Gerry Wolstenholme's Blog - Posts Tagged "books"

An absorbing couple of hours in the
Fleetwood Museum Bookshop

I am not a great traveller these days but one trip I do enjoy making is the seven-mile journey up the Fylde Coast to Fleetwood. My great friend Laura, with whom I spend many happy hours hunting around charity shops and junk shops for bargains, and I go there approximately once a month to browse in the fabulous Fleetwood Museum Bookshop.
The thing is it is not just browsing for we both come away having purchased any number of books, which is the object of the exercise in supporting the Museum. My excuse – that is if I need one – is that I am subscribing to Sigmund Freud’s view that collecting is compensation for grief. I can say that with some truth because my book collection has grown massively since I lost my dearly beloved wife, Linda, 17 years ago. Laura, a good deal younger than me, does not need an excuse, she just loves books!
The trip to the bookshop has become a regular outing on a given Tuesday and we have made friends with a charming lady who helps to run the shop and it is always a pleasure to meet up with her when we visit. I am afraid that at the time of writing this, having just come home after fish and chips from Pisces, the best fish and chip shop on the Fylde Coast, I have not asked her name. This is very remiss of me and I will rectify the matter on our next visit. Incidentally that is already scheduled for two weeks today, Tuesday 14 September.
On our visits I am never sure what I am going to buy because my tastes are very eclectic and anything I see that I take a fancy to could well go home with me! If I had to be specific, I would say that my two main interests are literature and art, with a strong liking for London, cricket …, should I go on? No, so you will get the idea, anything can find its way to the Wolstenholme library!
So the specifics of this last visit, the purchases from which I have just spent a most enjoyable hour or so looking through, reading the odd introduction or foreword and generally enjoying my purchases over a cup of coffee in the back garden. As I said to the lady in charge as we left, I might not have the time to read them all – I would have to live, say, 839 more years to get through all my books (even if I did not add any more, which is MOST unlikely) but just to enjoy having them in my collection is worth every penny spent. I know they are there amongst the hundreds, nay, thousands, which I own; Laura always teases me about how many that is and her estimate is around 12,000. Of course, she exaggerates as I would estimate it to be perhaps 4 to 5,000. However, be that as it may, there are plenty!
And after this latest visit there are a further 30 volumes. And I thought it would be fun to list them. I should add that they are not all for me for I do buy for my daughter, who, unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, for her, has my bibliomaniac genes in her make-up. I also make purchases as presents for her husband.
The titles this time around and what attracted me to them are:

A Christmas Carol and Other Christmas Writings by Charles Dickens. This is the Penguin Classics edition with an introduction by Michael Slater. I am a massive Dickens collector and any different editions, particularly with new introductions, are likely to end up at home. Incidentally, I was lucky enough to be invited to take part in a symposium with Michael Slater, who I have always admired, last year and an essay of mine accompanied his and a couple of other academics’ writing on the Blackburn Museum website.

Lord Hornblower by CS Forester. I have never read a Hornblower novel but I saw this American edition that had an eye-catching illustrative cover by Douglas Smith and it appealed to me. It will be my first Hornblower read; fancy beginning with the final title in a 10-novel sequence.

Period Piece by Gwen Raverat. I was a secondhand and antiquarian bookseller for many years and this book of reminiscences by Charles Darwin’s granddaughter was a perennial good seller but I never read it so I thought it was about time I did.

Jack Kerouac by Warren French. This title fulfils my literary interest. I have read the informative introduction already, over my coffee, and in the main body of the text the author introduces much of Kerouac’s fiction that does not get the coverage that On the Road gets.

Dear Dodie: The Life of Dodie Smith by Valerie Grove. Another literary title, which I never had in my bookselling days so I thought it was time I owned a copy to read.

Pursuit of Pleasure: High Society in the 1900s by K Middlemas. This tickled my history fancy as it concerns the society and social habits of the Edwardian years.
Tramway Memories by J Joyce. Not the famous J Joyce (I’m pleased to say for his wife said to him on one classic occasion, ‘James, why don’t you write something that people want to read?’) My Dad was a huge tram fan and I always bought him such books as presents so this one was in homage to him as he did pass on those interests, although not quite as strong.

