It was Douglas who had provided moral support for Alf on that shattering day in the Golden Fleece when he had desperately, but unsuccessfully, bid for the house he had wanted so badly. Later in 1951, when Alf and Joan were drawing up plans for their new house, his professional expertise as a surveyor was greatly appreciated.
The Thirsk and Northallerton Golf Club, to which Alf and Joan belonged, was a club with a difference. Because this small, nine-hole course had been purchased by the club together with existing grazing rights, it was populated for the greater part of the year by sheep. The other animals that explored the course were dogs, and two members who made full use of this rather unusual concession were Alf and Harry Addison. In the eyes of the Golf Club Committee, Alf Wight may have been a nobody, but Harry Addison was most definitely not.
Harry Addison, our family doctor, is mentioned in the James Herriot books as ‘Dr Allinson’. He assisted at the birth of myself and Rosie, and we all looked on him as a doctor who could do no wrong. The tall, bespectacled, balding man was not only the finest player in the club but, with a strong personality that commanded respect from everyone, there were few objections to the presence of his dog on the golf course. To be able to combine dog walking with a round of golf suited Alf very well and this happy state of affairs continued for many years, but it did not last for ever. Harry Addison, having suffered a heart attack, made plans to retire to St Andrews and, at around the same time, the club committee ruled that all dog walking on the course was hitherto forbidden.
Alf was very sorry when Harry left; he used to love watching the doctor playing the game so well, marvelling at the easy swing, followed by the little white ball sailing straight and true towards the green before fizzing to a stop close to the hole. But there was another reason to rue his friend’s departure; Alf, the lowly 18-handicap golfer, having lost his powerful ally, knew there was little chance of arguing his case for the reinstatement of dog walking over the golf course. His regular golfing days were finished; when it came to a decision between walking dogs or playing golf, his loyal companions won hands down.
Looking back on those days, he realised that dogs on a golf course are not a good idea and he bore no resentment against the committee, but it was a shame that his playing days came to such an abupt end. He did at least have ten happy years playing a game that gave him enormous pleasure.
It was not only tennis and golf that soaked up Alf’s spare time, nor the hours he spent with his wife and children. He never neglected his parents in Glasgow, and continued to visit them regularly as he had done since his earliest days in Thirsk. His mother also made sure that he never forgot the city of his boyhood, posting to Thirsk a long succession of savoury parcels containing Scottish food that was not obtainable in Yorkshire – mutton pies, sliced sausage, ‘tattie scones’, and black pudding with oatmeal. Alf still retained his love of the traditional Glasgow fare, and used to fall ravenously on these delicacies after a hard day’s work around the farms.
As well as the food, his parents sent down the Sunday Post, a traditional Scottish newspaper that Alf read religiously. He enjoyed the accounts of the Scottish football matches, while the timeless cartoon antics of ‘The Broons’ or ‘Oor Wullie’ still brought many a tear of laughter to his eyes.
The short holidays in Glasgow were of great benefit to Alf. His rural surroundings in Yorkshire seemed a million miles away as he listened to the bustle of the busy streets, the cries of the street vendors, the blaring of motor horns and the almost melodious droning of the tram cars as they swayed along Sauchiehall Street and the other great thoroughfares that he knew so well.
The enjoyment of our family trips to Glasgow throughout the 1950s was frequently enhanced by the company of my father’s cousin Nan, who was also godmother to Rosie and me. Nan, daughter of Auntie Jinny Wilkins, was the cousin whom my father saw most throughout his life; she was only thirteen years older than Alf and was like an elder sister to him throughout his younger days. She was an unforgettable character in the true tradition of the Bells. Despite consuming prolific quantities of alcohol as well as smoking phenomenal numbers of cigarettes, she lived to her mid-eighties. She once told us that smoking was one of her great pleasures in life, and that she had no intention whatsoever of trying to break the habit. ‘After all,’ she said, ‘I’ve been rolling my own from the age of eleven so why stop now?’
Nan’s husband was Tony Arrowsmith, a smiling benevolent man with a small pencil moustache, who spent a large proportion of his time firing off little jokes and wisecracks. Being married to Nan, he had it made: no matter the quality of the joke, Nan would laugh uproariously. Smoking had bestowed upon Nan a sharp, rasping voice with a grating laugh which we heard incessantly on those trips to Glasgow. Tony’s wisecracks and the harsh cackles of Nan were a tonic for us all.
Apart from visits to Glasgow, Alf did not take his family on holiday until 1950 when the arrival of an assistant, together with the steady prosperity of the practice throughout the 1950s, meant that he had the time and the money to enjoy a family holiday every year.
In 1951, we had our first-ever family holiday at Robin Hood’s Bay on the Yorkshire coast where we enjoyed the company of Alex and Lynne Taylor who were living nearby at the time. Two holidays in Llandudno in North Wales, in 1952 and 1953, were followed by a trip to the Lake District in 1954. We stayed at Skelwith Bridge near Ambleside, where it rained mightily, but this did not stop Alf falling in love with the magnificent scenery of the Lakes and he returned there regularly for the rest of his life.
A visit in 1955 to Baronscourt in Northern Ireland, where Alex Taylor was then managing the Duke of Abercorn’s estate, was followed by holidays in Scotland every year for the next five years. Two of those, to Ullapool and Skye in 1958 and 1959, were made especially enjoyable by the company of Jean and Gordon Rae and their family.
Gordon, who was an expert on natural history, enriched the expeditions into the hills with his tremendous knowledge of birds and wild flowers. My father was deeply impressed. Having had a city upbringing, and knowing little about the flora and fauna of his native land, he would listen with amazement as Gordon unfailingly identified each and every tiny flower.
Gordon was a fitness fanatic. While in Ullapool, he woke us up early to run down to the pier and dive into the sea before breakfast. My father, although keen on keeping himself fit, had by now adopted a less rigorous approach to maintaining his health; with the old days of the ice-cold baths having long since been abandoned, he politely declined to join us.
In those days, Alf and Joan never considered a holiday abroad; few people did in those days. In later years they did go abroad on several occasions, but they never enjoyed holidays more than those they took with their family and friends within the shores of their own country.
Alf looked back on the 1950s as some of the happiest years of his life. The practice was doing well, he had the pleasure of spending time with his family and, in addition, he regained those youthful habits of widening his horizons. He started several hobbies, some of them seriously, others less so.
One of the more transient crazes was that of deciding to live ‘healthily’. He bought a book by Gayelord Hauser called Diet Does It, and was convinced that, should he follow the advice within its pages, he would be supremely fit for decades to come. Gayelord Hauser described four ‘superfoods’ that were to be eaten every day – foods that in those days were virtually unknown. Yoghurt, wheatgerm, vitamin yeast and Blackstrap molasses began to appear on the kitchen shelves and Alf consumed them doggedly, not always with recognisable enjoyment.