Kenny Pye
Daniel Windever
©
Copyright 2023 by Daniel Windever
|
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. |
I
was sitting on the roof of the shed in my back garden, it was a
favourite place of mine as from up there I could look over all the
back yards as far as the flats on Clamley Road. It was from this
vantage place on high I would watch a lad of my age playing alone
three backyards down and one back. Summer was coming, the days warm
and filled with birdsongs. He had set up a cricket pitch and was
dressed in cricket gear. I was intrigued as he placed his bat on the
ground just in front of the wickets then from the other end of the
pitch he would bowl a ball. He would go to the wicket end of the
pitch pick up the bat and the ball then throw the ball in the air and
hit it with the bat and run the length of the pitch. He was bowler,
batsman and fielder all by himself. He looked in my direction and I
gave him a wave, he waved back and continued his game. I jumped from
the shed roof hit the ground and rolled over in the grass I realised
the roof was higher than I thought and I was lucky I didn’t
hurt myself. As I went into my house I thought it might be good to
meet this lad. A few days later as I was walking to school with
friends I spied the lad walking alone heading in the same direction
as we were. I caught up with him and introduced myself and my
friends. His name was Kenny Pye.
Kenny
was a short lad, immaculately dressed in his school uniform, turned
out his dad was a tailor and his blazer and shorts were tailor made
and stitched by hand, no wonder they fit him so well. He was an only
child who was sports mad. He knew the names of all the English
cricket teams going back years and he was able to recite how every
goal had been scored by Liverpool Football club players in every game
since the clubs inception. What was more he was an accomplished
player of cricket and football. He had moved into the estate from
Childwall. He invited me to his house on the coming Saturday. This
was the start of a friendship that would last for many years.
I
knocked on his front door on the Saturday morning and his mum
answered. She was a short lady, not much taller than me, his dad
appeared at the door and he too was short I asked if Kenny was home
and I told them my name and that I lived around the corner. They
invited me into the house. I followed them down the hall into the
kitchen and out into the backyard were Kenny was playing cricket on
his own. I joined him and bowled a few balls and had a few hits with
the bat. The way Kenny played was that each of us was eleven players
and so got to bat eleven times. Kenny kept a score of the number of
runs, who batted, who bowled and who caught who out. The game took
all day to play with time out for tea. His mum brought out cups of
tea and biscuits, whole biscuits not broken ones. And we sat on the
small grassed area of his yard. At lunch time his mum brought out
more tea and pieces of cake. At the end of the day I went home and we
agreed to meet each other on the corner of Clamely Road and East
Millwood Road on Monday morning and walk to school together with
other kids. I rarely saw Kenny in the school yard or at lunch times
but at the end of each day we met up and walked home together. Kenny
went to his house and I to mine, he wasn’t allowed to play out
on the street in the evenings. Saturdays became our day together. We
graduated from playing cricket all the time, as it was a game I
became bored with, to playing with matchbox and dinky cars, lorries
and buses. As the school holidays came around we had plenty of time
for games. We turned Kenny’s backyard into a city by pulling
out sods of grass and making roadways with roundabouts, T
intersections, cross roads and major roads. There was a city and some
country towns. This building of roads took us nearly a week to
complete and we stood back to survey our work. We had built on almost
the entire backyard. We drove many different model cars along those
roads and streets. Kenny was lucky as he had so many toys, every week
he would add to his collection. We played our games day after day in
the summer sunshine until one day the rain came. Our metropolis was
obliterated and washed away. When the sunshine returned Kenny went
back to playing cricket and I went to play and explore the
countryside with others as Kenny wasn’t allowed to go to the
Millwoods or the Oglet Shore or play on the Alderfield
Before
the summer was over Kenny called across the backyards asking me to
come around and play. Once more we built a system of roadways, towns
and villages but we had started to make Airfix plastic models of WW11
military aircraft. We built a complete airfield at one end of the
garden and another at the opposite end. One was British and the other
German. Between us we had five spitfires, five Hawker Hurricanes, two
Messerschmitt 110’s, four ME109’s, one Fokker Wolfe,
three mustangs, two Lancaster Bombers, two Mosquitoes’, one
Defiant and a Sunderland Flying boat. Kenny got to be the Squadron
Leader of the RAF and I was commanding the German planes because
Kenny owned more planes than me. We had many aerial battles and did
many bombing runs over each other’s territories. To simulate
bombs we made tiny mud balls and let them dry so they disintegrated
when they hit the ground. We also used marbles as bombs to get the
effect of craters being made in our roads and highways. We went to
the pictures one Saturday morning and watched The Dambusters. This
sent us into a building frenzy as we dug a few holes in the dirt in
Kenny’s backyard, we built dam walls all around the holes and
filled them with water. With one Lancaster each we took off from the
English airfield and flew several times around the yard pretending to
be on our way to bomb the dams. We collected some flat stones and
threw them over the water to simulate bouncing bombs. Finally
we
made holes in the dam walls and stood back watching the water run
over our roads and highways, our mission was successful it was time
to fly the planes home and pack up for the day. Except for meeting to
go to and from school Kenny and I stopped seeing each other for quite
some time. I joined others riding scooters, roller skates and bikes
and wandering here there and everywhere while Kenny stayed home. His
mother kept him close and wouldn’t let him have dangerous toys
or play rough games with anyone.