London United Tramways: A History 1894-1933 by Geoffrey Wilson. As well as the tram interest (see above), this combines another main interest of mine London and it also has historical context.

Loving Mr Darcy by Sharon Lathan. I have a number of sequels to Jane Austen’s novels and here is another. At school we read Northanger Abbey for GCE and I was not keen on it, thinking it a girls’ novel but I am now quite a Janeite and I do enjoy how other authors continue famous works.

It’s About Time: the dave brubeck story by Fred M Hall. Jazz is another of my interests and I well remember as a youngster Dave Brubeck’s Take Five entering the charts. It was, to me anyway at the time, a surprise hit as I was a rock ‘n’ roller with a passion for Chuck Berry. But Take Five took the music world by storm and became the first million-selling jazz record, I grew to like it and so I thought I ought to learn something about Dave and his record.

The British Tram by Frank E Wilson. Another for the small tram collection, it is a more ephemeral offering which, for me, adds to the charm.

Wicked Women’s Wit and Humour from Elizabeth I to Ruby Wax edited by Fidelis Morgan. I rather like such books for browsing and when I saw not unsurprisingly Dorothy Parker was oft quoted I couldn’t resist it.

The London Transport Golden Jubilee Book 1933-1983 by Oliver Green and John Reed. This combines my London interest with my interest in the metropolis transport systems so I just had to have it; perhaps this could be my next read!

A Brief History of Life in the Middle Ages by Martyn Whittock. I was not the greatest history scholar at school but as I have got older I find it fascinating to read about how people lived and acted in days of yore.

Churchill’s Grand Alliance: The Anglo-American Special Relationship 1940-57 by John Charmley. My Dad was a Churchill fan although he was a strict Labour voter and we had books on the shelves about him so I was aware of him from a young age. I thought this would be interesting because it looks at a specific aspect of his career.

The Booker Quiz by Christopher Booker. At first I thought this might by a quiz about the Booker Prize and as that is rather modern for my tastes I avoided it. However, I decided to have a closer look at it to discover that it is the author’s name rather than the award and that the quizzes are all literary. I thought it would be fun to have a go, that is until I looked at the first three and answered one question, Who wrote The Prime Minister? Yes, I knew that was Anthony Trollope but other questions left me blank! I will get better, I feel sure as I progress through the book!

The Decline of the Castle by MW Thompson. Architecture and castles in particular have always had a fascination for me so I thought it would be good to appreciate how the latter went into decline. The very minor disappointment is that Pendennis Castle in Falmouth is not mentioned for when we visited when Deborah was young I persuaded her to pretend that we were storming the castle as we made our way up the grassy slopes and once on the battlements that we were firing the cannons at the French! Well, it was fun at the time.

Birds in Your Garden: A month-by-month guide by Tony Soper and Roger Lovegrove. I bought this for Deborah for she has a haven of wildlife, particularly birds, where she lives in Somerset. It has lovely watercolour illustrations by Tony Busby.

Oasis Among the Chimney Pots: The story of a town bird sanctuary by Gwen Haines. Similarly I bought this for Deborah because she will appreciate the author’s efforts in setting up an urban sanctuary.

The Ship: The life and death of the Merchant Sailing Ship 1815-1965 by Basil Greenhill. I have always had an interest in olden day sailing ships ever since my Dad took me to see the Cutty Sark as a nine-year-old. And then, a couple of years ago we visited SS Great Britain and both these feature in this volume. An additional incentive to purchase it came when I opened the cover to discover the pricing of a great friend and former bookselling colleague Bob Dobson’s pricing inside.

