Fathers & Sons

History is littered with tales of fathers and sons and their quarrels. William of Normandy didn't get on too well with his sons.......especially when he came to divide his estate between them.

Henry II described his sons as a nest of vipers with much justification. The son who inherited his English kingdom was of course "Richard the Lionheart " who notoriously robbed his kingdom to finance his Crusades.

Sir Walter Raleigh is reported to have attended a sumptuous Elizabethan banquet and found himself seated some distance from his drunken son. At last, when he could bear the ill behaviour no longer, he administered a savage clout to his nearest neighbour and simultaneously commanded the neighbour to "Pass it on."

Then we come to George III who heartily disliked his son the Prince Regent. George of course messed about until he had upset the Yanks. So they buggered off and left us.

Moving a little closer to our own times, my late great friend, John Beeston of Pinnacle Farm, when musing about family relationships and closing on his sixtieth year said "To my father I am an untried youth...to my son I am a boring old fart." He went on to complain that somewhere between these opinions he had missed being an adult. Further, and even more aggravating, he had been looking forward to some of this adultery he had heard much about and damm, it had passed him by.

This just about encapsulates the relationship generated by fathers and sons.

Ups and Downs

My own relationship with my father had its ups and downs, the mistakes and corrections.
(I believe this is the current term). I suppose it began in 1942 when, leaving to be drafted into the army, he commanded me to take his place as man of the house. Quite a serious responsibility to hand to a six year old.

Later, he was very anxious that I should be properly prepared to go out into the world, so I suppose the next milestone was leaving school and starting work. I was apprenticed to him in January 1952 which, you may recall, was the time that our Queen began her reign.

I was directed to the Rookery at Worleston. It is now a rather splendid Hotel but then it was a private residence in the ownership of Ralf Midwood.

First job

Our first job was to put a new corrugated asbestos roof on one of the cow houses: but in that bitter Winter the pile of asbestos sheets were frozen together and outside in a stack.
My first job was to prise the sheets apart (with a spade) and chamfer the corners, then hand them to father as he waited upon the roof.

This was rather easier said than done for a fifteen year old with school soft hands and very little developed muscle power. It didn't take father long to see that I was not happy. After waiting rather longer than he considered necessary for a sheet to be heaved up to him he said " What's up with you ?"
I replied that I was cold
After studying me for two or three seconds he said: "The heat is in the bloody tools boy".

Apprenticeship

This more or less set the tone of my apprenticeship which was to last six more years.
I soon decided that it was not a good idea to work so closely with father but I was by now committed. Indeed I had signed an indenture. I have also noted that most certainly with the farming community this was almost a universal practice and I am sure many farmers sons have had their noses kept to the grindstone with the phrase: "All this will be thine when I have done with it."

I was once reduced to tears of laughter by a conversation I part overheard when a son of the village accidentally hit the hand of his father, whilst father held the chisel and son wielded the lump hammer.

When things had calmed a little I ask the son in private what exactly the Ayatollah had said after being on the receiving end of a lump hammer. "Well" said the son, "If you were to exclude the F word he didn't say much. In fact ,I thought he took it very well."

Further to my Apprenticeship I remember another occasion when my father arrived at the Rookery in the foulest temper. He went around the site giving almost every workman a rollicking. Eventually he arrived at my work station and his footfall sounded ominous as he crossed the yard towards me. When he rounded the corner and I saw the light of battle in his eyes I knew I was for it. "And you" he raged, "you must be full of bloody work...for I have never seen any come out".

Same age

Father decided to re-marry when he was the same age as I am now. Yes, I'm 76......I thought it demonstrated a vigorous and forward looking spirit, combined with an ambitious willingness to take a chance: coupled with his lack of expertise in the kitchen and a built in hatred of washing up.

He and the bride were very keen card players and a couple of days after the wedding father and the bride were seen visiting the Audlem Town Hall to attend a whist drive. Father was observed to be nursing what appeared to be a damaged leg and very unusually was aided by a stick.

