NO ONE LIKE ME

Blindfolded ness

Episode 1:

"Go on!" he invited.

"Well, what about the show Jarina?" asked my mother.

"You'll have to pay to see it when it opens next week,like everyone else," the sour gentleman informed her crushingly." And meanwhile this is a private rehearsal,so if you don't mind..."

A rehearsal on ice. A show on ice! I had never heard of an ice show before, but now the bewildering, enchanting scene before my eyes began to make sense.

Hitherto the word 'skating' to me had conjured up the familiar scene common to Christmas greetings cards. It was a thing that used to go on long ago, in some icy age when rivers froze solid,and women wore great layers of ankle - length clothing, with muffs and feather boas. Skates were long pieces of metal which curled high and ornamentally above the toe and were strapped on to the shoe. The whole business seemed so dangerous and unlikely that I had never pursued the subject beyond the Christmas card.

Thus my wide-opened eyes, unprepared mind under the impact of that first, unforgettable impression.

Upon the large, white frosted square long limbed girls in brief frilly skirts glided as gracefully as swallows. In the center a flaxen haired ballerina executed a ballet movement on the toes of her skates, and then spun like a top, her form dissapearing into a blur.

In a corner a man also spun dizzily-but with a girl swinging impossibly around his neck by the tips of her toes. Through them all, with a warming shout, swooped a red-haired daredevil. Soaring into the air like a wild eagle, he nonchalantly cleared a pile of chairs, landing in a flurry of white snow.

The awe-inspiring silence emphasized the dream-like quality of the scene, for this dating fast maneuvers produced no sound beyond the faint singing of the blades, punctuated by the occasional sharper cutting his of a skid stop.

I did not know it, but I was watching the foremost skaters of that time. Blonde Melitta Brunner, Viennese champion and runners-up to Sonja Henie. The Baron Von Petersdorrf and Erna Charlotte. Armand Perren, Len Stewart, and dainty little long-forgotten Emmie Boyd.

Red McCarthy, the mad barrel-jumper - perhaps the greatest showman of them all.

These afforded me my first glimpse of skating.

Our friend the sour commisionaire brought me back to earth. " If you really are surprised to see Mr.langdon," he was saying suspiciously, "here he comes now."

Nervously we approached the dignified, imperious, yet friendly looking man.

Langdon shook hands cordially with my mother, and regarded me with kindly interest. My mother was ever a tireless turner of stones and was unaware that she now stood before quite a rock. I suddenly heard her informing her employer: This is my daughter. She wants to go on the stage. She can do ballet dancing- can't you, Audrey?" She added, attempting to draw me into the picture.("You never speak up for yourself unless I make you," she would often complain.)

However, I only nodded dumbly. Behind me the faint tune of the singing skates made ballet dancing seem a pretty poor accomplishment.

"I suppose," ventured my mother, diffident but determined, "you could not find some opportunity for her?"

I groaned inwardly. What a daft question, I thought, to ask a man who put on ice shows.

If Claude Langdon also thought it draft he gave no indication. " I shall certainly her in mind, "he replied gravely, in his precise, old-world manner. And I suddenly felt sure that he would.

I did not know that Claude Langdon was one of the greatest promoters of public entertainment in the country, with a diversity of interests including speedway racing, boxing, plays, musicals dance halls (including the Hammersmith palais), ice rinks,and now-ice shows.

Màrina, his first large venture in ice-show entertainment, with its stirring tale of wild gypsy romance. Played to packed, spellbound houses all that summer. It was the forerunner of the great ice-entertainment boom which later swept the whole country, and it is still a legend in the skating world.

It might well be imagined that as a result of this revealing experience. I immediately altered my ambition from Going On The Stage to Going On The Ice. But even to consider attempting to emulate my gods and goddesses of the silver blades would have been sacrilege to my mind. They were strange and gifted mortals on an entirely different and far loftier plane. I was content and grateful to watch them and serve them. I ran errands for them; sewed, washed,and ironed their costumes, and dedicated myself to their needs.