LaRousse Encyclopedia of Renaissance and Baroque Art edited by René Huyghe.
The Complete Paintings of Piero della Francesca by Peter Murray and Pierluigi de Veecht.
Degas by Antoine Terrasse.
Klee by Douglas Hall.
An Introduction to The Humanities Illustration Book.
The World of Turner 1775-1851 by Diana Hirsh.
Manet and the Modern Tradition by Anne Coffin Hanson.
Holbein by Radu Boureanu.
The Drawings of Watteau by Malcolm Cormack.
History & Techniques of the great Masters: Toulouse-Lautrec by Christopher Ackroyd.
These art books cover a wide variety of styles and periods which reflect my interests from the Middle Ages and 15th century Italian della Francesca through Turner, a real favourite, the Impressionists, all of whom I enjoy, to the more modern Paul Klee. There are plenty of great images to enjoy even if I don’t get round to reading all of them!

Oh, I almost forgot, I did acquire two children’s books to go along with these purchases.
Noddy and the Roller Skates and The Wars of the Roses. The former reflects my interest in Noddy as he was my very first collectible; I had the whole series and my Dad built a special bookcase to house them into the wall in my bedroom. I don’t have those books now (sadly) but I have reacquired them and still have a sneak read of them when no-one is looking! As for the latter, it also dates back to my youth for it is a Pitkin Pictorial and we used to buy those at various places that we visited so I built up quite a collection. They, too, are gone but I am rebuilding the collection!
So there we have it, a resumé of today’s purchases. I do so hope it has some appeal to the reader(s)!

