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(Willie,
(can I ask you your name?)
My name's Willie Walker. (Tell us about the early days of Mavis Valley when you were
born, Willie?)
Well, I was born the 27th of July
1923. (What age does that make you now?)
That makes me, this July, I'll be
86 and
if you stayed in Mavis Valley you lived at the bottom of the
Row and you moved right up to the.... At the bottom of the Row there were
5 wells outside. You had a byre and
as you came into Mavis Valley there was a byre and the cows
fed on the canal bank and there was a shop there, Liddle's
and half a dozen houses and then you came up the rows and
you had 4 wells up the row and then the honeymoon building.
There was water in it and then you moved
up to the top buildings. There was water in them too you see.
And then.... (This was water inside or outside?)
Inside sculleries, what you called sculleries.
(So what did the house consist of, one room and kitchen?)
A room and kitchen, aye. They were all room and kitchens.
There were no single ends in them and I'll tell ye
when we were young we never moved out of the place. We never knew what
shoplifting was. The only thing we knew was stealing off of fruiters' carts.
(Oh that's terrible.) Ah well and this
fruiter used to come from Lambhill every Tuesday
and he used to go over to Rose Connnelly's and when he
went over to Rose Connelly's we were stealing his oranges. (Oh, who was Rose Connelly?)
She was a woman who stayed in the Valley. Her married name was
Brand but her mother died young
and she looked after the family, this Rose Connelly.
She finished up in these houses up here. See these were miners' houses.
(How many houses were in
Mavis Valley?) Oh I couldn't tell you that. I never gave
that a thought. (There were houses either side of the road, eh?)
Aye, aye. Ye had houses at either side.
(Were you allowed to play on the canal bank?)
Aye, you went along the canal bank at your own risk.
(Oh aye). And we used to play in the middle of the row.
We used to play football in the middle of the Row and if we weren't playing football we were playing at rounders
and up at the top of the Row
there was a tree with a swing in it and that's
what, ye swung off that and it swung that much that the
branch broke. But the ramblers used to come out at the weekend and play at bare footed football
in what you called the pit park.
It used to be a bing. See where the .......? riser is the now
That was a bing. (And the ramblers played football bare footed?)
Bare footed football and they used to plank their money in their boots
and the ones bigger than me used to steal their money. (Oh that's
terrible. Well stop laughing). That was the way of life
and ye never thought, ye never,
ye never... See a vet, ye never gave a vet a
thought. (No. How about the likes of your
mother's chores. How did her day or week go on?)
Well, your mother had time to sing ye
at night time. Your father
drank. They all drank.
And they used to come out, down from Quinn's
and if they weren't fighting they were singing.
And we gambled all day. (What did you gamble? What games did you gamble with?)
We played at tossing. See you couldn't get touched for tossing
pennies in... (That's tossing the pennies?) Aye. You couldn't get done
for that in Lanarkshire. (Why not?) Because
it wasn't in the laws. (Oh, right).
(What else did you do?) We used to go and steal *tatties. *POTATOES
(Oh, this is terrible.) And if,
and if the police never got you coming out the park they couldn't charge you.
But the farm up there, the hill.. (You didn't do the *tattie howkin', did you?) No, no. *POTATO PICKING
That was too hard for me but
that was how the women lived. The women went out and did the "tattie
howkin". They had a hard life of it.
but at that time it was all horses
and the old horses used to get tired and then they introduced the tractors,
steel horse you know. (And was it the women who did the "tattie howkin" mostly?) The women
did the "tattie howkin". (How about, eh
were you involved in poaching and all that, surely not?)
(Were you involved in poaching?) Och, we just used to go for rabbits and
pheasants and pheasants' eggs and duck eggs.
That was how we lived. (How did you catch the pheasants?)
Well, we used to put snares down and
feeding down, maybe raisins or that and they would eh
go and pick up the raisins and
the head would get in the snares and that was them.
(Good eating?) Good eating, best of eating. (Oh, terrible.)
(Who plucked and cleaned them? Don't tell me it was your mother?) No,
You cleaned them yourself. Same with the rabbits, aye.