Days,
weeks, seasons and school terms past and the early teen years came
round and found Kenny and I and indeed most of the people we were
associated with leaving behind our toys and getting into playing
sport, being boy scouts and members of church groups. Kenny’s
mum had started to let him get out and play his cricket with others
on Oak View and the Alderfield. For a while we played football every
Saturday morning. The lads were a raggedy team, most didn’t
have footy boots so they wore old shoes, old school socks and various
styles of shorts and shirts, except for Kenny he had a complete kit
of gear all in Liverpool colours, he stood out from the rest of us.
He would pick a team from the assembly of lads and those who were
left made up the opposition team. Kenny ran the game as it was his
casey we kicked around. There was much fun playing on Oak View as the
pitch had oak trees in the middle of it and you could bounce the ball
off the trees to gain an advantage. In the afternoon it was rugby
time and Kenny would come out in his full Wigan kit while the rest of
us wore what we had worn for the football game during the morning.
Again Kenny owned the ball so he got to pick the teams. We played the
game hard and tackled with force and many times Kenny’s mum
would come and ask us not to be so rough when tackling her Kenny. I
remember I was quite adept at kicking goals, an oak tree with a fork
in its trunk served as the goal, I was almost always successful in
getting the ball between the trunks. In the summer the football would
end and it was time for cricket, we needed room for this game so we
played on the Alderfield as it was a large open space. Once again it
was Kenny who picked the teams as it was his bat, ball and wickets we
used. We dressed in summer shirts, shorts and old school shoes while
Kenny wore his full kit of cricket whites, trousers, shirt, pads and
red cap. He kept score in a book. We had fun in the sunshine but
cricket being a game only the bowler, batter and wicket keeper get
any action out of for most of the time we grew bored quickly. To add
some action we got a tennis ball and put away the hard cricket ball,
now the batsman could belt the ball for miles and it would take ages
for a gang of lads to find it in the long grass. Kenny was so staunch
about sport he played in school teams and the Congregational Church
team. The other sport we got into was swimming, every Wednesday
afternoon we would leave school by bus and go to the baths. As Kenny
was an A student and I a B student we didn’t see much of each
other during school so going swimming was something that put us on
equal ground. We liked the swimming so much we started going to the
baths on weekends. It was great fun but we only got one hour in the
pool, a lifeguard would blow his whistle and get everyone out of the
pool then let the next lot of kids in to swim. One year Kenny and I
were in the school swimming team and went to Garston Baths on a
Friday night to participate in races. Kenny did well in the heats but
didn’t get to the finals, I think his mum being there and
telling him to breath in deep breaths and to make sure he didn’t
swallow any of the pool water made him lose some of his competitive
edge. I got to the finals and came third so I had a sense of
achievement. In the diving competition Kenny did well as he had no
fear of heights and dived from the high board, while I didn’t
get past the middle board but we enjoyed the night. Going to the
swimming carnival that Friday opened a door in our lives and led to
some years of great Friday nights. Kenny’s mum and dad asked if
I would go their house on Friday nights from six o’clock until
eleven o’clock and be with Kenny while they went out to the pub
for a few drinks. I said yes and a whole new adventure started.
