you keep me hanging on the telephone...........

inhttp://www.samaritans.org/

Have you heard of The Samaritans?
Founded in 1953 in The East End Of London.
All major towns & cities in the U.K. have branches.Open for email;visits & telephone calls 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
I was a volunteer in Halifax for 7 years.I also helped regionally & nationally with Training.
Here is a little history behind the organization.
Non - Religious , yet initially founded by a vicar Chad Varah who was moved by the suicide of a 13 year old local girl.She had started
menstruating and, thinking she had a terminal disease ,(with nobody to talk too), she killed herself.
I met Chad a couple of times in his later years.(photo above).His simple idea of befriending filled a lonely gap in British Life.
It's not counseling.You don't talk anybody out of 'topping themself' .You just stand alongside them and (to use that awful American expression ) "Feel Their Pain" with them. Never a Judge. Never a Jury.
Because it is a non-religious outfit.And because it is totally inclusive (after some hard-nosed training *blushes*) , you get a really nice mix of volunteers to work with.
Usually , volunteers will work in pairs.Very easily you might find ,say, a 19 year old big ugly Chav  with tattoos & sweaty armpits sharing a shift with a 70 year old Hyacinth Bucket look alike in twin-set and pearls! Despair comes in all shapes and sizes and so do the friends who witness this despair.
Being a Samaritan is one of the Proudest things I have ever done.
This photo was taken in the late 1970's. A Float in the Halifax Charity Gala.  
I would love to tell you that I,m the 3rd person in the tub,under the bubbles.But,That, would be a lie...........

This is a Sepia Saturday post.

Only while writing this post, I found Here  the  contact details of The Sams in The U.S.A.

[forgive the dreadful pun in the title of this post.Forgive ,also, My posting of Debbie Harry on my (much neglected) Music Blog.]  !
Click here for a cartoon called "Watch out! Stephen Fry has joined the Samaritans!"
+Did you know that Phil Selway ,the drummer with Radiohead, is\was (?) A Samaritan?I also learned via this link that Phil Selway went to the same Teacher Training College  (C.F.Mott,Liverpool) as me!As did Julian Cope.

*Monday update: This terrible story.Politics at it's worse.The Micky Mouse Telephone helpline called "The National Bullying Helpline".Is causing a minor storm here in pre-election Britain.They claim that government staff rang their helpline claiming our Prime Minister bullies them.........which may be true\it may not.However,they broke all the rules of caller-confidentiality.As always with Politics.Dont ask "WHY" ask "WHY NOW"*

after the goldrush............................

More uploads from my family's history here.............more info shortly.........Yesterday,.I met My Brother Zyg with Cathy & my Sister-in-Law Jean at The Bear in Todmorden.We had Lunch &; he gave me several Newspaper cuttings relating to Our Family's presence in North America. (not read them yet!) +137 more photos to share including the one above..........It's kind of tricky sharing & scanning these photos as they are both small & stuck in a photo album.I dont want to damage anything so i will take my time to copy them safely........

Here are the first batch I've uploaded.Something I never knew, My Aunty Brenda was born in Canada. My Grandfather moved there in the early 1900's "looking for gold" :"goldpanning" Whatever........I will give you more detail when i understand it more myself.
I have a postcard from Canada.Later my Grandfather must have moved South, hence these photo from Saranac Lake in upstate New York. .

I have been sharing these photos on facebook with Historic Saranac Lake
Turns Out It's Not Connected with Robert Louis Stevenson.But Interesting,None The Less (just mere coincidence a Family member returned?)......
.Sorry I have been AWOL from blogging .will visit you soon!Check Out Alan's Sepia Saturday for other romps !

Lang may yir lum reek wi ither fowk's coal

click image below for biggary & detail

frús'trey-ting-lee.........if enlarged ,you can see the faint inprint of a previous letter written over the top of this Xmas card.............................

"lang may yir lum reek "or 'long may your chimney smoke'.............a shortened version of “Lang may yir lum reek wi ither fowk's coal.” ( “Long may your chimney smoke with other people's coal.” )
This is my contribution to Alan's Sepia Saturday .As i told Alan the other week in Union Cross pub in Halifax I have a big box full of old (mainly sepia) photographs I need to scan/preserve.This is one i pulled out at random.The problem with many of these photos is ,although they are connected to my family, I really do not know the detail behind them.My Mum's side of the family came from Fife & Edinburgh. One of the few things I know about what is a very complicated family tree is that I am related to Robert Louis Stevenson .
The reason it is complicated & why big chunks are unknown to me is that my maternal grandfather was married 3 times .His first 2 wives (including my grandmother) died in childbirth.He had 3 children.One to each wife.My Mum had a half-brother & a half-sister.each of who had different mothers!


Although all the 3 were reasonably close they ended up living throughout the UK.One in the Home Counties of England.One in Edinburgh & my Mum in Yorkshire..My childhood was an endless series of trips to distant half -Aunts and quarter -cousins!


Genealogy has always been an ology-too-far for me .It's just too damn complicated!My maternal grandfather died (in Malta.he was a sailor) in 1951.He kind of abandoned my Mum when she was wee.So she was never very forthcoming on him & his relationships and the finer points of family history.Added to which my Dad's Polish family was even more complicated & distant to me .Astrology has always seemed a better bet!