If I could have seen that in little over a year's time I should whirl across the ice with the gypsies, drift with the snowflakes, and tread the stately mazurka in London before the Queen I should have died with joy.

Two events of significance to me took place towards the end of the run of Jarina.

A new skater joined the show. An exceptionally tall, dignified man. He looked quite old, I thought, probably as much as twenty-two or -three. He had a 'steady-office-job-rising-to-managerial-position-with-good-pension' appearance. I was rather scared of him, what with his height and his severe aloofness, and I always avoided him. They called him 'stanny', but his name was Jay Stanbroock.

And one of the girls from the corps de ballet dragged me on to the ice almost literally. 'I'm going to see you skate before the season finishes,' she declared, standing over me as I laced up the ill-fitting hired boots with trembling, fumbling fingers.

'I could never possibly do it- I knew I couldn't,' I protested. But I found that I could.

Episode 2: What a relief

And when one of my ice gods, Red McCarthy, kind-heartedly and with an excess of optimism, signed my autograph book 'To Jayzee, a future skating champion,my fate was sealed.

Mr Langdon saw me venturing out into the center of the ice the following day and beckoned me.

'I am very pleased to see that you are learning to skate, my dear," he said, in his kindly but authoritative way. "I am commencing a free ice-ballet training scheme in Liverpool this winter, which you may join."

My heart plummered down into my hired black skating boots. During this sojourn among skaters I had heard only too frequently of the exorbitant expense entitled in learning this art, and the thought that I should miss such an opportunity as Mr. Langdon was now offering me was quite horrible.

"B-but we live in Twickenham," I stammered frantically. "When the show finishes we shall have to go back home."

"Then you may skate free at Dinael Ice Rink." Mr. Langdon nodded abruptly and added, as he turned to go: " If you work hard, and learn to skate well enough, I shall put you in my show next summer." And the great man meticulously confirmed his offer of free admittance to the Sportsdrome, Richmond (of which, it transpired, he was the managing director), by letter, at the same time offering my mother the position of wardrobe mistress with his presentation of Jarina at Blackpool the following summer.

Jarina ended in Liverpool a few days later, in a welter of flowers, speeches, sentiment, and glory. We tied up our brown-paper parcels and returned to the Twickenham house, which seemed to have suddenly and strangely shrunk.

The Sportsdrome, Richmond, of which I had, in my cloistered earlier days, barely heard, was a fact only a couple of miles from our home. It was a very bewildered Mr. Hopkins (the rink manager) who regarded me the following morning from beneath the horn-rimmed glasses which he eternally wore draped round his forehead- for ornament apparently, for I never saw him utilize them."Hoppy" heard out my sweeping statement that I had free access to the ice and skate-hire department of the Sportsdrome for the winter season with the manager of the place, he could not see how I could have obtained such a privilege except from himself.

It was then that I dramatically produced Mr. Langdon's letter."Hoppy" read it (without the aid of the spectacles), subjected me to a further quizzical scrutiny, and abruptly capitulated, shaking his head in amazement as he retreated, and muttering something about 'creating a precedent."

Ten minutes later I swept on to the great, shining expanse of ice, elated and inspired. I was Claude Langdon's protégée. I was a future skating champion. I was, eleven minutes later, flat on my face. As I hobbled ignominiously to the ambulance room in search of sticking plaster I caught sight of Hoppy starring at me, his eyebrows thrusting his spectacles even further up his forehead in amazement at this extra-ordinary "find".

The first place to which my skates took me was - Blackpool. Now, with over a hundred miles of very varied and glamorous travel behind me, I still retain an immense admiration for this great northern playground. And not just because I love it personally.

Blackpool posseses a unique, wind-swept spaciousness, clean-lined, sweeping vistas, and yet a paradoxical homely cosiness springing from the warm hearts of the North Country folk who made it.

"But the crowds!" People argue.

