Pie 'n' Mash and Prefabs by Norman Jacobs

Godlonton’s was a shoe mender called Thomas. We would always re-sole or re-heel a shoe rather than throw it away and have to buy a new pair.
    The shops we frequented on Saturdays were further up and included Gunner’s, and later Blyth’s and Hammett’s after meat had come off ration, and Sorrell’s, where we would buy our cooked meats, such as ham and liver sausage. A great favourite of Dad’s, which we regularly bought here, was wurst, a German salami, which he fried with egg. I thought it was delicious.
    Our chemist was formally known as Benjamin’s, but we always called it Benjy’s. There were a couple of chemist shops in Chatsworth Road, and the other was called Fox, Wells. They were both easily identifiable by the four brightly coloured carboys (large bottles) that stood in their window. Like the red and white striped pole that projected outside barber shops, these carboys were signs that immediately identified the type of shop it was.
    Getting a prescription made up took a bit more work than it does these days when most items come as pre-packaged pills. Then, all the pills were loose in large jars and the chemist had to pour out the requisite number through a measuring device into a plain cardboard box. There also seemed to be a lot more medicine in bottles rather than tablets dispensed in those days – again poured out of a larger container into the chemist’s own stock of bottles. Ointments and creams too were made up by the chemist, often grinding the ingredients in a pestle and mortar. It seemed a much harder job in those days than just picking the requisite boxes off a shelf.
    As well as getting our prescriptions made up here, we used the chemist to get our film developed. This was in the days when photos were taken on 120 or 127 roll film, usually with just eight photos on the roll. After the photos were taken, the roll would be removed from the camera and taken to the chemist who would then send them away for developing. After about a week of eager anticipation, the photos and negatives would be returned in a small paper wallet and collected. All so different from today’s instant digital age!
    The baker we used was Carrington Brothers; here we bought Wonderloaf or Carrington’s own baked split tin, which was wrapped in tissue paper. This was on the corner of Chatsworth Road and Rushmore Road.
    On the opposite corner was an off-licence and next to that was Harry Shaw’s magnificent corn shop. His whole shop, as well as the pavement in front, was full of sacks of seed and grain, such as barley and oats, which all together gave off a wonderful smell. We frequented the shop often to buy items such as lentils and butterbeans and especially split peas, which Mum used to make pease pudding, a staple item of our diet, but you could find all types of food and pet food for sale in those sacks. You bought it by weight and the seeds or beans or whatever it was would be scooped up out of the sack and poured into a paper bag.
    Next to the corn merchant was my favourite shop in Chatsworth Road, Willis’s, the sweet shop. Most of its contents were just heaven! My absolute favourites were Refreshers but I also liked aniseed balls, bull’s eyes, Love Hearts, blackjacks, rhubarb & custard and fruit salad (at a farthing each), sweet cigarettes, sherbet dabs, sherbet fountains and Spangles, which were small square boiled sweets in a packet and came in many different flavours, my favourite being the Old English packet containing liquorice, mint humbug, cough candy, butterscotch and pear drop flavours.
    When I had a bit of extra cash, I was able to buy chocolate bars such as Fry’s Five Boys, Tiffin, Punch and Milk Motoring. Another favourite was ‘Spanish’, which was what we always called liquorice and it came in various forms including long strings, wheels, pipe-shaped and even liquorice root. You could also buy packets of Smith’s crisps here. There was