(Quite expertise?) They were great eating
See when your mother put a rabbit
in the stew, see the cat, the cat used to
go daft from the smell of it.
We all had cats you know. (And did you find that
good feeding and all the rest of it?) Oh, aye aye.
You never bothered. You got a big plate of "tatties" and mince. (What, stolen
stolen potatoes?) Aye. (Poached
pheasant?) Aye. (Oh, shame on you). How? How's it a shame?
It was just the way they lived. And that's the way
the tinkers lived and all. (But it was good feeding
from the miners' point of view?) Oh, aye aye it was the best of feeding.
(How about the girls? Were they into the skipping ropes and all that kind of thing?). They were into
skipping ropes. They used to play at skipping ropes and
seemingly up here in the Hilton Terrace they
used to
play at "peevers" on the pavements and the woman below me used to come out with water and
and wash the chalk away. (And what about Mavis Valley? Were you left alone at Mavis
Valley?) Eh? (Were you left alone at Mavis Valley to play the games?)
Oh, nobody bothered us, nobody bothered us. The police never even came.
and.. (What did you think., sorry Willie, on you go).
And when one flitted, we used to play cards till
one and two in the morning, with a candle, in the old house.
(For fun?) No, we used to gamble. (Och,
stop it). Always gambled. (Poached
game, stolen potatoes and gambling?) Aye.
In fact, the farm up there, Knox of the Hilton,
he said the first two *dreells were for the Vailie ones. They would take them *ROWS
anyway. In fact
(A peace offering?) Aye.
(What cooking facilities did your mother have?)
You had, you had the hob.
What they called the hob. (A hob, what's that?) The fires.
See the fire, the open fire? (Coal fire?). Aye.
They called that the hob and the kettle sat there and
whistled till it was time for the tea.
The kettle was always full and sat on the hob.
(And there was, what, 13 of you?) Aye,
aye. (Were you Catholics? You must have been
Catholics?) No, we weren't Catholics. Our old mother had the photo of Billy in the house.
Aye, she had the photo of
Billy. But we never bothered. We played at
football. The Catholics played the Proddies and we didn't know..
We went to the Sunday school but once we were 14 you didn't go anywhere then, you know. You just lived your own life but not
them. They had to go to Lambhill to the chapel.
and them that didn't go to the chapel,
a bloke used to go round on a Sunday with the book and
get a collection for the chapel off them.
(Oh aye). But they didn't need to do it with us. We,
we wouldn't have given them anything anyway.
But (But anyway, back to your mother, your mother's role
was cooking the game and making the soup. Do you think you were well fed
then Willie? Was it?..)
Aye you were well fed. You were never starving. In fact
she made a big pot of soup. That was all you got, was
this bowl of soup. You never got any more You never got anything
else bar the bowl of soup. (Was that enough to feed, eh,
12....14?) Aye, 13.
(13, 13, sorry, aye). Aye, aye, a big pot of soup.
(So then it was a room and kitchen?) And
your teapot. When ye,
when you stayed down the Row you flung the tea leaves
out on the "sheugh", what you called the "sheugh". (No teabags?)
No. They had no teabags in those days. (Sorry, right carry on).
And they got bread out the Store.
There was no sliced bread in these days and it wasn't even wrapped.
Aye, and you never thought anything of it. A bloke would come up with the basket
full of bread and that was how you lived. In fact we had a Co-operative
and that's
where you got the pit boots and all the stuff, the tallow
for the lamps and all that. (What for the lamps Willie?) Tallow.
(Tallow, what's that?) you had a wee
In the olden days in the pit you had a wee tallow lamp.
And it had a wick and you cut the tallow up
and put it in the wee tallow lamp
and that was how you lived. And
when we went to the Balmore we had carbine lamps.
And when you ran out of water you had a *** in it. (Oh, so how was the
carbine..
it worked with water, did it? (What did you do if you ran out of water?). You pissed in
it. (Carry on). And then
maybe the wick gets trapped
and you had to blow the, put your mouth and blow
the water through to get the wick clear again, you know.
You had pickers for the wick.
That was, eh, wee
steel pickers and this big Hughie Alexander,
he used to sell them. So he says "I don't see so and so."
