In addition to the pigs and poultry we also grew a lot of plants for the trade and I used
to bring up from work to these different places and get the orders and I was very interested
in pigeons so I take a couple of pigeons to work with me and put a little tiny note with
a rubber band around the leg and let the pigeon go because we had no telephony and you couldn't
get a telephone in those days so Daisy would wait for the pigeon to go in the loft sometimes
they were a bit stubborn and they took a long time to go in and remove the little note and find
out exactly what the orders were for the following day you see so that's how we worked it but in
later years we did manage to get a telephone. On a Wednesday there was the stall market which was
a very big affair and you'd have 20 coaches come up from South Wales 10 to 20 virtually every week
in the summer period and it would be absolutely buzzing during the summer they'd have what they
call a miners fortnight where they'd be on holiday and you couldn't walk to the market you'd
have if you wanted to get into high ten you'd have to walk around it was that you know my father
couldn't cut steak and chops quick enough. On hot days I will I remember people having to carry
office chairs above head height through the throng of people to get to someone who'd fainted in the
heat it was incredible you were actually I remember carrying an office chair over everyone's
shoulders you know with one hand holding on onto one leg of the chair to try and get it through to
a lady who'd fainted in the middle of the crowd it was that crowded and I remember the man who
sold the crockery do you remember his name was Walter Davis from Birmingham was he from oh sorry
from Worcester and it was the highlight of people's day to flock to her as a market to see him
throwing the dinner services in the air and catching them and banging them and telling you
how cheap you could buy it and he had a great big loud voice do you remember him Eddie. He used to
come along as well with his brother and sell the linoleum from the back of a lorry. I think he did yes.
Market traders were very special people that they have their own language and their own their own
terminology so for instance a market officer or a market inspector is known as a Toby so excuse me
make you the Toby where's your office and all that kind of thing so that was the first thing so
if they used to draw a crowd a crowd was known as an edge pulling the edge is the art of drawing
the crowd in and then twirling the edge is the art of feeling like a spinning top so you're like
spinning your story to the edge and they're gradually getting drawn in and all this kind of thing
and then the first thing they do is they do ramping now you ramping is ramping the price up so
I've got a genuine invitation a Wedgwood tea set here look at that lovely lovely markings on that
you know can you see that so this is worth in the shops you won't get this for 50 quid that's
ramping so it's putting the price artificially up and then what they do then is they start batting
and batting is batting the price back down so it's in the shops it'll be 50 quid I don't want
40 quid for it I don't want 30 quid for it I don't want 10 quid for it ladies and gentlemen it
is breaking my heart I'll give you this for a fiver if he had things there that would sell that
were cheaper that would do the same job and last as long he would he would sell that to people so
people always used to come back to him because of his knowledge and because he was just a very
honest man as such so he got to know people that way but also the other people within the
businesses I mean he would buy buy things from all the different businesses there so you know he
would go to Barons Belts and Sprockets a Carlton who worked there and buy certain bits and bobs for
his business he would go to the to the actual market itself part of our job as market inspectors
was to resolve complaints and disputes between customers and the retail traders so a customer
would come into the office and say I bought this last week and I washed it once and it's fallen
apart or it's broken or something like that so we'd have to go out to the store and mediate
between the customer and the and the trader and so we had to have some knowledge of of interpersonal
skills and sales of goods acts and all this kind of thing but lots and lots of occasions happened
one memorable occasion was a teenage girl came into the office with all her mates and said you're
the boss here are you in charge I said yes what we do for you says I got a complaint about what
are your traders I bought a skirt from him last week and it don't fit and it's horrible and I
want to give it back and I want my money back for it I said okay have you have you got the skirt
please and she said well I'm wearing it tonight it was a busy bustling market it was really packed
to traders packed of customers every Saturday I was there it was well I think the best times was
in the 90s early 90s then onwards so well up to the late 90s when the foot and mouth come in
and it really died off then