The
first night was spent eating a bag of crisps each and watching TV,
when Kenny’s mum and dad arrived home they had a had a large
portion of chips which the four of us sat and ate then it was time
for me to go home. Being summertime it was still reasonably light and
I enjoyed the walk along East Millwood Road then down Sandham Road to
Alderfield drive. It only took me five minutes. One Friday night I
arrived at Kenny’s place and he was so excited, he wanted to
show me what he had got for his birthday. We went into his lounge
room and there was a record player with half a dozen 45’s.
Kenny switched it on as his mum and dad left for the evening. We
played the records nonstop first one side then the other. Every
Friday from then on Kenny would have six more records to add to his
collection. He became a Cliff Richard and The Shadows fan and he
started modelling himself on Cliff Richard. Kenny combed his hair
like Cliff and dressed like Cliff. The two of us would pretend to be
rock stars singing and prancing about. Kenny started collecting Adam
Faith records and added Frank Ifield to the mix and when he
discovered the Everly Brothers they too were added to the collection.
We had the best of nights with the music and finished off with our
feed of chips. Kenny started inviting two other lads we knew from
school and the church, Rodger and Gordon, to his house unbeknown to
his mum and dad. They brought some of their records and we had the
best of times. Rodger and Gordon had good singing voices and they
would pretend to be the Everly Brothers and sing along to the records
their rendition of the song ‘Bird Dog’ was perfection to
watch and listen to. At 10.30 Rodger and Gordon would leave and Kenny
and I would tidy the lounge room, pack up the records and turn the TV
on for when his mum and dad would come in not only with chips but
with pieces of fish that they had added to the menu. At this time
Kenny’s mum and dad started to allow Kenny to go out on
Saturday nights to the church social evenings. At the same time I
became very friendly with a young girl and Kenny with her younger
sister. We were invited to the girls house every Saturday morning to
have cups of tea a selection of broken biscuits and sometimes a piece
of cake while we listened to Saturday Date on the radio. Our weekends
were becoming busy, Friday night at Kenny’s house with Rodger
and Gordon, Saturday morning at the girls house, Saturday afternoon a
game of football or rugby, Saturday night at the church social and
Sunday morning at church. Kenny escalated the Friday nights by
inviting some of the girls from the church group. Rodger and Gordon
brought their girlfriends and they brought two girls along, the
lounge was crowded as we danced and sang along to the ever growing
collection of records. It was inevitable that things would come
unstuck. One night Kenny and I didn’t get the house back in its
usual order when his mum and dad came home, there were some cups in
the sink from the tea we had had and the girls had left face powder
on the sink in the bathroom. I had no supper that night and future
Friday nights were cancelled.
After
a few weeks I was once again invited to spend Friday nights with
Kenny, his mum and dad didn’t like leaving Kenny on his own
while they went to the pub so it was back to Kenny and I and the
records and TV. One Friday was to be more memorable than others. I
arrived at Kenny’s place as his mum and dad were at the front
door leaving for the pub. I was invited in and as I entered the
lounge room my heart did a dance. A princess stood by the corner of
the fireplace, her dark hair teased high on her head and combed in a
bob, blue eyes surrounded by black eye liner, eye lashes curled to
almost touch black pencilled eyebrows, lips painted red with lipstick
what a captivating face she had as she smiled at me. She wore a white
blouse unbuttoned enough to show the start of her curves, a rock and
roll skirt coloured deep blue with a red scarf tied around her waist,
sheer stockings and a pair of black flat heeled shoes. She said hello
and introduced herself to me as Linda a cousin of Kenny’s and
she was staying at Kenny’s house for the weekend. Linda
explained she was dressed for rock and roll as she was to have gone
out dancing but her parents had other ideas and sent her to Kenny’s
house. The record player was switched on and the rock and roll
records played. With a bit of rearranging of the lounge room we had a
dance floor in front of the fire. Kenny danced with Linda and she
tried as best she could to teach me the steps to the Jive. In the end
I found it more pleasing to sit on the lounge and watch Linda twirl
and whirl with her rock and roll skirt spinning and showing layers of
tulle petticoats. It was time for a break so we switched from rock
and roll to ballads and sat sipping dandelion and burdock and
munching on crisps. We put the lounge room back in order and when
Kenny’s mum and dad came home we had our supper of fish and
chips. It was a once only night that I met Linda and never saw her
again.
