Can I start this piece by saying that I am anything but an ego tripper. I am utterly sincere when I say that I firmly believe in the power of both of my projects, to entertain inform and inspire...yes I know they will also make someone or other a hell of a lot of money. Me I don't care about the money I just want to tell both stories. Telling stories and bringing them to life is why I got into acting rather late in life after a life in industry, a goodly portion of which was spent in Jaguar Cars Castle Bromwich, formerly The Castle Bromwich Aeroplane Factory. I am genuinely interested in hearing from anyone who wants to add to my store of information, to spread the word. To help promote it or better still invest in it. That includes time and expertise in helping to write it.
Ok, that's the pre amble, now the detail ( apparently nitty gritty isn't pc anymore)
Like most Baby boomers, I grew up ( that's a lie ed
in the 1950s with stories all around me of a war that was very close to the older generation but which to us was ancient history......I once asked my Mom what it was like to travel on a stage coach, so slewed is the child's capacity to comprehend time. In fact I was born into a world still inturmoil and only 7 years after the end of the War.
Many people wanted to forget re build and move on. Others understandably couldn't. Thes were the ones whom my generation felt alienated from, the "What we did for you lot in the War" types. Well as time went on we grew sick of hearing it. The Billy Cotton band show and The Navy Lark on the radio presaging those inspirational words "Eat that lot up, that was our meat ration fer a wik whats on your plate"......Not as endearing then as it is now. It was thus many years later before I became sufficiently adult to understand that indeed although we hadn't asked them to, our parents and grandparents generation had indeed made a terrible sacrifice for us.
Bit by bit my interest grew and it was finally when the BBC commenced the biggest blog in world history when it opened up its People's War sites, that my work began to take shape. The sites have been closed to new contributions for about 3 years now, however, they are still accessible and a visitor to them will readily see that they are both detailed and eloquent and simple and from the heart too. I began to understand the nature of what my family had gone through in the City where the first bombs landed on civilians (June 8th 1940 Alleyne Road and Erdington Hall Road B24) aqnd where the last ones were still raining down some two and a half years later. All of this was and still is largely unknown even to Brummies ( it's just not talked about). My City was so vital to the war effort that within 20 minutes of those bombs falling less than a mile from CBAF and Fort Dunlop ( their intended targets), Churchill had slapped a D notice on the entire City. From that moment any reports of the Nightly 8,10,12 hour raids ( Now you know why Brum became a concrete jungle in the 50s and 60s) happened to A MIDLANDS TOWN.
That was how Goerings devastating raids were told to the rest of the world. An aeroplane factory, A Munitions factory, A Tank Factory, A tin hat factory a bailey bridge factory a rifle and machine gun factory etc etc ad infitum were destroyed in A MIDLANDS TOWN.
So In a nutshell, I have taken thos stories. Some of which are big enough to warrant re telling by actors playing their originators. Others? Well witness this
I
come ome after I'd been in the hospital after Dunkirk. Me legs had been smashed ter pieces. Our Mom and Dad couldn't afford ter get down to see me in The hospital so I couldn't wait to get back home. I walked up Lodge Road and a warden told me our house had gone up our Mom and Dad and me two brothers and sister all copped it trying to get to the shelter. I went back to the barracks"
See what I mean about simple eloquence? There are hundreds of similar tales and these stories have been woven into the lives of fictional families who work at The Beezer ( BSA) at the Nuffield ( Castle Bromwich aero) at the Eddystone ( The radio pioneers who made the very radio that Ike used to set off operation overlord) etc. It is a story of tragedy and tears of laughter and humanity and sheer courage. Imagine those of you who are young enough, What it would be like to walk into work past the bodies of those killed by a bomb that wiped out the nightshift. You'd brush the dust off your machine and carry on...You had to to survive. This was The home front and their story deserves to be told every bit as much as the heroes of the front line, for they too are a dwindling generation.
It is the story of My City, but it is the story of all the home front. People were conscripted and volunteered from all over the country even London, to Brum to work in the factories where over half of The Spitfires were made and Lancasters and tanks and ambulances and Hurricanes etc etc. My dear friend Alex whom you will have read about in my previous posts told me
"I used to either fly in or cycle more often than not with my Dog Tony trotting by my side all the way from Hampton to the factory. As D day approached we could all see something massive was going on. Street after street grass verge after grass verge began to steadily fill up. crates of guns ammunition, bedding, clothing Tanks, armoured vehicles, field guns..As far as the eye could see all of this stuff produced by the most uncomplaining people in The British Isles, The British Race at their very finest"
Alex who was proud patron of The Birmingham Air Raid Remembrance Society, wanted my work to proceed more than anything. More even than the retelling of his epic racing and record breaking days. I am what I am, I am passionate about all of this but I am not a business man as I said at the outset. Thus if anyone wants to help, then please simply say so
Spitbloke over and out
I guess the J5 bit needs explanation? J5 is Junction 5 of the M6 motorway. a minute from Jaguar cars better known as The Castle Bromwich Aeroplane Factory......Erdington Birmingham24