[jamesicus]

Wartime Blackpool ..........

The last time I was in Blackpool before the war broke out was when my father took me to watch a cricket match -- Australia vs An England XI, on 1 September 1938 -- more about that in a later posting. We went to visit my father's uncle in Weybridge/Kingston-on-Thames (?), Surrey, for our holiday in 1938 (?) -- my first visit to London.

When I next went to Blackpool, in July 1940 with my mother, (my father couldn't go due to his essential war production job and his Home Guard commitments) things had changed dramatically. The Tower lift was closed and the prewar nighttime gaiety was subdued by the blackout (the illuminations were suspended for the duration). Sections of the promenade were roped off by the military so that recruits could be drilled in marching -- you sometimes had to thread your way through formations to get to the sands.

A real shocker for me was no Blackpool rock! -- sugar was heavily rationed in the early years of the war. The colorful shops, stalls, exhibitions, etc., along the front were not as numerous as prewar. Pleasure Beach was only a shadow of its former self at night -- no lights!

However, wartime Blackpool was still a fun place with lots of great entertainment. Big band swing (Joe Loss, Teddy Foster, Ted Heath, et al.) was featured at the Tower Ballroom and Winter Gardens and there were plenty of variety shows -- now usually with patriotic themes, for pride in country was very high at this time.

Unlike the beaches in southern England where there was a great fear of invasion, the Blackpool beach was not guarded with barbed wire as far as I can remember (but I have since read elsewhere that it was).

The biggest wartime excitement I can remember at Blackpool was when American airmen arrived for flight training at a nearby facility in 1943. Things really livened up! Yanks were everywhere, especially at night at the Tower Ballroom and Winter Gardens. It was rumored that Capt. Clark Gable was here for flight training and quartered in a promenade hotel.

I recall a tragedy at Blackpool during the war when a two Briitish aircraft collided in mid-air over Central Blackpool and one crashed through the roof of the Central Railway Station. I believe the pilots were killed. However, I cannot find an official record of this event.