During
one winter Kenny and I watched TV as we wanted to see Qatermass and
the Pit. This was an idea that backfired as being alone and with the
only light in the lounge room coming from a standard lamp in one
corner, the glow of the coal fire casting shadows all around and the
glimmer from the TV screen we scared ourselves to death. The first
two weeks weren’t so bad but then the series started to get
scarier and scarier. We almost climbed over the back of the lounge
many times as the shadows danced around the room. The third week
found us keeping the main lamp on so we could obliterate any shadows
in the room. I was becoming so scared I would get Kenny to walk part
of the way home with me. We would walk in the cold air along East
Millwood to the corner of Sandham Road. Kenny would turn back and run
home while I walked along that road. On my right was a brick wall the
full length of the road. On my left was a dark deserted field that
held a large storm water pipe, which kids played on and in, but late
on a freezing cold dark Friday night that pipe was very similar to
the thing that had the quatermass creatures in it. I would walk fast,
holding my breath, making sure I placed my feet on the ground as
quietly as possible, I looked straight ahead for fear of seeing
anything, doing my best to keep my imagination under control. When I
got to Alderfield Drive I would exhale and take deep breaths then run
to my front gate, jump it and knock on my front door hoping it would
be opened quickly so I could get inside. As the series continued I
started walking home by going down East Millwood Road then along
Clamley Road to Alderfield Drive, it was lot further to walk but it
kept me away from the concrete water pipe and the danger it posed in
my imagination. Kenny and I were never happier than when the series
finished, it had held us captive for six Friday nights, terror
stricken but unable to turn it off. It was good to get back to
playing records once again.
It
was summertime, time for the annual family holiday. Usually my family
went to Wales and camped out in tents but one year Dad hired a
cottage in the tiny village of Powfoot in Dumfries in Scotland.
I
asked if my best friend Kenny could come away with us so I would have
someone to spend my time with while away from home. I was a teenager
and the most important things were friends, music, girls, music and
more girls. So mum and dad gave the OK. The whole family piled into
the Bedford van, my six sisters, two brothers, my friend, me and mum
and dad. Suitcases were stacked under and between seats then with a
wave to Kenny’s mum and dad who were standing at the kerbside,
we took off into the night.
It
was a long trip from Liverpool to Scotland especially at night the
little kids couldn’t play I spy, or count how many sheep, cows,
Rolls Royce cars and people we passed. Sleeping was difficult at
first with the cries of mum she’s touching me or mum he’s
breathing on me and I don’t want to catch his germs. After
threats from dad that he would stop and leave us all on the roadside
in the dark or worse still he would turn around and take us back home
we settled down
.
Early
in the morning sunshine we pulled up in front of a tiny white cottage
that looked like it was a thousand years old. Dad unlocked the front
door to let us in and in we went to claim a bedroom and make a cup of
tea. Now when you entered this cottage there were two steps down into
the lounge room. So we fell in rather than walked in. After the
scramble, the baby was crying and crying she had fallen down the
entry steps and hurt her wrist. It was realised she had done some
damage as it was swollen so while us older kids organised the younger
ones mum and dad took to the baby to the hospital. Sometime later,
they returned with the babies arm in a plaster cast, she had broken
her wrist. This was just in the first few hours of the holiday what
would be next.
Suitcases
were unpacked and when it came to Kenny’s case, it was full of
dirty washing. It turned out Monday was washing day in his house and
as we had left on Saturday night, he didn’t have any clean
cloths except those he was wearing. Mum wasn’t impressed with
having tons of washing on our first Sunday. With Kenny’s
washing done and hanging on a line in the back garden, it was time to
explore. The cottage fronted a quiet road, across the road was the
beach, and on the beach was a long line of tall poles with netting
tied between them that ran into the sea then turned in a circle. Dad
explained it was a fish trap. When the tide came in the beach
disappeared and the poles were under water, then when the tide went
out large fish such as salmon would be caught in the trap. It was an
ingenious way of catching fish. On the Monday, we saw how it worked
when the tide went out and there were salmon and other fish left
wriggling on the sand. The fishermen came and collected them while we
watched in amazement. After they left we ran along the net line
paddling in the little pools of water when one of my brothers called
out “Look what I got” cradled in his arms was a huge
salmon the fishermen had missed. That night we had salmon steaks for
dinner and my brother was the hero of the day.