A former colleague (who shall remain nameless) called to him across the street as follows: "How doo 'arry, 'ow did you do that, (gesturing towards the bad leg), getting it over or getting it back".

Another son of the village, observing that his parents were dressing and preparing to leave the house to attend an important function, asked his father if he may be allowed to borrow the family car to make a brief foray into the village.

Father and mother waited rather along time for the car to be brought back and ultimately espied son walking back to home. When son reached home he opened the conversation with the words:
"Oh you will laugh when I tell you...I've rolled the car and written it off"

My son

My son Steve and I were walking up Bellis's bank with a can to J&W Motors, he having run the van out of petrol. He suggest, quite spuriously I believe that I growled at him between my teeth: "I who have an aeroplane and a van, two cars a motorcycle, a JCB and a dump truck, and I am walking up Bellis's bank because you have run the bloody van out of petrol".

When we visited the States to visit him, we observed him take off in a Piper Pawnee (pulling a Banner) under some power wires, he apparently later said to his mother: "I bet my dad said "does 'e know those bloody wires are there?."" He did of course.

Then there was another son of the village who, when asked if he would care to join the RAC for motor rescue said: "No thank you I am satisfied with my membership of RUMD. The RAC man, being a little puzzled, asked what is the RUMD. "Oh!" he said, "it's Ring Up Me Dad."

When Steve first learned to fly, it presented me with perplexing problem. He had already rolled and written off the family Mini down Long Hill Lane, so confidence in his mature judgement was at a rather low ebb. There wasn't a chance in hell of my lending him my Jaguar!

But I had to think differently about the aircraft. You see, a new pilot needs to gain experience fairly rapidly, and forbidding him to borrow my aircraft was not going to serve this purpose. So I had to create an anomaly that he could use the aircraft when he wished, but I'd kill him if I caught him in my Jag. Needless to say he mainly wished to fly when I had filled the tanks...But that's what dads are for.

His apprenticeship

When he began his apprenticeship at Rolls-Royce at Crewe, his principal personal transport was a push bike. Needless to say the novelty soon wore off, he must have a motorbike.
Being the youngest of his peer group at the RR Apprentice School, he soon found his pals all arrived on motorbikes whilst he still peddled a bike.

We acquired a little motorbike and patiently went through it to check it out. I began to feel un-easy about the possibility (nay likelihood ) of him taking to the road without the vital paper work as he waited impatiently for his birthday. He needed a Provisional Licence to begin his motoring career and this time, unfortunately, coincided with a strike of the clerks in the Licence office. No Provisional licences were to be issued until the strike was over.

Cunning plan

I pondered this with an ever more rebellious son intending (I was sure) to take to the road when my back was turned. In the words of Baldrick "I conceived a cunning plan".

It came to my attention that the Isle of Man would, from the Government Office, issue a provisional driving licence to anyone who attended in person and was resident on the Island. And that an IOM licence is valid on the mainland.

So, I borrowed an IOM address from a generous friend and that was Steve's first over-water flight. We came back with a Provisional Driving Licence which might have been a smidjin un- ethical. But at the least it was legal, it worked, and he rode in triumph to work and could not be prosecuted.

There is a small post script. After a while he aspired to four wheels, which resulted in the redundancy of the little motorbike. He very carelessly stored the bike in a shed some distance from the house. This shed was not very secure and one night the back wheel of the bike disappeared for ever.

Realising that the bike was now losing value, he decided to attempt a sale, though he had not paid for the thing in the first place. Moreover, it was now incomplete. Undeterred, he placed an advert and promptly cleared off to safe distance to observe. He had of course primed his mother on the required terms of sale.

When he returned he was astonished to discover (and so was I ) that Mother had sold for the desired price and Steve was temporarily back in funds. We often suspected but were never sure that the purchaser may already have the back wheel.

Till another time.
Cheers Geoff Farr.

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