Anyway this is a series of photos I had passed onto me when my half-Aunt Brenda died in Edinburgh 1985.This was a Christmas Card sent from Saranac Lake in upstate New York.


My guess is it was posted around the late-1800's or very early 1900's.Another guess it was sent to a member of my extended family.Maybe the sender too was a relative? I have several other photos from North America around the same period.I have about twelve from the series.Lots of Snow!It's really frustrating because one is of The Family Dog (with HIS name written on the back).I know the name of their bloody hound but not theirs!
Finally.For This Week.Here is another photo I dug out today.Again I know little.I seem to remember my Mum saying they were Family.and the house is in The Americas.Another mystery............but please look here.You could write a whole historical tv mini-series on the basis of this one photo alone!


Sometimes Life is like getting a 1000 piece jigsaw for Christmas.Then,come January you find out that 743 bits are missing................................

POSTCRIPT: [click ]
Coincidence...............after writing the above I went to Wiki and read up on the life of Robert Louis Stevenson.Turns out he wintered in Saranac in 1887! Of Course my post is probably 99% totally unconnected with this fact..but it does make you think.................

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Imagined_Village

at last, a Protest Song about Afganistan..............

"..............Drawn from Martin Carthy's extensive repertoire, the song is a Napoleonic anti-war ballad about crippled cannon-fodder, brought bang up to date to reflect the toll paid by amputee veterans of Blair's wars..............." INDEPENDENT:

Ralph Winston Fox.

“He is ignored by the Dictionary of National Biography and Encyclopaedia Britannica. There is no portrait of him in the National Portrait Gallery. He is a man largely without honour in his native town and despite obituary notices in most of the major newspapers, and a memorial service attended by 1,500 people.............."............the only memorial to Fox which exists in Halifax is a small plaque on a bench at Bull Green – on which the date of his death is incorrectly recorded...............[from:]
n.b. The ßench is outside what used to be the main Gents Public Toilet in the town !One the other hand, the Spanish recently put up a monument to him in the town of Lopera where he was killed.Sort of proves J.C.'s point that "a prophet has no honor in his own country". ?

The Great Halifax Marxist Writer&Fighter Ralph Winston Fox. I also have a copy (somewhere!)of an unpublished dissertation I helped research 15 years ago on his Life & an out-of-print copy of one of his novels ,if you wish to borrow?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Winston_Fox
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Brigades

http://www.trotsky.org/archive/pollitt/articles/1937/fox_tribute.htm
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/SPfoxR.htm
http://www.marxists.org/archive/fox/index.htm
http://www.marx.org/archive/jackson-ta/articles/1937/fox_writings.htm

She Flew..........................

Tie two birds together.
They will not be able to fly,even though they now have four wings

[HAKIM SANAI]

My Mum Died At 7 pm Last Night.

This Is A Photo Of Her Taken By The Halifax Evening Courier in 1983.

I was quite embarrassed & puzzled about it at the time.

She had left the Budgie's cage open &;the living room window open.It had flown away......................!I really do not know what she was thinking of? She lived very near the Newspaper Building.Perhaps she hoped the bird had flown in and perched on the Editor's desk?

Anyway.She was appealing to the readers to report any sightings.

More innocent times.These day the local paper is full of Murders &;; Drugs Raids......................

6 months after this photo was taken My Dad died suddenly.............................

I have prettier photos&;stories&memories of This Beautuiful Woman...........but this story seems so poignant to me today.

Neil Young "ßirds":Performance from ßridge School ßenefit 1991.

The Sacred Poetry Of Hakim Sanai

Champion Jack Dupree

image:from


Click here to read more about The Champion.


I got a great Email yesterday From Champion Jack Duprees grandson.Just a few corrections regarding my post on October 17th 2006
Jack didnt live in Ovenden,Halifax until his death.He & his wife moved to Hanover.Divorced &
He therefore died in Germany (not Halifax as I had said).
The KKK burned alive both Jack,s parents.
The Childrens Home Jack was brought up in wasnt run by Louis Armstrong (as i said!).Rather, Louis was himself an orphan at the same place (only at a later date)
Also, The Anniversary of Jack's death is on the 21st of this month.
William Thomas Dupree was, in my 'Umble Opinion, one of the finest Bluesmen ever recorded.It is also a matter of great Pride to me that he lived part of his great life in my hometown of Halifax.
Here is The Illustrated Champion Jack Dupree Discography .
Here is Champion in His Pomp.

Regards To Cazza for the Information.

{PS the Cute Little Girl in The Photo is Georgiana.}


CHAMPION JACK DUPREE MUSIC MP3 DOWNLOADS: =http://www.mp3.com/artist/champion-jack-dupree/summary/

TrojanDownloader.Win32.Con Hook

My PC is poorly @ the moment:(
Anybody know how to get rid of Trojans?I have good security( Norton ,Macfee & the AOL stuff) but I have been invaded (i think it was something got by Chris while downloading from Limeware). I can delete it all ok.But it pops back up within the minute........................
The pc is (obviously )still working but its slow.popups etc.
Ive found a useful site majorgeeks that has lots of good freeware&shareware.Hopeful I will find the correct medicine.until then,i feel like John Cleese & his Fawlty Car!