On
the Tuesday Kenny and I sat in the back garden reading the New
Musical Express so we could keep up with what was going on in the
world of rock and roll music. Having read the paper, I walked through
the long grass and found clumps of rhubarb. The stalks were the
largest I have ever seen even to this day. So we harvested it and
that night it was rhubarb pie for dinner and I was the hero of the
day.
The
Wednesday was a blisteringly hot day, so every one of us spent the
day swimming, sunbaking and exploring the shoreline for shells... we
watched the tide change and the sea disappeared for miles. Our backs
started to feel sore; we were burned to a crisp. That evening was
spent oohing and aarghing as mum and dad dabbed our backs and
shoulders with camomile lotion to cool our fried skin.
On
the Thursday, Kenny and I went into town. There was a pub, a grocer
come sell everything shop, a bus shelter, a garage, a café and
nothing else in the main street. Kenny and I spied three girls in the
café having a milk shake so in we went. We sat down at a
little table and ordered a pot of tea we were very cool guys. We said
hello to the girls and asked them if they lived here or were on
holidays. They looked at us, giggled, giggled some more then said,
“Wha kinda language are talking in?”
“We’re
from Liverpool,” Kenny told them.
“Oh then warra you doin
here then?” they asked. We told them we were on holidays. They
told us they were going to the gathering of the clans on the weekend
and we should come along. After they explained how to find the
location of the big clan gathering they said, they would see us there
on Saturday. The holiday was going well, baby sister breaks wrist on
day one, little brother catches huge salmon on day two, I find the
worlds largest stalks of rhubarb on day three, day five we are burned
to a crisp and Kenny gets us an invitation to the gathering of the
clans and a date with three girls on day four.
Just
as we are about to leave the café a man comes in with a case
and starts opening up the juke box. We ask him what he is doing and
he explains he changes records on jukeboxes and he is putting Connie
Francis new release breaking in a brand new broken heart on the
jukebox. When he finished I put sixpence in the slot and played the
record. I loved it, Kenny loved it but the girls said what kind of
misery song is that if that’s the music you boys from Liverpool
like don’t worry about Saturday and left.
Friday
found us all at a castle, scrambling over turrets, along narrow
corridors and having a great deal of fun reliving the days of knights
and damsels and barons. From the castle we went to Gretna Green and
explored the place and learned that this was the greatest place to
get married and more people had eloped and married here than Las
Vegas in America.
Saturday
we went to the gathering of the clans and watched all the Scots
people dancing, playing bagpipes, tossing the caber and sword
dancing. Kenny and I saw the three girls but they ignored us, I
guessed playing Connie Francis’s new record had been a big
mistake these girls were into bagpipes and drums not ballads and rock
and roll.
Sunday
we arrived home, piled out of the Bedford van and left mum to a weeks
washing while we caught up with friends in the street. Kenny’s
mum asked Kenny why he brought home a case full of dirty washing
didn’t we wash cloths while on a weeks holiday. It had been a
good week it never rained once. In all the years I knew Kenny this
was the only family holiday he went on.
December
1961 saw the last of Friday nights at Kenny’s place a cousin of
his started to visit every weekend and Kenny’s mum and dad
considered two was company and three was a crowd so our Friday nights
came to an end. It was also the last time Kenny and I attended
school, we both got jobs in Liverpool city and started our employment
in early January 1962. For a while we met up on Saturday nights at
the church social dance and at the Sunday service. I said a final
farewell to Kenny when I left home on the 17th October,
1962 to travel to Australia. We corresponded with each other quite
regularly up until 1966 then we lost touch. I often wonder where
Kenny went to in his adult life.
I
am Daniel Windever, aged 77, living in Lake Tabourie NSW Australia. I
write stories about my childhood days. in Liverpool UK.
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