PAGE 2 • TODAY IN HISTORY • 13th April 1964 Background: Sidney Poitier made history not only when he won an Oscar, but because he

was one of very few successful black actors at that time. He starred in a lot of successful films, and went on to direct films too. Questions: Did you like Sidney Poitier? Which of his films have you seen? Where did you usually go to see films? What sort of cinema was it? Did it get films as soon as they came out or did they come round later? What is your favourite film?

PAGE 3 • TODAY IN HISTORY • 14th April 1970 Background: The explosion on the Apollo 13 was a very dramatic chapter in the history of space missions. The damage happened in the service module, not in the ‘living quarters’ and fortunately the astronauts survived.

Questions: Do you remember the Apollo 13? Do you think the astronauts considered 13

lucky or unlucky? What do you think it might have felt like in the cabin of a spacecraft? What kind of sounds do you think the astronauts would hear in space?

PAGE 3 • TODAY IN HISTORY • 15th April 1953 Background: After fierce storms in April, East Anglia was hit by terrible floods. The area

around Hunstanton was really badly affected and thousands of pounds worth of damage was done to properties and roads. The American, Reis Leming, who had bravely rescued so many people came back to visit the area 50 years later. Questions: Do you remember the storms in 1953? Have you ever experienced flooding in the area where you lived? What did the flood water smell like? What was it like when the floods subsided.

PAGE 4 • TODAY IN HISTORY• 16th April 1964 Background: The so called Great Train Robbery was a daring robbery that had taken place

the previous summer. When the case came to Court, the Judge made it clear that because of the level of violence involved, this was not in any way a romantic adventure story. Questions: Do you remember the Great Train Robbery? If you had been the Judge, what punishment would you have given to the members of the gang? What is your opinion of Ronnie Biggs?

PAGE 4 • TODAY IN HISTORY • 17th April 1969 Background: Bernadette Devlin made history as the youngest woman to be elected to

Parliament, at the age of 21. Her maiden speech was said to have been ‘electrifying’. Questions: Do you remember Bernadette Devlin? Which other women MPs can you remember? Who do you think make the best MPs, women or men? Why do you think that is? !

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THE WAY WE WERE • from Mary’s point of view PAGE 5 • Full skirts Background: Full skirts came in after the war when fabrics were more readily available

and not rationed. Dior is credited with making them fashionable. It was called the New Look. Questions: Do you like full skirts or straight skirts? What do full skirts feel like to wear? Do you like wearing long skirts or short skirts? Did you ever wear mini-skirts?

PAGE 5 • Flan Background: Flans used to be popular in the 1950s. A basic egg and bacon flan was

something that girls would have learned to make in cookery lessons at school. You occasionally heard Egg and Bacon Flan referred to as Quiche Lorraine, but generally the term ‘quiche’ came in much later. It’s said that ‘real men don’t eat quiche’, presumably suggesting that ‘real men’ need meat! Questions: What do you call this popular dish, ‘quiche’ or ‘flan’? Do you like it? How do you make it? What sort of fillings were your favourites. Do you think it’s true that ‘real men don’t eat quiche’? Why do you think people say that?

PAGE 6 • Lipstick Background: Lipstick is often the first cosmetic girls use. Fashions change over the years -

sometimes pale lips are fashionable, as they were in the 1960s, and sometimes natural pinks or deep plum shades are popular. Bright clear red has usually been seen as sophisticated and sexy. Questions: How old were you when you first wore lipstick? What colour was it? Where did you get it from? Were you allowed to use lipstick, or did you put it on in secret? What shade of lipstick did you like best? What did it feel like on your lips? What did it taste like? !

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DO YOU REMEMBER? • from Jack’s point of view PAGE 6 • Golden Godwin Background: Golden Godwin was one of those slightly sweet not particularly strong drinks

that were acceptable for women to be seen drinking. It was not considered ladylike to drink beer or lager. Drinking spirits, like gin or vodka, was expensive and considered a bit extreme especially for young women. Questions: Have you ever had a Golden Godwin? What did it taste like? What did it look like? What sort of glass was it served in? What other drinks did you like when you were old enough to drink alcohol? IF you didn’t like alcoholic drinks, what soft drinks did you like?

PAGE 7 • Bill Haley Background: Rock Around The Clock was a big hit for Bill Haley and The Comets and it

marked the start of Rock’n’Roll. Until then young people had listened to the same kind of music as their parents. Rock’n’Roll provided something different and instead of going from ‘childhood’ to ‘adulthood’, there became an intermediate stage of being a ‘teenager’. Questions: What kind of music did your parents like? What sort of music did you like when you were young? Did your parents like your choice of music? How did they describe it? Did you have any records where you liked the ‘B’ side better than the ‘A’ side. Who was your favourite singer?

PAGE 7 • Reach for the Sky Background: Reach for the Sky was a popular film because Douglas Bader was a national

hero for his bravery. Kenneth More was at the height of his popularity at this time, in the role of brave and adventurous figure that he often played. His popularity wained later when he left his wife for one of his much younger co-stars and subsequently married her. Questions: Did you see the film Reach for the Sky? Did you like Kenneth More as an actor? Which of his other films have you seen? How often did you go the cinema? Can you remember how much tickets cost? !

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OVER TO YOU • Readers’ Letters PAGE 8 • Radio Background: Lots of people will remember the design of the Bush portable radio shown in

the picture. It was one of the most popular radios of its time. The Light Programme usually broadcast popular music and comedy programmes. The Home Service was equivalent to today’s Radio 4, with mainly documentary and spoken word programmes. The Third Programme broadcast classical music. Pirate Radio stations broadcast pop music and adverts. Questions: Which was your favourite radio station? Did you prefer radio or television? What were your favourite programmes? What sort of radio did you have?

PAGE 8 • Rock’n’Roll Background: Rock’n’Roll and jiving were dances of the 1950s, although they were similar

to the American ‘Jitterbug’ that was probably a little earlier. It was very energetic and fast. Questions: Did you ever do Rock’n’Roll or Jive dancing? Where did you go to dance? Who did you dance with? What did it feel like to be spun round on the dance floor? What did you wear? Who was your partner? !

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QUIZZES • for fun PAGE 9 • Cakes PAGE 9 • Wordsearch !

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SINGALONGS • to prompt recall PAGE 10 • My Old Man’s A Dustman PAGE 10 • Pack Up Your Troubles In Your Old Kit Bag