Blackpool extends along the shore for nine generous miles. Forget about the "Golden Mile.". Leave Central Pier behind and go south towards the dunes. Walk out across firm, water-marked sand at low tide until you reach the silver sea a mile or more beyond. Here space is so big. Freedom so free. Here you can throw off every stitch under the warm summer sun and bathe as you were born. None more inquisitive than the seagulls or oyster-catches will surprise you.

Watch the sunsets from this same spot, with the wet sand shinning, extravagantly embossed with intricate patterns by the wind and the sea, and the great sky splashed with colours that never had a name.

Turn in the dusk,and watch, on the remote, blue-grey, flat horizon, which is punctuated only by the slender exclamation mark of the Tower, the lights come twinkling on, as though some giant's queen has split her gems along the edge of the world.

Walk back to what you wish. The large hotel;the more modest accomodation of the little home, where your landlady will be preparing your chips, peas, and parkin ("and here's a coop of tea, love, while you wait"); the romantic, sophisticated dinner- dance at the Casino, or the priceless opportunity of second childhood on the Pleasure Beach, with a hot dog in your hand and a'Kiss Me Quick' hat awry on your head.

Those who have missed Blackpool have missed a little slice of life that is not to be found anywhere else in the world.

The Blackpool Ice Drome opened in June 1937 with Jarina, and I was perhaps the proudest member of the cast.

During the winter at the Richmond Ice Rink I had learned, with the aid of skating magazines library books, and many kindly hints from the instructional staff, to skate well enough to qualify for the chorus standard of those days. For six months I had lived in the small, dedicated world of the learner, obsessed with edges, the position of the 'free' leg, 'clean' turns, superimposition, and the all- pervading importance of whether a circle was true or not

And at the end of the time I knew that I would never become a skating champion.

My sheltered, sedentary childhood,spent, without boisterous playmates, largely in day-dreaming, had left me muscularly undeveloped and entirely lacking in the natural timing essential for any sport. Yet I tried with everything I had , taking a perverted delight in painful tumbles, and exhibiting the resulting battles-scars with undue pride. My sharp, protruding hip-bones were never without an interesting colour scheme in which black and blue predominated; my pointed chin also received a fair share of decoration, my knees long despaired the comfort of skin covering; I wore plasters with the pride of medals, and on one memorable occasion I triumphantly picked up half of my right eye-tooth from the ice.

But my ballet lessons stood me in good stead. What I lacked in athletic prowess I learned to make up in Grace. Nor did theory present me with any difficulties, and the knack of being able to make others do what I was unable to do myself was later to open the door to the instructional side of the profession.

Meanwhile I faced up to my limitations, modified my extravagant ambitions, and was not only prepared to accept half a loaf but eager to enjoy even a mearge slice if it came my way.

At the end of the winter Mr. Langdon, who possessed the quality of all really great men, of remembering promises, however small, and people, however humble, paused during one of his infrequent visits to Richmond for a board meeting to watch me from the barrier. Again he summoned me with an imperious inclination of the head.

"You are getting on very well, my dear," he told me. "I shall put you in my Blackpool show this summer -on one condition. Have those little Lord Fauntleroy curls cut off immediately. You are a young lady now. Dress like one."

And with his familiar Stern nod he was gone.

I changed from Shirley Temple to Marlene Dietrich overnight, to the utter consternation of my mother and grandmother. But it did not last,of course, and by the time Mr. Langdon saw me again at the rehearsals for Jarina I had scraped off the initial heavy layers of cosmetics, found a reasonable style for my shorn locks, abandoned the dangling ear-drops and cripplingly high-heeled shoes, together with my mother's one slightly moth-eaten fur, and generally simmered down into a fairly presentable happy medium.

The smart, modern, new Blackpool Ice Drome, still smelling of paint and fresh wood, was packed for the opening night.

The curtain went up on many of my ice gods of the previous summer and this time I was there on the ice with them. I was a part, however small, of this wonderful show. It took some believing.

But the applause at the final curtain was solid and real enough. Once again the romance of the gypsy chief and the princess had won the unpredictable heart of the public.

Jay also turned up here again, now re-cast in the eminently suitable, dignified role of 'princes Jarina's' father.