"So and so's
emigrated." "Oh, so and so and he owes
me tuppence for my pickers."
(This was the lamps down the pit you were using?) Aye.
The carbine lamps and the tallow lamps. (And did you have a cafe down the pit, a restaurant? How did you feed?)
You're as bad as Lady Astor. She wanted houses built down the pit.
You're as bad as her.
(Tell me how you dined down the pit? How did you eat?) We had a pit piece
(Pit piece?) Aye, and if it wasn't in a
pit box it was in papers,
brown paper and, eh,
there used to be wee *** flies.
You had no bathrooms or toilets or anything like that and if a bloke needed a ***,
he just sat at the side of the road and had one. (Right). And then you had
wee *** flies. Theyused to get into your piece and
you had to chase them before you.. (Had you an hour's tea break Willie?)
No, no, you just had about 20 minutes.
When you went down the pit you had a couple of slices of bread before you
started and maybe you worked in a wee
12 inch working. You crawled up to it and
you didn't come out of it until leaving time. (What about dinner break?)
Och, you didn't bother about it, no, and, eh,
you just lay there
till such times as it was time for going home. (You didn't leave the
coal face at all.) No, ye crept up to your work
and kind of stayed there until it was such times as it was time to go
back home but.. (And back home,
back home what about your mother? What kind of washing facilities did she
have?)
Oh, she had the wash house outside and the boiler
and the *bines. What we called the bines, *LARGE TUBS
bines, you had the
bines out at the...
The clothes came out of the boiler into the bines and then they hung them out in the
back round the.. (Oh right, so the..
Oh the bines, that was the buckets?) Aye,
that was..(Bines, they called them?) Aye they called them the bines.
(How did that all work?)
Oh, it worked all right and the bines never got touched.
They done their washing and they had their days full of washing
(Aye). They didn't... and they
used to fight with one another for whose turn it was.
for the wash house, aye. And I told you about the wee boy that
up here in 13,
up here in Hilton Terrace. These houses were
built by Carron Company, Falkirk, and whatever happened to this
Jock McCall. He got put out and they landed in Hardie's room in the
Vaillie and Hardie moved
up our side to water in the house and.he got a wee kiddy drowned in
a bine of water. The wash houses were never locked
you know, and (Sad).
It was very sad but Hardie went away back to Stirling.
(After he lost his wee one?) Aye, but Jock,
he stuck it out and when these ones flitted to
Bishopbriggs, Jock moved up to their house. Jock was the same as us.
We wouldn't move up to Bishopbriggs. (How not?)
It was too near the pubs for our fathers. We couldn't even go over here
to Jellyhill. We called that Jellyhill. That never got Hilton
Terrace. Up above Jellyhill . (Do you think drink was a good or a bad thing at the time, Willie?)
Och, it was a good thing. You didn't worry about anything of these things.
And in those days a half penny was a half penny and a
penny was a penny and a ginger* bottle was a ginger bottle. *LEMONADE
And a jelly* jar was a jelly jar. (What value were they?) *JAM
Och, they were just valued at half pennies and pennies.
all depending on the size of the... (When you returned them?) Aye
(Where did you get them?) You got them over at the coup.
You got ones flinging the
jelly jars out and you got them over at the coup.
Then you took them home and washed them and then took them
down to the shop, (Aye, good) and got sweets for them.
(And what kind of....
this gambling bit? Was there a lot of heavy gambling went on?) Oh,
aye, aye, aye. You were tossing your pennies.
(What did that involve? What does that mean?)
Tossing the pennies? (Aye). Aye, that was heads and tails,
playing at heads and tails. If it came down tails
you won. If it came down heads,
the boy that was tossing the pennies, he won. And that was how it carried on, you
know. Then you played at pontoons And up at the top
(That's gambling as well, though?) Aye, and up at the
top of the Row they used to play at Rummy.
Six card Rummy or something but everything
was for gambling. You gambled from one week's end to another.
In fact, this chap,
this chap skinned the school through the
day, and at night time
he went up and he got skinned. His mother sent
for the the police, 'cause he got skinned.
