Whats your Leeds secret?

[shutthatdoor]

Johnny39 & Stutterdog have reminded me of something I had just about forgotten. We found if you got an old magnet from a big speaker, you could rub it in circles around the cover plate on old electric lamp posts and turn the light on. Must have affected the switch inside somehow. Hours of fun. Cost to public purse? Who knows.

[Johnny39]

shutthatdoor wrote: Johnny39 & Stutterdog have reminded me of something I had just about forgotten. We found if you got an old magnet from a big speaker, you could rub it in circles around the cover plate on old electric lamp posts and turn the light on. Must have affected the switch inside somehow. Hours of fun. Cost to public purse? Who knows. Didn't know that one shutthatdoor, nice one.

[stutterdog]

shutthatdoor wrote: Johnny39 & Stutterdog have reminded me of something I had just about forgotten. We found if you got an old magnet from a big speaker, you could rub it in circles around the cover plate on old electric lamp posts and turn the light on. Must have affected the switch inside somehow. Hours of fun. Cost to public purse? Who knows. Did we have electric street lights in 1950?Didn't know about that one though. When I was a kid we would go into peoples "bin 'oyles"looking for old newspapers with which to light fires. We made the fires on a place called the "Pit" Which was an area of ground behind Marston Radiators, Armley Rd.There's photo of the pit on Leodis. A tall chimney is being demolished in 1938. We would sit round the fire to keep warm.Mainly in Winter when it got dark early. When I got home mum would tell me off for stinking of smoke! Happy Days indeed!    

[Linky Oik]

stutterdog wrote: We would sit round the fire to keep warm.Mainly in Winter when it got dark early. When I got home mum would tell me off for stinking of smoke! Happy Days indeed!     Heh! We never tired of lighting fires and cooking spuds in the embers. One time though, things got out of hand...There was a bit of wasteground on Mushroom Street (where the Chinese Supermarket is now). So much old junk had been dumped there we could always find something to burn. One fine summer's day we found that someone had dumped thousands of copies of the Leeds Weekly News. Naturally we built a bonfire and sat back to enjoy the afternoon. Unfortunately the fire spread through papers scattered nearby and suddenly there was a conflagration across the wasteground. We desperately tried to put the fire out but it was soon obvious it was beyond us. Then we heard sirens and ran to hide in the buildings nearby. Anyhow, it seems someone must have seen us and called the fire brigade. They had the fire out in five minutes. I think it was weeks before us 10-year-olds got over the fear of a knock on the door from the cops and lengthy jail sentence.Sometimes I think about our antics and wonder how we ever survived our own recklessness.

[tilly]

When they were pulling down all the houses and a couple of shops in Pottery Fields We got into one of the shops and found a shoe box with discs the same size of an old penny in side.We went around all the chewing gum machines and the rest is history.

[jonleeds]

Linky Oik wrote: stutterdog wrote: We would sit round the fire to keep warm.Mainly in Winter when it got dark early. When I got home mum would tell me off for stinking of smoke! Happy Days indeed!     Heh! We never tired of lighting fires and cooking spuds in the embers. One time though, things got out of hand...There was a bit of wasteground on Mushroom Street (where the Chinese Supermarket is now). So much old junk had been dumped there we could always find something to burn. One fine summer's day we found that someone had dumped thousands of copies of the Leeds Weekly News. Naturally we built a bonfire and sat back to enjoy the afternoon. Unfortunately the fire spread through papers scattered nearby and suddenly there was a conflagration across the wasteground. We desperately tried to put the fire out but it was soon obvious it was beyond us. Then we heard sirens and ran to hide in the buildings nearby. Anyhow, it seems someone must have seen us and called the fire brigade. They had the fire out in five minutes. I think it was weeks before us 10-year-olds got over the fear of a knock on the door from the cops and lengthy jail sentence.Sometimes I think about our antics and wonder how we ever survived our own recklessness. Linky Oik, similar tale to yours, back in the 1980s when I was a nipper living in Morley some of the best fun we had in the summer holidays was with a box of 5p matches from Pughs newsagents in Morley Bottoms. Nothing particularly criminal mind, just making little fires in the woods and fields, we'd get polythene sheeting and wrap it round a stick, set fire to it and the molten plastic would drip off flaming little gobs which made a whizzing sound as they dripped off. Many an evening we'd return home to a bollocking from our mums for smelling of smoke. Anyway one summers afternoon we were down Station Road where a number of old mills had WW2 air raid shelters still standing. These shelters were long since derelict and were favorite dumping grounds for copies of The Midweek Extra, which was a free weekly paper based in Wakefield that was also delivered in the Morley area. As it was free nobody would really complain if it wasnt delivered so many a teenage lad would get paid for delivering it, but really either chuck them down these air raid shelters, or else trade them all in for 'once with scraps' at Whitby Fisheries / Hillycroft chippy who would use them to wrap everyones take away fish supper in. So this summer afternoon when we discovered this mountain of Midweek Extra's in the air raid shelter my friend Danny's pyromaniac tendancies got the better of him and he lit up the bone dry pile. Of course in no time at all the shelter was a raging inferno (well one end of it was) and because the air raid shelter had a front and rear entrance the blaze drew a real draught of air through which furthur increased its fury... As the inferno continued we discovered that there were also some tyres that had been dumped under papers which when ignited started billowing acrid black smoke out of the far end of the air raid shelter. By now the blaze was out of control and despite our best efforts at peeing and even spitting on it, we couldnt put it out and before long we heard the distant wailing of fire engines... Of course we scarpered to a safe distance to observe the chaos my friend had unleashed. 2 fire engines, dozens of firemen, and coppers arrived. Later on when our mums and dads smelt the all too familiar stink of smoke on our cords and tracky tops we all got a good smacking... but nobody admitted who done it - Until now! - pulvis et umbra sumus !!!

[Phallica2000]

When I was in like year 3 of primary school (1987) my friend Mark got his head stuck in the railings of Armley Clock School on Armley Road. A fire engine had to come and get his head out, I bet that was thoroughly embarrassing.

[buffaloskinner]

uncle mick wrote: buffaloskinner wrote: In my much younger days I used to listen to Radio Luxembourg on a transisitor radio under the bedcovers Could that have been Jimmy Saviles " under the bedclothes club" the mind shudders Sorry but I don’t find your post in the least bit funny and suggest if you want to make child molesting comments you find a forum that suits your humour, which is not this one.

[uncle mick]

buffaloskinner wrote: uncle mick wrote: buffaloskinner wrote: In my much younger days I used to listen to Radio Luxembourg on a transisitor radio under the bedcovers Could that have been Jimmy Saviles " under the bedclothes club" the mind shudders Sorry but I don’t find your post in the least bit funny and suggest if you want to make child molesting comments you find a forum that suits your humour, which is not this one. buffaloskinner. I apologise if you found my comments offensive as they were not meant to be as JS did have a "under the bedclothes club" on Radio Luxemburg

[buffaloskinner]

Accepted, thank you