It was 1973 and my life was starting to get better and better, I was working, I could drive, I had my motor bike and I had a steady girlfriend. We were settled in Stanley Court in Burscough and mum was working at Ormskirk Grammar school in the sixth form kitchen as cook in charge. The twins were going to the grammar school and could see mum every day if they wanted to. Heather was working in Southport at a wholesale chemists called Bells. She had fallen out with her parents over a silly argument and had come to live with us, she had to share my mum’s room. I had broached the idea of getting engaged but had not popped the question yet.
Mum and her got on really well and still do, they would go shopping together, take the train into Southport and stroll around the shops. One day they turned up at my work at lunch time and asked could they have a chat. We went out and Mum said they had been window shopping and had called in to an old friend of hers at Bobby and Ernies, this was an antique and jewellery shop in the town. Heathers said they had a gorgeous ring and would I like to come and see it. I said OK and we went and had a look. It was a really pretty ring, solitaire diamond and about a quarter carat, set in yellow gold, not new but really nice. I said I would love to buy it but I did not have any money with me. Then mum said “I still have the money you gave me to put in the bank.” What else could I say then? I bought the ring and took it back to work with me. Heather and mum carried on with their shopping. When we got home I said nothing until later in the evening when we were alone and the I gave Heather the ring. We were engaged.
We decided to start saving in earnest and not just money. Heather got boxes and started a bottom draw. She bought soap and toiletries which we put away in the loft whenever it was on special offer. She bought towels and sheets and put them away too. I decided that getting some money would be better so I changed my part time job and went working at the Bull and Dog in Burscough town in the evenings. I did evening shifts four nights a week to make money. I started to look around for a better paid full time job too. One day I saw an advert in the paper for a delivery driver for a frozen food company in Ormskirk so I applied. I got a letter back within a couple of days inviting me to go for an interview. It was with PK Frozen foods who had a shop in Ormskirk town centre and a yard off Derby Street. The building they used as a freezer had belonged to Bob Taylor the local under taker. It had been the chiller where he stored the dead bodies before it was converted to a walk in deep freeze. Peter Kenworthy was the managing director and we hit it off at once. He offered me the job straight away and I said I would have to serve a week’s notice at my present job. They were not best pleased when I said I would be leaving and tried to charge me for the driving lessons but John the foreman said they could not do that as they had offered to teach me and I had not signed to agree to any repayment if I left. I did not get a leaving card or present when it came to the next week.
Working a PK was very different, I had to load up with stock in the morning for van sales to chip shops and deliveries that were pre-ordered. It was cold and at times very uncomfortable because I was wrapped up in thermal gear and sweating but in sub zeros temperatures. I was taken out for a week by one of the other drivers to show me how it was done. It seemed straight forward until the next week when I was out on my own. On the Monday I was given a local round in Ormskirk and Southport and did quite well, I took more than the lad had done the previous week and Peter was very pleased, I was too because I was on commission as well as my wages. The Tuesday I was given the Wigan/Bolton round I had done the week before, I was doing quite well until I got out around Horwich and I got lost. I had eventually had to go and buy a map, no such thing as satnav is was A to Z or nothing. Bolton town centre was like a maze to me but I managed and everyone got all they needed, even if a few where closed after lunch when I got there. I got back to the yard at gone six o’clock but no one seemed bothered. I improved quickly and within a couple of weeks I put the maps away and was back in the yard first most days. The other drivers said not to rush round to make the job last, but I went out and canvassed shops we did not call on as I passed to increase the sales and so my earnings. When I came to take a holiday they had to split some of my rounds on to two vans as the other lads said they could not get round them all in one day.
One day I left the loading of my transit box van to the foreman while I put the rounds in order for him in the office. He came in the office and gave me the keys to the van saying it was all ready to go on the Wigan/Bolton round. I left and went out of Ormskirk up past my old school on Wigan road. As I got over the top of the hill towards Westhead I felt the back of the van swerve and start to wobble from side to side. I was doing about forty miles an hour and I tried to brake to slow the wobble down. It did not work and I was going straight for a lamp post on the other side of the road. There was no traffic coming up the hill towards me and the van swerved badly as I tried to correct the direction. The van started to roll over on to the driver’s side and the whole thing went in slow motion. It rolled over onto its side and the spare wheel which was in the cab came over towards me. My bag and all the delivery notes came flying too, I ended up sat in the seat lying on the driver’s door with everything and the spare wheel of the transit van on top of me. It slid for about fifty yards before coming to a halt right across both lanes of the road. I scrambled up from under the wheel and opened the passengers door. The driver of the car behind me had stopped and came running over. I looked about from my position balanced on the side of the cab of the van. The roof had come off the box and the load of frozen food was strewn down the road towards Skelmersdale. Sausage, chips, pies and frozen peas everywhere.
I was helped down to the road and an ambulance coming from Skelmersdale pulled up and the paramedics took me in the back to help me. I was given oxygen for the shock and they had to leave because they had a heart attack victim to deliver too. They managed to squeeze past my van and proceed to the casualty department Ormskirk General Hospital. I was taken in after the heart attack victim and given an examination. I had got away with no damage at all. I rang the office from the hospital and someone came out for me. They had already been informed by the police what had happened. A police sergeant turned up at the yard later that day after the van had been towed back. When we looked at the van the off side rear tyre had blown out as I drove along. The police said it had been overloaded on the back axle and I was to be prosecuted, the company was to be as well. Charges were eventually dropped against me because I had not supervised the loading and against the company because the load had just been thrown in and not stacked at the front as it had been before it was weighed. It taught me a lesson to always check my load before taking it out in future.
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