And our
gambling schools never started till after 12 o'clock.
Till the Catholics came home from the chapel. The chapel, they used to walk
from the Vaillie to Lambhill to the chapel.
And their day finished at 12
o'clock and they could do what they wanted after that. So that's when the school started.
When they came home from the chapel. (You mean by school, you mean tossing the pennies?)
Eh? (By school, you mean tossing the pennies?) Aye, and we used to go to the Shangie
School. That was a school like an old........ That was ..
"It's all right. He's interviewing me."
(We're having an interview here). "Are you famous?" (Yes, Willie is, aye).
"I'm giving him all the gossip about old Mavis Valley". (Oh, girls, you'd love it).
(But give us the gossip then, Willie, of Mavis Valley. What romance were
you involved in?)
None. (Oh, come on). No, no.
Not interested, too young.
(Nonsense). Too young. (I think you're covering up here). I'm not covering up. Don't need
to cover up. Too young, and
any romancing we did, we went to Lambhill.
Aye, that was along the bank, you know.
(Hold a minute, hold a minute Willie. Wait till I check it Willie.)
(So, from your mother's point of view she had the washing outside?)
(Were the toilets outside as well?) Closets we called them. We
didn't call them toilets. (Oh,I'm sorry, closets). Dry closets.
And the bin men used to come round...
A horse and cart used to come round and empty the *** bins,
aye, and if they weren't too careful
it went over the
top of them. And one of the easiest
half crowns I every got, they couldn't get round for
the frost and my mother says "Willie, if you empty that
bin into the midden...."
(What was this?) "If you empty that bin into the"
The *** bin. "If you empty that into the midden
I'll give you half a crown." Before you could say Jake Robertson
it was emptied into the bin. Well, a half
crown at that time was 5 pints of beer. And I mind of jumping into this car* *TRAMCAR
and I had a half crown and a penny and I thought I was giving
the conductress a penny and I gave her the half crown,
and I never got it back. (Oh, shame, shame, shame).
(That break your heart, did it?) Well
I had to walk out to Lambhill and then along home. I was heading
for.. (Did you not feel isolated there Willie, miners
in Mavis Valley Rows?) No, no we were used to it.
You were used to it. You didn't feel isolated. (How did you entertain yourself in an evening,
in the house, in the winter?) You used to play at cards with your brothers
off the wall. Dropping the
**** photos off the wall. Aye *CIGARETTE
And your mother used to sit and sing to you.
That was her way of living. And wee Johnnie
would be away getting drunk. Many a
fight in the house, too, you know. Aye, many a fight.
(What was that about?) Oh, different things, different
things. I say, we had a brother,
he stayed out our way with his two kids
and this woman's man was away in the
army, Reggie, you called him.
This brother of ours was
dingin' about her. Stayed up the Row from us and she
had a baby to him and she brought the
baby down and put it on one of our beds. The door was never
shut and one of our brothers took it back up to her. There was many a fight
in our house through that, you know. A man away in the army and her
and this brother of ours. He was a widower, you know and
he was ding dongin' about with her. In fact
they landed in those ploughmen's cottages. (So there was a bit of romance
going on?) Oh, aye, aye. (And you weren't involved?)
No, any romances we had we went away along the
bank. (Oh, I see, oh sneaky?) Aye,
sneaky, if you call it but we didn't
romance. The ones did but we didn't.
We had our own gang and we just went
down. You didn't chap the door, you just gave a whistle and they came out.
And away you went along the bank. (This was in your teens then?)
(This would be in your teens). (What about this running along the canal with the
Gypsy Queen? What was that all about?) Oh, that was just pastimes.
You'd be up the woods, swinging off the trees what you called 'Granny Save Us',
you know, swinging off the wee trees.
And you'd here the *** of the Gypsy Queen at Brassie's Brig.* BRIDGE
That used to be Brassie's.Brig down there. There was a wee shop down there
and at the back of the shop
there was a pear tree and we used to go along there at night and
steal the pears off the trees
and there you are. (You were telling us about leaving the swings when you heard the horn
blowing of The Gypsy Queen).