There are many book shelves around my house and every shelf I look on intrigues me and I wonder what the books must think of their neighbours, who often have little or nothing in common with each other; how do they converse I wonder?!
For this second ramble, I am picking a different shelf in a different room from the one I looked at for the first ramble. This is because, apart from my Dickens’ collection, which I try to keep together – at least in the same room – books of different genres nestle next to each other everywhere. You will soon see what I mean!
Books on war, or should that be military history (the heading I used for such in my catalogues in days of yore) are not my favourites but I do have a number of them scattered around the shelves (and the wardrobes). And one leapt off the shelf I am concentrating on and it is Ian McDonald’s The Boer War in Postcards. I am interested in the Boer Wars, perhaps because Conan Doyle wrote about them, and me and Linda were always postcard collectors so the two subjects combined endeared me to this book.
The book provides a vivid record of the way that the war was seen by the people and countries involved as it unfolded before them. The thing that somewhat surprised me from the images within was the number of comic cards that the war spawned. All together with the battle scenes and troop shots they do provide a useful historical record of the conflicts.
Sitting nearby is another military history volume, The Battle of the River Plate. My interest in that battle was pricked when my Dad took me to see the film in 1968 and as a youngster it made a massive impression on me with its high drama; I can still remember the scene in Montevideo harbour with the British ships standing off, the American commentating from the quayside and then Captain Langsdorff scuttling his ship the Admiral Graf Spee. High drama, indeed! I must read it soon to remind of the battle, not least because the book’s sub-title is a somewhat bewildering The Grand Delusion.
Close by is a book that sounds military, Brothers in Arms but its sub-title tells us The Kennedys, the Castros, and the Politics of Murder. I have always had a fascination for the Kennedys that probably developed when a friend walked into our dormitory in London in November 1963 and announced ‘President Kennedy has been sot.’ We were stunned. So this book could be interesting especially as Lee Harvey Oswald, with his supposed Cuban connections will undoubtedly feature in it.
The nearest a neighbouring book got to warfare was the fact that the subject had a Prussian childhood. The book is Dietrich A Biography. Finely modelled cheekbones and a broad smooth forehead define Marlene, although my early, and perhaps abiding, memory of her was as she appeared in the film The Blue Angel. Once she arrived in Hollywood she became the highest paid woman in the world and this book looks at the lady behind the glittering image. She did visit my hometown of Blackpool in 1954 but I was too young to appreciate it … pity!
And from a movie star we move on to a traveller and explorer in the Last Voyage of Captain Cook as told by John Ledyard (1751-1789) who sailed with Captain James Cook and it is the only account of Cook’s third voyage to be published by an American. It vividly covers life aboard the first ship to sail to the Hawaiian Islands and Cook’s tragic death on an Hawaiian beach. Also in the book is Ledyard’s harrowing journey through Russia and his spell in pre-revolutionary Paris.
A far cry from Paris is Steven Watts’ Mr Playboy: Hugh Heffner and the American Dream. Watts suggests that Hefner ‘profoundly altered American life and values’. This is quite surprising considering Hefner’s Methodist upbringing. My interest lies in reading how he established his publishing empire as Playboy became such a cultural phenomenon. As a bookseller, collections of the playboy magazine would come up in various private libraries that I purchased and I was always pleasantly surprised when I came across serious literary articles within its covers; I distinctly remember one learned one on PG Wodehouse and things like that always helped to sell the magazine to collectors of, in that instance Wodehouse material.
I had never read any Terry Pratchett books, or even owned any of his books as they do not appeal to me. But when I saw Dodger on a bookseller’s shelves and realised that it had undertones of Oliver Twist, I just had to purchase it. It remains unread so far (with hundreds, nay, thousands, of others) but at least own it and can read it when ready – its strapline of ‘a scavenger in the squalor of Dickensian London’ is certainly appetising.
Mention of Dickensian London takes me to a nearby book, The Mile End Murder, which was billed as ‘The Case Conan Doyle Couldn’t Solve’. Author Sinclair McKay writes of the murder of Mary Emsley, an East End girl who was killed in what is described as ‘a veritable locked room mystery’ that took place in August 1860. Investigations revealed a variety of suspects and a sensational public trial followed. Arthur Conan Doyle believed that an innocent man was executed in one of the final executions at Newgate. The author follows this through and ends with a sensational revelation.
And moving on to Edwardian times, there is close by The Peasenhall Murder in which Martin Fido and Keith Skinner collaborate on a 1902 case from the sleepy Suffolk village. It is billed as ‘one of England’s most extraordinary real-life murder mysteries’. We shall see when we read it one of these fine, or not so fine, days.
To crime of a different sort in Scene of the Crime for the book is sub-titled A Guide to the Landscapes of British Detective Fiction. The book represents my interest in crime fiction, particularly from the so-called Golden Age, say 1920 to 1950. The authors Julian Earwaker and Kathleen Becker use a regional approach and also picture selected authors with their comments on their choice of location. For instance, Peter Gutteridge is pictured outside the Half Moon pub in Plumpton where a good part of A Ghost of a Chance was written with the suggestion, ‘The 1979 painting on the wall here provides a vital clue’ – perhaps best not to see it before the book is read!
On a much lighter note The Really Lancashire Book sits alongside and this is a series of essays from a relatively short-lived magazine of the mid to late 1990s. There are historical, topographical, amusing and even dialect essays within its covers (I don’t understand a word of Lancashire dialect although born and bred in the Red Rose county). Two of these are entitled ‘Med I’ Lancasheer’ and ‘Jugglin’ Wi’ Fawse Teeth’, both of which titles are just about understandable, even if the contents of the stories aren’t! ‘Lancashire’s Mormon Connections’ is alongside ‘Southport’s First Car’, which was owned by Felix William Isherwood Hudlass; it apparently claimed a top speed of 15mph! I also noticed ‘A Dedicated Amateur: WW Parr of Blackpool FC’ by a certain Gerry Wolstenholme … enough said, let’s move on!
And finally on this ramble two arty books rub covers with the more macabre titles, Luke Hermann’s 1963 JMW Turner 1775-1851 and Herbert E Binstead’s 1929 The Furniture Styles. I first appreciated Turner when visiting the National Gallery and my interest was increased when Linda and I visited an exhibition of his work at The Tate Gallery. ‘Yellow Billy’ with swatches of his colour on show really captured my imagination from then on! The furniture book comes from our shared interest in furniture design and this one, under the Sir Isaac Pitman imprint, covers many of the style used from Elizabethan through Queen Anne, Chippendale, Sheraton, Adam, Hepplewhite right through to British New Art. And with 177 line drawings it is a real treat.
Oh, well … and so to bed!

