Kennedy Assassination...

Was clearing out the office yesterday, making room for some new servers so that we can be spied upon more thoroughly by our new head office and I came across a pack of five facsimile newspapers from moments in history that we'd bought from one of those annoying book club men who dump things in reception hoping that you're honest enough to buy them rather than take them home,read them and return them before he comes back to collect the money.

Who me ?
Would I do a thing like that ?
{snigger}

Anyhoo, one of the entire old newspapers in the pack is the Daily Express from Saturday Nov 23rd 1963, the day after President John Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas,and I suddenly realised why I had bought this pack of old newspapers a few years ago.

Its because I remember our mum reading from that very issue.

I was seven years old, Ned was five and as our dad worked on a Saturday we would both go and snuggle up in our parents bed after he'd gone, and I remember that morning as clear as if it were yesterday, my mum sitting up in bed, me and Ned lying alongside her, probably fighting, she's drinking a cup of tea, opens up the newspaper and starts to cry. I ask why she's crying and her only words are, "they've killed him".

Why did she say "they ?".

Even on this side of the atlantic the man was held in great affection and just eighteen years after the end of a war that had brought this country to its knees we still relied heavily upon the USA for financial backing, their problems were our problems, President Kennedy's assassination was received with just as much shock as if it had been our Queen.

And thats all I remember about it.


The rest of the Daily Express is hilarious though.

My dad used to get the paper every day and I all but learned how to read from the Daily Express but I'd forgotten all about those little two inch square adverts, all in black and white of course, that take up most of the advertising pages

Binocular vision spectacles, a must for horse racing and theatre go-ers, two and half times magnification - you know apart from the fact that they make you look like some sort of pervert I can't understand why these never took off.

Womens corsets, dozens of adverts for womens corsets with the genius of criss-cross design, keep a hand on those hips ladies - they look very comfortable too, I can't imagine why they went out of fashion, I'd wear one, my hips are way out of control now.

Raincoats, hundreds of adverts for raincoats, government surplus gaberdine raincoats, American army combat raincoats, Royal Air Force stormcoats, duffle coats, Alpine Samoraks (whatever they were).

Cosijamas, new no cord technology, no riding up no buttons, suitable for women too.

A metal ironing board which was "an ideal xmas present" (I can just imagine Suzannes reaction if I bought her an ironing board for xmas)

Shackletons High Seat chairs, no-one in the UK will need an explanation of what a Shackeltons chair is, but they also made Shackletons High Seat Comodes too, for just £5.12.6 you can have a shit while you watch tv with the family - why are these no longer available ? I may ask Shackletons, they are customers of ours.

Its full of adverts is my Daily Express, some of them so small that you'd need to buy the binocular specs first to be able to read them, I've just seen one line right at the bottom of one of the pages advertising "telescope and stand £4.4.0, free trial" they were a trusting lot in those days weren't they ?


An ironing board as a present for the wife, its got me thinking seriously now.
It would be better than the keyring I bought her one year anyway.