Of Sweets, Cinemas, and Leo, Entrepreneur of Heeley Bottom

     I believe the last ration coupons to go (the last to affect me, at least) were for sugar and sweets. By that time, my friends and I were allowed to go to the cinema, without adult accompaniment, provided we could get to the first house, which started at 6, finished before 8, giving us ample time to be home by 8.15. Our way to the cinema took us by a house window shop, a confectioner’s. On the day sweets came off ration, we had each been given the 6d admission, plus 3d to spend on sweets, by way of a celebration.

Sweet Shop

     We went in the shop, and asked again- ‘Is it right? We can buy sweets without coupons?’ We were assured it was so, by the shopkeeper who was probably feeling confident of a bob or two’s worth of trade from this grubby but enthusiastic crew. We looked round and round, considering all the possibilities. The whole 3d on one purchase  would buy a small (2oz) chocolate bar- Fry’s plain and milk chocolate sandwich, or Fry’s ‘5 Boys’- the best chocolate ever. There was a soft caramel filled bar, a bar filled with mint cream, and Cadbury’s Milk Tray, in its original form of 6 individual chocolates set in one block. Or that might have been Caley’s. Or 3d would buy 2oz of almost anything loose- dolly mixtures, jelly babies, liquorice allsorts, chocolate éclairs, sherbet lemons, pear drops, coconut mushrooms, wine gums. The shopkeeper even offered to weigh out two separate ounces for the 3d purchase. We were in a paroxysm of indecision. Eventually, realising we were getting tight for time, we left the shop without spending a penny piece between us. We were stunned by the complete freedom of choice.  We just couldn’t decide, perhaps because, to choose one or even the two separate ounce option, would mean leaving all the other choices behind. Whereas by not buying anything, the whole shopful of sweets remained available to us, and we could still have whatever we wanted.
     The furthest flung cinema that we could reach, by our license to roam, was the Heeley Coliseum. Such was the scale of the place that, with the introduction of wide screen films, they had to rig a rising blind to winch up over the lower portion of the screen, to achieve the desired proportions.

Leo

     They did have a commissionaire, though, resplendent in brown, double-breasted great-coat, with yellow piping and braiding, and matching peaked cap. He rather spoiled the effect, with his black and yellow woolly scarf, wrapped tight round his neck, like a surgical collar. The face above it was long, sallow, a horse-face, and under the cap was a full head of unruly, staring, coarse, black hair. I am slightly tempted to say it was cut ‘en brosse’ but ‘en lavatory brush’ would have been closer the truth. His name was Leo. Us kids all new him well, not only from the Coliseum, but from the public swimming baths in Broadfield Road, where his day job was life guard/ bouncer. In both capacities, we kids ran him ragged because, in spite of his sour face and surly manner, we knew that in truth he was just a great big pussycat, and we loved him.

     Over 20yrs later, when I was designing for a shop-fitting company, in the same area, my working day usually started at 8am, seeing the men off to various sites, from the firm’s yard, then I’d nip into the local Greasy Spoon for coffee and a bacon sandwich, before going back to the office in time for the phone to wake up, about nine. Another regular customer in the caff was Leo. In 20yrs he hadn’t changed a hair. Though the Coliseum was just a memory, he was still bouncing, at the swimming baths, and he had worked up a window-cleaning round, around the shops, along Heeley Bottom, just to bring in a bit of change.
     In conversation, one day, he related an interesting little nugget from his childhood. I already knew of the Sheffield family grocery company, Arthur Davey & Sons, with their town centre grocers’ shop, where the coffee roaster sat in the window, like a huge silver tumble dryer, and filled Fargate with the tantalising aroma of roasting coffee beans. I also knew of their large bakery, on the end of Paternoster Row, opposite the L.M.S. railway station. And I knew that, not only did they bake bread there, which Jane and I used to buy, hot from the oven, at the ‘factory gate’, but they also produced savoury pies, cooked meats, sausages, bacon, cured hams, pork pies, pigs trotters, brawn, saveloys, even calves’ foot jelly.
     What I didn’t know, was that when Leo was a boy, all this meat went into the bakery on the hoof, and was lodged in stabling, in the basement, until called up to the abattoir, then up again, to the roasting tins and the pastry cases. Leo could tell me this because he reckoned that as a boy, on Christmas morning, before he had any thoughts of jolifickating, he had to go into Davey’s basement to feed and water all the animals. It was his Dad’s job, normally, but the old man used to allow himself a bender on Christmas eve- only the one night of the year- so he always reneged the next morning, and delegated the job to young Leo.
     Now there’s another story you can believe or not. I fear it’s probably too late to check with Leo. I merely pass it on.