Eric Barton 7 May 1909 to 21 May 1997

I discovered some back issues of Picture Postcard Monthly and decided to have a browse through them before discarding them. And in the July issue for 1997 I discovered a piece entitled The first postcard dealer – Eric Barton. I immediately realised that this was the Eric Barton that I had met and got to know, especially when in the first paragraph it mentioned his Baldur Bookshop on Hill Rise, Richmond. That is where I got to know him, quite late in my bookselling career I should add.
The last statement is something of a surprise for Richmond, and John Prescott’s establishment in particular, was one of my favourite book-hunting grounds and I had visited it regularly throughout my early years of bookselling. But I had heard of the reputation of the owner of the Baldur Bookshop so I studiously avoided going there while in Richmond as there were other profitable outlets to visit where the welcome was more wholesome, shall we say.
Then some years later, after I had returned to my hometown of Blackpool, and visited London for book buying trips I was in Richmond with my wife, daughter and Mum and Dad and while they went shopping I decided to go and pay a visit to the Baldur Bookshop. It was a wintery November day and as I opened the shop door the doorbell sparked Eric into action. I was greeted with a loud shout from the rear of the shop where Eric sat on his cushioned chair and tried his very best to discourage customers from entering. ‘What do you want?’ was the cry. ‘I just wanted to have a look round to see if there was something for me to buy,’ I replied. This brought from him ‘Well, what are you looking for?’
As a youngster I would probably have been intimidated by his approach and stopped in my tracks but then, well established, I simply proceeded into the well stacked shop. Indeed the shop had been described as ‘one of the most individual, maddening but rewarding secondhand bookshops in the London area’. His approach was summed up by Michael Goldsmith in that 1997 article with ‘[H]e presented a more austere figure – and several visitors confirmed to me that he was the sort of chap who would truculently throw you out of his shop rather than serve you if he didn’t care for “the cut of your jib”.’
Eric had opened the shop on Hill Rise in 1936 with a partner, who soon disappeared, and had developed it into what it was since that date. He spent some time in the forces and on his return he acquired huge quantities of postcards and he is credited with almost single-handedly reviving a postcard craze that had died out with World War I. By the 1950s he was acknowledged as having over a million postcards in stock but by the time I was there this had been well picked over but there were still dozens and dozens of boxes of postcards interwoven with the thousands of books.
He had acquired any number of celebrity customers during his time including Caryl Brahms, Ronnie Barker, John Arlott, TS Eliot, Compton Mackenzie and Bernard Levin, as his business expanded. By the time I arrived he was winding down a little and some six years after my visit he retired in 1993 when his extended 15-year lease ran out. Interestingly, one of his accomplishments had been that he persuaded the then London County Council to install a plaque on Oscar Wilde’s Tite Street home in Chelsea.
But back to my visit we discussed trends in bookselling and when I mentioned cricket as one of my main interests, he changed completely. The 1997 article explains this with Goldsmith saying ‘once you got him going on his three favourite topics, cricket, the weather and reminiscences of the postcard world – he was off like a train!’ And fortunately one of my subjects coincided with one of his so we were, almost instantly, friends!
I spent a pleasant hour or so with him and then, as I was about to leave, he announced, ‘I have a present for you.’ He went to the back of the shop and brought out a battered Panama hat. A long-time MCC member and attendee at Lord’s, he told me, ‘I wore this at the Eton versus Harrow game at Lord’s in 1936 and I want you to have it.’ I immediately fell in love with it, thanked him and departed into the November gloom proudly wearing it. When I met up with my folks outside the department store where we were to have coffee, my daughter almost collapsed on the floor when she saw me approaching in this Panama and it remained a family joke for many years. Almost as long as the hat lasted me, for I wore it religiously until it was beyond wear – even then my son-in-law extended its life by wearing it while working on his garden for some years!
So, as you can imagine, my feelings for Eric Barton were, in the words of the heading of this article, ‘all-round good egg’ for he was certainly a character and an entertaining one at that. Thank goodness I got over that initial ‘What do you want?’

A BIBLIOGRAPHY

Each of the publications was privately published and issued in a limited edition of 10 copies, each one signed and numbered by the author. They consisted of a title page, the text, a varying number of pages, and a limitation page and were presented in a red plastic folder with adjustable spine.