This earned him a new nickname, 'The Dook', and made him seem to me more unaproachable than ever.

Yet, strangely enough, I was not undully afraid of the combined producer, musical director, and choreographer, Belgian Ray Goderé, the 'grand old man', of ice shows, who, with his threatening fist, ferociously bristling white moustache, and snake-like hissing from the orchestra balcony at any who erred on the ice below, struck terror into many a braver soul than I.

He always referred to me as 'de skeeny one' .I was still far too thin,and many were the times when 'old man' would roar, during rehearsals:

'Hey,you-de skeeny one. You are not in line - isn't it?-vis de girl in de front.'

Obediently I would shuffle one way or the other, only for him to discover that owning to the fact that I was usually half the width of the hefty athletic wench before me there was a considerable margin of error, and if I was in line on one side of me I could not possibly on the other.

"Is a problem,"he would say, shaking his lion's mane of white hair. isn't it?"

But in spite of their awe of him the girls of the Jarina ballet were a high - spirited lot,and would often liven dull matinées with very naughty pranks. Such as the time they went on for the gypsy scene with large Jaffa oranges bouncing coyly in the blouses which pro-truded above their black velvet corselets. settling picturesquely around the camp- fire they then cheerfully proceeded to devour the fruit and make"orange peel " teeth with the skins. I really thought the 'old man' would fall off the balcony with rage, and he called rehearsals at 8 a.m. for a week after that. But it was no punishment to me, for at that stage I adored rehearsals.

Episode 3: Done deal

I was earning £5 per week in the chorus of Jarina, which was less than the older, more experienced skaters were getting. Halfway through the season Mr. Langdon troubled to seek me out and, in his now familiar Stern but fatherly manner, told me that he was pleased with my efforts and would raise my salary to £4 ¹⁰s. That was a princely sum in those days, and more than my mother and grandmother had earned regularly between them in Twickenham. So I had just reason to feel I was the cat's whiskers as I pooled this weekly amount in the kitty already containing my mother's considerably healthier income from her new duties.

By the end of the summer we know that Jarina was to go from Blackpool to the Empress Hall, London. And before the closing night my head was further inflated by the receipt of a London contract at the colossal salary of £7 per week.

Jarina in London was a grander, more elaborate, vaster affair than the preceding presentations.The cast was treble and fabulous new costumes were made for us. It was a great success, of course. And on the day when Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth - now the Queen mother - honoured Empress Hall with her presence, no 'Cinderella' could have been more thrilled than I was.

Now another famous showman came into the picture. Tom Arnold presented the first touring ice show with a portable ice tank which could be laid on the stages of real theatres. Ice could be produced in thirty - six hours.

At the end conclusion of Jarina in London I was among those chosen for this tour, and so at last I performed before the footlights of real theatres.

The tour, winter sports, starring Hope Taylor, lasted eighteen months, and, in spite of my 'skeeny' legs, I had the gratifying experience of seeing my photograph outside theatres, in programmes and newspapers all over the country. And at stage doors, together with my fellow chorines, I patronizingly signed countless small children's grubby autograph books.

I was the poor little girl who had made good. Well, good enough, anyway. Nothing, it seemed, could go wrong.

We were actually on the train en route from Ayr to our next date, paisley, when war was declared, and when the train arrived in Glasgow the company disembarked and promptly scattered like autumn leaves before a gale, leaving a frantic and scarlet- faced company manager alone on the platform yelling:

"Hey, wait a minute! You can't do that!"

But he was too late , they had already done it.

And so my family and I were left in no doubt at all that the show had broken up. Not knowing quite what else to do we took the next train for blacked - out London, whence quite a lot of other folk seemed to be fleeing.

I don't quite know what any of us expected, yet I have to confess that, as I entered the old- fashioned Twickenham house, and found myself once more behind the lace curtains, my main thought was a completely selfish one:

"Well, 'Cinderella,' twelve o'clock! That's your lot!

