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Tales from a Kingsley Road Kid

Make My Dream Come True

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on April 8, 2008 1:13 PM

The first time I watched Runcorn FC, I was seven year old boy. My Dad had just beaten the ‘bookie’ with a ‘Six Penny accumulator’ and won over £11 on the horses! He took us to Canal Street to watch Runcorn FC in the winter of 1964.

I didn’t know then that standing on the Popular Side would change my life forever. I would end up writing a book about my home town club - Runcorn FC, called “Gone But Not Forgotten.”

So, after two years and lots of hard work researching and writing the book against the odds, I have had no funding at all to do this project.
I’m asking all football fans and ex-players, or anybody who can help me fulfil this life long dream, to sponsor this book.

The reason I am writing the book is so that our club’s wonderful history, will be remembered for generations to come.

I have interviewed ex-players, managers and life-long fans, including relatives of the famous 1939 team. I have collected together dozens of photographs, some even go back to the very beginning of Runcorn FC in 1918.

I am hoping that local companies will see that that this project is worth while, and sponsor the printing costs to make this dream become a reality.

If you would like to be one my top twenty sponsors - because that’s all it would take - to make this book something we could all be proud of, please do not hesitate to contact me!
A donation from every sale of the book will be given to aid ‘The New Ground Fund’ for Runcorn

Grumpy Boy Scouts and Blackberries

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on April 6, 2008 7:33 PM


When we were teenagers, in the early seventies, we played football on Heath Park in Runcorn, until you couldn’t see the ball.
Once, the football went into the pond, the water was dirty, and we knew there was broken glass at the bottom, it was going dark, no one would volunteer to go in with the frogs.

Luckily it was in the middle of the Scouts “Bob a Job” week and a little red headed Boy Scout happened to be passing the Heath Park, so we grabbed him, gave him a stick and held him over the pond to get the ball.
After the boy got the ball out, he ran off throwing lumps of soil at us and using quite shocking language for a Boy Scout, perhaps they had a badge for swearing in those days. We shouted after him “See you again next year” “Not blooming likely he shouted”. He was none too pleased with the task, even though we did give him a bob for the trouble.

Later in the year, as the autumn weather came and leaves littered the pathways, we climbed trees for conkers to string.
We also used our old jams jars to go blackberry picking, the ones we had collected tadpoles in, but had to throw them back as Dad would go mad if we took anymore home. We washed the old jam jars in the dirty pond water, then we went blackberry picking at Weston, after playing in the caves on Runcorn Hill. The blackberries were always at their best in mid to late September.

We took them home and Mum made homemade blackberry pie and a rice pudding to go with it. I can still taste that pie now, as far as the Boy Scout goes, I wonder what happened to him, I bet he kept well away from the Heath Park on “Bob a Job week”!

A Walk Around My Old Town?

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on March 8, 2008 12:40 PM


I Can’t help feeling sad, seeing so many of our lovely old buildings disappear from the ‘Old Town’ landscape.
While I understand the need for redevelopment after all these years.
It does seem such a crying shame that a lot of our unlisted old buildings are being snapped up to be turned into apartments, when what the Old Town badly needs is a retail development.
Our heritage is fast disappearing along with our identity, maybe we won‘t realise this until its all gone.
What we don’t want is for the Old Town to become a distant memory, or a collection of old black and white photographs

Take the La Scala building in the High Street in Runcorn, originally it was a cinema, then a well known bingo hall.
It’s said “the Beatles once played there in the early nineteen sixties”
I’m sure it had an art deco frontage and was used in many top t v drama, such as ‘Pennies from Heaven’ by Dennis Potter.
It’s a shame the buildings façade couldn’t have been kept in it’s original state and the building redeveloped inside, this could be said of a lot of Old Town buildings.
It is really heartbreaking to see the ruined shell the La Scala has become because redevelopment has taken so long.

Waterloo House in Waterloo Road was built in the late 1830s by Charles Hazlehurst and it later became our Town Hall from 1874 to 1933.
It became well known as a community centre for the company YKK.
Who, in their right mind would let one of Runcorn’s Town Halls be turned into yet more apartments?

To complete the trio of well known buildings due to disappear soon is the Technical Institute known locally as the Tech.
The Tech was built in 1894 by John Tomlinson Brunner of I C I fame with the help of public subscription.
In 1902 the pupils of the new Runcorn County Secondary School shared the building.
These building are all a major part of the history of the Old Town.
I can’t help but have some misgivings as to what is happening in the Old Town and if we are really doing the right thing.
Such a pity we couldn’t take a leaf out of Frodsham’s book and preserve our heritage for the future.

The Oldest Sport in Runcorn?

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on February 27, 2008 6:57 PM

football-thumb.jpg
1903 Highfield and Camden Works Competition.


