mother – Page 2 – My Dad's Photos

Crunch…

28/08/201012/04/2020 By shendy1 Comment

This will have been painful for my mother (at the back, in the duffel coat) - she's a huge fan of Ferraris, and this is one that's had a bit of a ding. It's a Ferrari 250 GTO, at the International Trophy meeting at Silverstone in 1963....

Honeymoon

28/08/201012/04/2020 By shendyNo Comments

Marriage put an end to the petrolhead holidays in France, but in June 1963, the parents went to France on their honeymoon, ambling around the Alps and the Loire. When the French say "chausee deformee", they really mean it! La Grave. The parents stayed here for a few days, SWMBO and myself went a couple of times in the early 2000s, and in 2008, the whole family went back (see previous posting). Looking at this photo now, we reckon that the low building is the restaurant for La Meijette, the hotel we stayed at in 2008. It looks like my parents stayed back up the road, possibly in the Hotel des Alpes. This is down in the valley, by the Romanche river. I've been down to the same spot myself, and that water is bloody cold! While my parents were in La Grave, the Alpine Rally "just happened" to pass through town. Hmmm, coincidence or planned? We shall never know. And from the Loire, Azay-le-Rideau....

Domesticities

28/08/201012/04/2020 By shendyNo Comments

March 1963, and what I suppose is a tolerably important landmark in several people's lives - including me. "Do you, John Cristopher Hendy, take..." Yep, the parents got married. I've never seen any wedding photos, and there are only a few from what appears to be a very small reception at the Green Man pub near Silverstone. I imagine this is because my father was otherwise occupied on the day. The Green Man is/was a long time favoured haunt of racing drivers for decades. Now, a racing driver's pub near Silverstone - I wonder how that managed to get chosen for the reception? It's got a modern Premier Inn tacked onto it now, although it burned down just before the British Grand Prix this summer. Mother, on her wedding day... This is probably a unique photo - my father's mother and my mother's father. He was proper Northampton shoe industry working-class. She wasn't. The rest of my mother's family - twin brother, mother and younger sister...

What the…

28/08/201008/04/2015 By shendyNo Comments

There's nothing particularly startling about this photo, apart from the fact that it's my mother looking very stern and HOLDING A GUN! It's apparently a rehearsal for a play called The Chinese Bungalow....

Very important photos

06/03/201012/04/2020 By shendy1 Comment

I can't overstate how important these photos are. Having moved to Northampton for his job, my father carried on with the amateur dramatics thing, joining the Masque Theatre in 1960 (we actually have the letter confirming his membership). He remained a member for the rest of his life, sometimes acting, sometimes helping backstage, and taking photos of many, many productions - I totted up and something like 300 of the 850 b&w films are of Masque productions. I don't propose to scan many of these, but will probably hand them over to the Masque archive. Anyway, the young lady in these pictures, Greta, was stage managing this production (The Entertainer in 1961), and I think he took a bit of a liking to her - rather a lot of a liking in fact. A sort of married for 45 years with two children liking... Yep, say hello to my mother. You know the membership letter I mentioned above? She signed it. The chap in the...