This thread has revived a lot of very happy memories of my youth! The photos, particularly that of the concourse, and the lists of companies operating in the 60s and 70s and the airliners they used brought me back to a comfy feeling of 'modernity and progress' that has been fast-forwarded often beyond my financial means!
My earliest memory of Ringway was watching the planes through a diamond-shaped wire mesh fence with my father. I suspect this would be around 1960 or so, before the new terminal was built, and remember asking a uniformed gentleman with stripes and 'scrambled egg' on his hat if he was the 'pirate'; I don't think he appreciated that at this stage in my development I had not grasped the difference between 'pirate' and 'pilot', and he didn't deign to reply. I remember going for an orange squash in Forte's restaurant ... if I remember correctly there were maroon and cream banquette seats, something totally different to what we sat on at home.
I was fortunate to fly to Paris on an Air France Caravelle (tins of drinking water and little salt and pepper shakers on the meal tray), to Guernsey via LHR on a BEA Vanguard and Viscount, and to return to the airport around 1970 with a family member making her second flight after her first one 50 years previously! She had a wonderful time.
My school days were made far more enjoyable by being on the direct approach, watching from my dormitory window and from the prep room window and dreaming where each plane had come from rather than concentrating on the exercises set for homework. Many a time the roar from from a climbing BAC1-11 drowned out my teachers' voices and led my to dream about what would be happening aboard rather than face dull reality.
I used to walk from Cheadle Hulme to Ringway at weekends just to enjoy time in the concourse ... oh the smell of the rubber flooring and the sheer exoticism of the airline liveries and details of the departures and arrivals boards. I remember the chandeliers so well, and the travellators in the car park! One of my friends dad had a dairy farm just opposite the airport that supplied the airport with some of its milk.
All that has now gone. On the rare occasion I travel through Manchester I try to superimpose my memories on the actual facilities. No joy. The past has gone, and, I suspect, much of the romance of foreign air travel. Thank goodness that we have our memories, and a big thank you to all those who have contributed before me to this thread in helping me to relive them.