"Oh, I do like to be beside the Seaside....
Oh, I do like to be beside the Sea. There are lots of Girls beside, that I'd like to be beside. Beside the Seaside. Beside the Sea." Reginald Dixon, all in white , rising majestically, seated at the MIghty Wurlitzer Organ from the caves below the wonderful Tower Ballroom, Blackpool to the acclaim of hundreds of couples massed there, eagerly awaiting the feast of lovely melodies that accompanied their glide across that beautiful setting.
The picture that Andy has so kindly posted above was taken on my first leave after finishing my "OPs" and the Flying Instructors' course at Lulsgate Bottom. It was taken on the Promenade at Blackpool and I was a "Sprog" F.O. in June 1944. I had over 850 hours in my Log Book; My lovely Wife was with me, my first born, Peter , was five months old, I had just celebrated my 22nd. Birthday and for the first time could reasonably look forward to a life without the dreaded "Chop", hanging over me, which was what we used to use as an euphemism for "Getting the Chop" which ,as you can see, is another one for the first. I can honestly say that the feeling of being "screened" from Operations in the dark days of Bomber Command's worst losses of 1942/3/4 must have been like the feelings of a condemned man being told that he had been reprieved.
Those thoughts were probably in my head that sunny day in Blackpool , sixty five years ago. Sometimes "Nostalgia" is a nice place to wallow in, Reg