1. Netherfield v Barrow An epic cricket poem 2006 10pp.

2. Twenty of Rossall School, with two bowlers v The All England Eleven Rossall, May 1862 2006 8pp.

3. Victory in VJ Week, North of England v Australian Services Blackpool
16, 17 August 1945. 2006 14pp.

4. “Bowled at last”, The Strange Story of Richard Gorton Barlow’s Headstone 2006 8pp.

5. George Duckworth on Bodyline at the Mount Street Fireside Fellowship, Fleetwood, October 1933 2007 1p.

6. Controversial ‘Ciss’: Cecil Parkin, Blackpool Cricket Club Amateur 2007 12pp.

7. “[Tommy] Mitchell Won It”, The Controversy behind Blackpool Cricket Club’s Ribblesdale League Championship 1933 2007 7pp.

8. A Little Known Sydney Barnes Cameo, Blackpool v Whalley, May 1929 2007 5pp.

9. Cell Break in Seven Minutes: Harry Houdini in Blackpool, June 1905 2007 6pp.

10. The Tragic Death of Frederick Bull, once of Essex County Cricket Club 2007 7pp ills.

11. A Photographic Mystery A Lancashire County Cricket Club Team Group 1907 and 1908 2008 8pp ills.

12. Jack Bond’s Last Stand: Lancashire v Middlesex, Lord’s 15 July 1972 2008 6pp ills.

13. Early Cricket in the Fylde Rossall Hall v Preston, September 1848 2008 6pp ills.

14. Oscar Wilde in Blackpool ‘The House Beautiful’ Lecture, 12 December 1883. 2008 6pp ills.

15. A Bumper Benefit – Cyril Washbrook Lancashire v The Australians Old Trafford, 7, 9, 10 August 1948 2008 12pp ills.

16. “Enchanting Place!” Noel Coward in Blackpool, September 1942 2008 6pp ills.

17. The Blackpool Cricket Club Tour of The Lake District, June 1899 2008 8pp.

18. The Match That Never Was Lancashire v Surrey at Stanley Park, Blackpool 27-30 August 2008 2008 8pp ills.

19. Early Cricket in the Fylde Rossall Hall v Fleetwood 19 September 1845 and 6 October 1845 2008 8pp ills.

20. “A delicious walk by the sea”, Charles Dickens in Blackpool, April 1869 2008 8pp ills.

21. The First Incarnation of Blackpool Cricket Club 1872 – 1874. 2008 6pp front cover ills.

22. Kitchener Memorial Match for the benefit of the Accrington Pals Captain Harwood’s England XI v The Mayor’s Lancashire & Yorkshire XI Accrington, 6 September 1916 2008 8pp ills.

23. “An enterprising and entertaining batting display of cricket”, Frank Howarth’s Reward Blackpool v Clitheroe 2 August 1941 2008 4pp ills.

24. A Test of Endurance: Blackpool FC defeat six of Chelsea 29 October 1932 2009 7pp ills.

25. Frank Woolley’s cotton-county century: Lancashire v Yorkshire Haslingden, 23 August 1916 2009 4pp ills.

26. An unofficial baggage master Lancashire v West Indians Blackpool, September 1957 2009 8pp ills.

27. Reminiscences of a first-class groundsman at Rossall School 1938 Dennis Sullivan, ex-Surrey and Glamorgan 2009 8pp ills.

28. “Now for the Ladies” … The Battle of the Roses Lancashire v Yorkshire Blackpool, 15 and 16 August 1934 2009 12pp ills.

29. Young Malcolm Hilton bags Bradman – twice! Lancashire v Australians Old Trafford, May 1948 2009 10pp ills.

30. “Here and Hereafter” Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on Spiritualism, Winter Gardens, Blackpool 20 January 1920 2009 10pp ills.

31. Harold Gimblett’s Benefit and a First County Game for Glastonbury, Somerset v Northamptonshire 26, 28 & 29 July 1952 2009 14pp ills.