DURING those first strange, tense months of the war, while my mother and grandmother returned wearily to their sewing- machines, I hung around the Richmond Ice Rink, literally, aimlessly, wondering as so many did, just what the future held.

In March 1940 however, I had a letter asking me to go at once to Empress Hall, Earls court, where, in the midst of absolute confusion, poor old Ray Godoré was attempting to organize a very large show for Claude Langdon in aid of a war- time charity.

Perhaps that show, thrown together, lasting only a very short time, and now scarcely remembered, was one of the greatest ice shows ever.

For that particular occasion the National Skating Association of Great Britain waived their hitherto strict rule regarding the combined appearances of amateurs and professionals, in view of the charitable aims of the show, and the greatest skaters of that time converged upon Empress Hall, each making their contribution, mostly without pay, to this first skating war- effort.

Headed by World Champion Cecilia Holledge the line of finale stars and principals stretched shoulder to shoulder clear across the Empress Hall arena when we finally stood for 'The King ' , bright - eyed, over - emotional, and quite carried away with the thought that we were 'doing something '.

To my delight I was again chosen for the Blackpool summer company, and in due course we commenced rehearsals at Richmond under the eagle eye of Eve Brad field , who had been responsible for the choreography of Winter sports, and under whose meticulous discipline I greatly enjoyed working.

With the carefree unconcern of youth, and my complete absorption in the sparkling life of ice- show business. I did not assimilate or appreciate the immensity of the catastrophic upheavals which were taking place in the world beyond the ice Rink. People looked very grave and a little scared when the news came through that france had capitulated, but the thing still did not strike me fully or personally until Mr. Langdon entered in the middle of the rehearsal and, looking more stern,more serious, than I had ever seen him look before, beckoned the company to gather round him at the barrier.

'Young ladies and gentlemen,'he said, and his voice was very sad. 'You have heard the dreadful news. Under the circumstances I feel that I cannot continue with my plans for this show or for any further ice shows. I am very, very sorry.'

After the company had broken up, those of us who lived near Richmond continued to skate every day, endeavouring to grab every moment on ice, expecting at any time to find that the Richmond rink too had closed its doors.

One by one the boys who had skated with us so gaily departed, waving their 'papers' with a casual 'Cheerio'- some never to skate again. Foreign skaters with whom we had worked and made good friends, and whose interest in politics was less than my non- existence own, were interned for the duration.

Then one day, as I was half - heartedly practising spins in the center of the ice, I glimpsed an excited figure by the barrier. It was Betty Donolan, Mr. Langdon's secretary, frantically waving a contract.

"Can you go to Blackpool - tomorrow?" she gabbled. "Mr. Leonard Thompson has decided to put a show on there himself."

Could I go ? just try to stop me !

Blackpool without lights! with camouflaged planes lying tensely at the squares Gate aerodrome. With ugly iron girders stuck gauntly over the great strand against against possible invasion. With sinister pill boxes perched on the golden dunes that had hitherto known only picnics, wild flowers, and lovers. With the pleasure Beach turned into a parade ground, and pathetic little bands of men still in civvy clothes, gas- masks slung in cardboard boxes over their shoulders, drilling awkwardly to the sergeant's bellow. with bewildered Civil servants suddenly evacuated from orderly London offices to hastily adapted hotels. With Mr. Leornad Thompson, owner of the Ice Drome and pleasure Beach, traveling to his palatial offices in the Casino perched precariously on a very tall bicycle.

Blackpool, with the motley, the paint, and the powder laid aside for the duration, showing in true colours: warm- hearted, welcoming, determined, defiant. Giving everything that it had to give. The playground where Britain now came to learn how to make war, or to lick its wounds, or just to have a breather, returning rested and strengthen, ready for the fight.

During that summer show, ice Parade of ¹⁹⁴⁰, I was also given the opportunity of joining the permanent instructional staff of the Ice Drome, a chance which I jumped at

So with almost every other rink in the country closed down, and no other ice show presented in Britain for the whole of the duration, I ended with the best of both these frozen worlds: a permanent teaching job and a five months' show every summer.