Aye, swinging off the trees. Calling "Save me." Swinging off the trees
up in the woods and you'd hear the horn of The Gypsy Queen
and you ran until you got up to it and sometimes you ran to Kirkintilloch
and the biggest part of it was it turned at
Kirkintilloch. Occasionally it went further on to that other bridge I was telling you
about. (Auchinstarry?). Before you come to
Auchinstarry. No I think it was by, I''m not sure whether it was
by Auchinstarry. (Craigmarloch?)
Craigmarloch, aye. (You ran to Craigmarloch?) Aye. In fact
I worked in the Dullatur.
(Go for it Willie. You got as far as,
em, what did you call it,
Craigmarloch). Aye. (That's some distance). Och
well that was nothing to us. We were young and healthy.
We lived on "tatties", stolen "tatties". (Were you wearing *gutties and sandals and all this?) No, our *SANDSHOES
bare feet. (What?) Our bare feet.
We ran in our bare feet. See when there was,
see when this weather came we never wore shoes or that.
In fact you could hardly afford a pair of gutties in those days,
they were dear to buy, you know, but we didn't,
we never wore sandshoes. In the winter time you wore those
big tackety boots. That was how we went to
the Shangie school. (With the boots?)
We were in Lanarkshire and the Shangie school was in Glasgow.
And if your father wasn't working you got authority
clothes. The tweed
trousers and jacket and
the *combinations and the stockings and the big boots. *ALL IN ONE UNDERWEAR
shod out for everybody. You never got that at the Briggs school
you see. (It would be warm though?) Och
well, we didn't bother about.. (Did you do a bit of sledging and all that in the winter months?) Aye
we had sledges. Used to go over the park with the sledge and sledge in the
pit park with the sledge and in fact
it's not everybody who had a sledge and we used to
call them trains. We would all sit at
the back of one at the top of the hill and slide down the hill.
And then there'd be a smash at the bottom and you flew out all ways,
you know and you thought nothing of it. In fact we used to play at golf over in that
park too. (You would't go on the canal when it was frozen, did you?)
Aye. In fact I used to go along the canal when I worked in
the Golshie on my bike. (On the canal?)
Aye, and the bit I was feared for was the couper.
But I'd maybe be in Mallin's
having a couple of pints and the Dutch courage,
that just let me go by
the couper. (Were you allowed on it as children?) Eh?
(As children were you allowed on it with the ice? As children were you allowed on it?)
Och aye.
You never thought much of it you know. (No, just there I suppose. Swimming in it?)
Just, just, I never swam in it but there
were ones did swim. We used to sit at the foot of a Row and
they used to go in and swim at the foot of the Row. (How about your sisters? How did they take up their
time in the....?)
Och well, they had their own way of living I suppose. At that time you'd
local couples.
"How you doing?" "Good to see you."
About 80 of us walked that bank. I'm about the only one that's left.
(Oh right you are Willie, So what do you think Willie? All's said and done,
you enjoyed life at Mavis Valley? The miners' rows, the houses were
ok or weren't ok?)
They were all right. There was nothing wrong with the houses. (What were they like in the winter months?)
It was all right
apart from the globe cracked. (What globe cracked? What was this?)
The paraffin lamp. (Oh aye). It cracked with the frost.
And that was you sitting that way but you didn't worry about it because you couldn't care less.
(Was that you left just with the firelight?)
Aye. You had a fire in the room and a
fire in the kitchen and you didn't worry about anything.
(Plenty of coal?) Aye
You went up the woods for sticks. You cut up wood,
up the woods. Ones never bought coal.
All they did was burn wood. (Aye right). I went up the
woods and got loads of sticks. (Did you not get a supply of coal?)
Eventually, when the Coal Board took over. (Aye).
Eventually, if you were a miner you got coal
but if you weren't a miner you never got coal. The
coalman used to come round, Willie Bulloch.
He used to have a horse and cart at one time and
then he got a motor but if you weren't a miner you never got
coal. (I see. I see)
You got it loose and you had to fling it in to the
cellar. Up at the top end you had a cellar but
how they lived down the way I don't know. I think they had cellars round the back.
Aye