32. Lancashire v Sussex, Blackpool 31 August, 1 & 2 September 1960 An Essay in Celebration of Jon Filby’s half-century & Murray Goodwin’s Benefit Year 2009 8pp ills.

33. ‘Sides They’ll See at the Seaside’ Blackpool v Sheffield Wednesday, 10 December 1925 2009 10pp ills.

34. Richard Gorton Barlow remembers Johnny Briggs, January 1902 2009 8pp ills.

35. Blackpool’s Superbowl Sundays Air Service Command Warriors’ perfect season, Bloomfield Road, 1944 2010 5pps front cover ills.

36. Some Blackpool Cricketing Heroes of the Past 2010 12pps ills. NB: Produced in a limited edition of 30 copies.

37. Calypso Cricket for Rohan Kanhai’s Benefit Blackpool v West Indian XI 26 July 1962 2010 6pps ills.

38. An Early Appearance for a young Ernest Tyldesley, Lancashire v XXII Colts 27,28 April 1908 2010 6pps ills.

39. “Somewhere on the high seas” Blackpool FC captain Jack O’Donnell goes absent without leave, December 1931 2011 8pps ills.

40. Twenty-two years on Red Rose Champions again – after last match success Lancashire v Nottinghamshire Old Trafford, August 1926 2011 13pp ills.

41. Bill O’Reilly and Frank Ward rout England England XI v Australians Stanley Park, Blackpool 31 August, 1 September 1938 2011 10pp ills.

42. Cricketer, Footballer, Administrator, Gentleman The Multi-talented Jim Cumbes 2011 6pp ills.

43. Early visitors from the Caribbean An England XI v West Indians Blackpool 26, 27, 28 July 1906 2011 14pp ills.

44. More Ashes for Australia ‘The Ashes of Peace’ – Body-line Burnt at Blackpool 5 November 1934 2011 2pp front cover ills.

45. The Atomic Boys: Blackpool FC’s colourful band of supporters explode on the scene 2011 14pp ills.

46. Dexter’s Derring-do all in vain England v Australia, Old Trafford July/August 1961 2012 18pp ills.

47. Learie Constantine to join Blackpool Cricket Club for the 1938 season. Will he sign or will he not? 2012 10pp ills.

48. The formation and first season of The Northern Cricket League 1952 2012 8pp ills.

49. Greg Chappell The Player’s County League’s First Centurion Somerset v Surrey, Bristol 15 June 1969 2012 10pp ills.

50. The untimely death of a cricketing legend Edgar Arthur (Ted) McDonald Blackrod, 22 July 1937 2012 12pp ills.

51. Blackpool Cricket Club’s Bolivian spy wicketkeeper Roy Sheffield, formerly Essex CCC 2013 16pp ills.

52. ‘May I borrow your umbrella, please?’ A casual remark and its consequences 2013 8pp ills.

53. Old Trafford under water England v Australia 8, 9, 11 and 12 July 1938 2013 10pp ills.

54. In Quest of the 'mythical ashes' England ladies v Australia ladies Stanley Park, Blackpool 26, 28, 29 June 1937 2014 14pp ills.

55. A tragedy delayed … The untimely death of Blackpool Football Club's Jimmy Hampson 10 January 1938 2014 20pp ills.

56. The English [FA] Cup holders surprisingly vanquished South Shore v Aston Villa 2 July 1887 2014 5pp ills.

57. An historic match Glamorgan v South Africans St Helen's, Swansea 4 and 6 August 1951 2014 10pp ills

58. Gala Day Cricket at Whitegate Park, Blackpool 13 June 1914 2014 8pp ills

59. An ill-fated tour Rajputana Cricket Club in England, 1938 2014 15pp ills

60. Dickens on Dickens: Alfred Tennyson Dickens at the Winter Gardens, Blackpool 5 November 1910 2015 13pp ills

61. Visitors from across the pond Blackpool FC v Canada 4 January 1892 2017 5pp ills

62. A Grand Charity Match: W Strutt-Cavell's XI v XVIII of Twickenham 17 September 1900 2017 12pp ills

63. Blackpool Football Club: The Stanley Arms Solution 22 July 1887 2018 6pp ills

64. The First MCC Tour of Australia: A Scarce Piece of Cricket Memorabilia from 1903 2018 4pp ills

65. For King and Country: Remembering the six Blackpool FC footballers who were killed in action in World War I 2018 9pp ills