Yet strangely enough it was in Blackpool, away from hostilities, that war and what it meant finally finally came home to me.

There were many world- renowned skaters who donned their blades for the last time at the Ice Drome, wearing brand- new uniforms. Freddie Tomlins. Hope Braine, Harold Tarrant. Walter Gregory. All destined to make the supreme sacrifice.

There were the boys whom we dated and promised to write to who didn't live long enough to receive the letters.

We went to dances at the R.A.F. convalescent home, where men with haunted young faces tried to beat pain and sickness and God knows what memories. There was a baby- faced pilot who hopped gamely through a whole conga on his remaining leg, and then apologized for having to sit the next dance out. "Sit on my knee," he said. "It doesn't hurt a bit now." And I suddenly became aware that he was beating time to the music with a foot that wasn't there. I remember the firework displays across the dark night sea which indicated that Barrow was coping it. The faint rumble in the earth which meant Brighton was having a packet. The odd bombs which dropped on Blackpool like a spiteful sample, wiping out two 'sand- grown' families.

Compared with the rest of the world the horror which reached us was little, but it was profoundly shocking in a place meant for fun and laughter.

Though I didn't want to leave my dear, adopted home town, the gay flat which I shared with my mother and grandmother, and my beloved profession, I began to feel guilty. To feel that I too should 'do something.'

When I took my A.T.S. medical I was amazed and shattered to find that I was rated physically unfit for any kind of war work. And at a time when the catch- phrase ran:' If your body's warm you're in.' Apparently I had been a hyperthyroid case all my life. No wonder I was not the stuff of which champions are made.

So, feeling extremely inadequate, I was forced to content myself with fire - watching, knitting endless balaclava helmets and khaki gloves, and writing innumerable pep- letters to any boys I knew over seas.

I was still emotionally retarded, and at twenty- one had reached the adolescent stage which I should have long left behind. Emancipation went to my head. I just couldn't be blase enough. I bleached my hair bright yellow and wore it in a thick page -boy bob on my shoulders after the fashion of those times. I smoked, drank far more than was good for me, had a boy - friend for each day of the week, told risque stories, and gloried in my own daring.

Ice Drome life was busy, but I loved every minute of it.

Swiss Armand Perren, trainer of Jeannette Altwegg( who became the first British skater to win the Olympic title, and was later awarded the M.B.E.), was the senior instructor at the Ice Drome, and star of the Blackpool Ice parades for many years.He was wonderful fun to work with his giant English;his childish temperatures during a performance (' I don't going on again. They play my music no good. I keel that M.D.'); his conviction that his quick anger was far more deadly than it ever was. ( ' Never I carry a knife, or one day I would keel someone.')

Armand had also been in Jarina, and in fact was one of the skaters I had seen practicing on that memorable day when I first walked into Brighton Ice Stadium. perhaps because he remembered that scared, skinny kid, he took a special, kindly interest in my Skating. In his spare time he coached me, without payment, for N.S.A. medals. He always said:

' I tell you in ten minutes what my pupils pay me for one whole hour to hear. You write it down queek, so you don't forget.'

And on the hushed, ghastly hour of the test, when the virgin sheet of high - gloss ice threw every double track you had made into screaming relief, and the spectators had frozen into a silence deeper than that beyond the grave, and the duffel- coated, red - nosed, grim judges were slithering sinisterly across the surface in their fur - lined boots, converging stealthily, mercilessly, on your poor, cowering tracing, it was that moment in which, learning over the barrier, Armand would offer much - needed encouragement. His great eyes rolling fiercely, his voice echoing loud and hollow round the tense drome, he would snarl: "When you don't pass I keel you.'

But am still alive.

Year by year the male cast dwindled, and then the girls too started vanishing into the maws of factories and Services, so that eventually Mr. Thompson, enquiring if I should continue to remain free and hearing that I would, remarked: 'If the war goes on much longer you will end up the leading lady. There won't be anyone else left.'

I thought he laughed much too heartily at the idea.