I am trying to find out which sport is the Oldest in Runcorn.

As far as I know, The Runcorn Rugby team seems to be the oldest sport on record (Established in 1876).

I have found that the earliest Football Club in Runcorn may have been established in 1903 - Unless anyone can tell me otherwise.

If anyone knows of any earlier sporting clubs in Runcorn than that of the Rugby Team, please - let me know.

The One that got Away?

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on February 17, 2008 1:31 PM

The One That Got away?

Many years ago my late father Thomas Darlington told me an interesting tale about the great George Best.
I’m hoping my memory is right on this one. Maybe somebody out there can enlighten me if I get any facts wrong after forty years?!

It was in the 1960’s and Manchester United were playing at Old Trafford, George Best had never been booked at the time - which is a surprising fact if I’m right.
The referee was our very own Roy Darlington - no relation to my family but a good friend of my late father’s. I think Roy may have worked on the tarmac, laying flags with my father in Runcorn? Roy booked George Best during the game for being a bit ‘lippy’ and kicking the ball away. After the game the referee gave in his report of the match and the booking of George was strangely overturned by the FA…
Not surprisingly Roy Darlington ‘hit the roof’ and was extremely annoyed about famous players coming before the rules of the game. Roy then decided to inform the FA, that he was quitting. Roy quit even after he had reached the high standard of refereeing, good enough for Division One - a big achievement at the time for someone local.
Roy never refereed a league match again and the player got away with it.

I could be wrong. Perhaps the booked Manchester Untied player was Bobby Charlton or someone else?!

Come on you Reds, put me right on this one if you can!

Does anybody remember who Manchester United were playing and when it was?

Revenge Is So Sweet

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on February 14, 2008 7:31 PM

In the old days the Bin men had a very hard time of it, with the metal dustbins full of ashes from the coal fires. One or two of them hated the job so much they took it out on the local people on the round.

I remember a sweet old lady who lived by us and was very particular about keeping her house spick and span, her doorstep gleamed like a shiny new bar of soap.


Continue reading "Revenge Is So Sweet"

What's In A Name?

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on January 29, 2008 1:03 PM


Gone are the good old days when our babies were called after grandparents and names were passed down the family line.
Today they are more likely to be called after famous footballers or pop and soap stars.
I wonder how many boys called Beckham and Elvis are running round Runcorn?
Lately the fad has been leaning towards naming our babies after where they were conceived. This may be why lots of children are called London or Paris.
If we all named our children after where they were conceived imagine what names we would shout getting them in for their tea, “Magaluf, Ibiza your teas ready”

The best example of this was a family we met on holiday a few years ago who’s first baby was called Paris, the second one was called Chelsea and the third one was called Chester.
You could tell how the family fortunes may have changed over the years.
I wonder what the next baby will be called if they have another one?

More recently people seem to have been naming new babies after their favourite drink or car they would most like to drive.
This may be why girls are being called Tequila or Mercedes .
So the next time you hear someone shout Lamborghini or Jaguar don’t worry it could be just someone calling their child in.
By the way I was called after a children’s song ‘There changing the guard at Buckingham palace, Christopher Robin when down with Alice for years I thought Alice was a disease!


Calling Old Runcornians

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on January 21, 2008 2:41 PM

Calling all Old Runcornians

I am helping to write and research a book on Education in Runcorn.
So, I am looking for your school memories before the 1960’s, especially those of Holy Trinity School and Shaw Street School.
If you have any stories that you think will be of interest, please contact me via my blog or by telephone on 01928 716361.

History Repeats Itself?

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on January 14, 2008 1:04 PM


While trying to buy a hot water bottle for a very cold new bedroom, I suddenly realised that Great Britain was starting to look like an old episode of the Glums on black and white T. V.

Walking past row after row of silver whistling kettles, fire lighters and red carbolic soap I came a cross a stack of clothes horses something I hadn’t seen since the sixties.
These are fast replacing expensive to run tumble dryers.


Continue reading "History Repeats Itself?"

Broken Biscuits Boys

Posted by Kingsley Road Kid on January 7, 2008 1:54 PM

On Saturdays it was broken biscuit day, my brother and I as always made our way to the Old Town.

We saved our sixpences to visit a well known store that sold off its broken biscuits, and flattened cakes, to clear the space for new stock for the following week.
We stood patiently in the long queue waiting to be served.

Continue reading "Broken Biscuits Boys"

The moon landing 1969

Posted by Trinity Mirror Cheshire on November 21, 2007 11:11 AM

In 1961 the American President Kennedy, promised within a decade a man would land on the moon.
Chris%20Darlington.jpg
I remember watching the moon landing on the large black and white television at school.
The 20th July 1969 the day the Eagle has landed or so they said?

Continue reading "The moon landing 1969"