66. Blackpool FC's worst ever player …? George T McLay 30 January 1897 2019 2pp ills

67. Lancashire County Cricket Club’s Annual Pic-Nic to Blackpool: Presentation to JT Tyldesley, August 1906 2020 3pp ills

68. 10 for 102 and All That, being the story of Bob Berry’s 10-wicket triumph for Lancashire against Worcestershire at Stanley Park, Blackpool, 29, 30, 31 July 1953 2021 10pp ills

69. Kiwi War Cry at Bloomfield Road Blackpool Borough v New Zealand, 10 September, 1955 2021 8pp ills

70. Tom Goddard Benefit Match Sir Julien Cahn’s XI v Mr B.H. Lyon’s XI Stinchcombe Stragglers Ground, 13 and 14 September, 1936 2021 14pp ills

71. An interview with Tom Hayward followed by A Complimentary Dinner in his honour at The Lion Hotel, Cambridge 23 April, 1902 2022 12pp ills

72. ‘Our Visitors are nice fellows …’ The South Africans in Ireland 1907: All Ireland XI defeated at College Park, Dublin, 5, 6, 7 August 2022 13 pages ills

CK Broadhurst owner's death

I was saddened to read of the death of Laurie Hardman of CK Broadhurst and read your on-line article that invited comments. As I knew Laurie from the very start at Broadhursts, I thought I would just pen a few thoughts.

He was more or less a contemporary of mine and I well remember him joining Broadhurst, which I note was 1969. At that time I was just starting my secondhand bookselling career and Mr Broadhurst was my mentor (all the time I knew him I never knew the C stood for Charles for I, as an 18-year-old, respected him and always called him Mr Broadhurst). I was from Blackpool and regularly visited his shop to pick up books that I could sell on or add to my own collection.

He was very good to me and let me have some nice items at a price that I could pass on and whenever I called he used to take me up to his office, where there was usually a roaring fire going, and have a chat. He told me how he started the shop after World War I because when he returned to his previous occupation after the war, WH Smith said that they did not want him. So he told me he would show them and start his own shop ... to use that old cliché, the rest is history.

His manager at the time and for years thereafter was Mr Sankey and he too was a gentleman, with whom I established a good realtionship. He, too, looked after me whenever I called and all the years I knew him he was Mr Sankey; I am not even sure that I ever knew his forename either!

Then Mr Broadhurst told me he had taken a young man like myself and it turned out to be Laurie, who, even from that young age one could see that he had a love of books. He, too, was most personable and when I began issuing catalogues in the early 1970s he would purchase items from me, either for stock or for himself. I well remember selling him a boxed set, of about 16 volumes of one of my favourite authors at the time, Stanley Weyman, now virtually unheard of. I was a little sad about this because it was in my own collection but I wanted to enhance my catalogue so I listed it and it sold (sadly!). The fortunate thing was that Laurie bought it so I knew it had gone to a good home - perhaps he still had it in his personal collection! Incidentally I have never seen another full set.

I was working in London later and still used to pop in to see Messrs Broadhurst, Sankey and Laurie (I did know his forename!) and still was able to secure a few bargains to pass on to the London dealers with whom I associated. Mr Broadhurst and Mr Sankey knowing this, they did give me a generous discount so that I could make something for myself. Laurie meanwhile, in those early days, was mainly working on the ground floor.

Although I had not corresponded with him for a few years now (however, my daughter has dealt with CK Broadhurst and has mentioned that her Dad was once a customer and friend of theirs), I still cherish his friendship and I feel sure that his colleagues and of course his customers will miss him very much. He was a gentleman and will be sadly missed and I am delighted to be able to pass on these happy memories of him.

Rest in Peace Laurie.