Stratford on Avon on travel itinerary
Shakespeare’s home among stops on family journey
It was autumn 1962. Peter Cape and his family — wife Barbara, and son and daughter Christopher and Stephanie — had returned to London, to their rented flat in Stoke Newington after a two-month-long trip through the British Isles visiting historic sites, artists and craftspeople and assorted lifestyles.
My father had sponsorship from the Imperial Relations Trust to do this and, as he was also a television producer with the fledgling BCNZ/ NZBC, he was training with the BBC in modern production techniques, which were at the time 20 years ahead of New Zealand. We had driven 5067 miles (8154km) in a 1948 Ford Anglia, with a cage-load of pet mice, and laden with camping equipment, which we deployed nearly every night in all manner of location and circumstance. My father kept a diary recording our exploits and it is that account I am using for this column.
I had turned 8 on the MS Oranje somewhere in the Pacific, on April 3, bound for Tahiti, Panama and Florida. We sailed into the developing Cuban missile crisis. We escaped to England, arriving in Southampton on April 29. Our road trip began on July 18, 1962, and we arrived back in London late on September 20. Life settled into a regular pattern with my father working with the BBC. I learned the art of playing conkers. There was schooling as well as trips to see such places as Oxford and Cambridge Universities, Stratford on Avon, Hampton Court Palace, Whipsnade Zoo, Brighton Pavilion, Kew Gardens. Diary entries were succinct and occasional. In late September we had driven from Gretna Green to Bampton and Gilsland, stopping at Willington where my father’s diary again takes up the narrative . . .
September 20, 1962, Thursday
Up and away by 9.30 and a fast journey to York. Photographed gates at Minster (after visiting). Had lunch and off south. Long drive on the A1. Photographed castle and barges at Newark. Barbara thinks “loose chippings” is a place – odd name – if anyone told me there was a place called Fat Bastard Charlie here I’d believe them.
South and south. Stop in layby to cook meal on primus (which doesn’t want to work) in a cold gale. (English drivers back on roads, woman tried to bully us off on a hill). Home at 11.30.
September 23, 1962, Sunday
Church
[This would probably be St Mary’s Church of England, in Stoke Newington, since I was attending St Mary’s primary school and my father was an ordained Anglican minister.]
September 24, 1962, Monday
Started attachments with BBC – saw filming for Tempo show.
[Tempo was an ITV contemporary arts magazine programme presented by the Earl of Harewood (director of the 1962 Edinburgh Arts Festival) that ran from 1961 to 1968. It was Independent Television’s answer to the BBC’s Monitor presented by Huw Wheldon screening between 1958 and 1965. Both programmes were forerunners of Aquarius and The South Bank Show.]
■ September 25, 1962, Tuesday
Local trip to Canterbury.
■ September 26, 1962, Wednesday
Shopped.
■ September 27/28, 1962 Thursday/Friday
RTV
[RTV probably refers to either BBCbased religious broadcasting, regional television or foreign television such as the Dutch RTV-7 network.] ■ September 29, 1962, Saturday
To Cambridge
[Saw Kings College Cambridge, the Chapel and Jesus College. All part of Cambridge University.]
■ October 13, 1962, Saturday
Brighton in afternoon and evening. [We visited Brighton Pier, the pavilion and the beach.]
■ October 20, 1962, Saturday
To Whipsnade Zoo. [Whipsnade Zoo was memorable for several reasons. In New Zealand, animals were exhibited in cages: concrete boxes with iron-barred open sides. At Whipsnade, enclosures were more open plan with corralled paddocks, sturdy timber fences and solidly built timber accommodation shelters. We saw tapirs, pygmy hippos, camels, flamingos, deer, wallabies and horses. One could pat a white rhinoceros through a fence and I recall seeing a wolf pack running free through pine trees.]
■ October 21, 1962, Sunday
Oxford, Stratford on Avon. [This was iconic. Home to Shakespeare and picturesque in its heritage.]
■ October 22, 1962, Monday
Shopped for duffle coat. Car costs £5 for new starter motor.
■ October 23, 1962, Tuesday
Spent day finding tunes of songs for Folksong Prog. [Programme]
[This may have been a follow-up to a Tempo performing arts episode. On October 21, ITV ran a cover story on an American Folk Blues Festival in Manchester.]
■ October 24, 1962, Wednesday
Shopped.
■ October 25, 1962, Thursday
Visited O B’s, Relg – Bcasts. [Outside Broadcasts, Religious Broadcasts].
[Songs of Praise debuted on October 1, 1961, featuring congregational church singing. It is still running and probably inspired TVNZ’s own Praise Be.
Sixty years later, on Sunday, October 31, 2021, I watched an episode of the BBC’s Songs of Praise filmed in Stratford-upon-Avon on NZ’s Shine channel. Talk about synchronicity.
The year 1962 saw the start of several iconic BBC programmes such as Z cars ( Jan 2), Steptoe and Son (June 14), The Saint (Oct 4). Coronation Street
first screened on December 9, 1960. Telstar (satellite) carried the first trans-Atlantic broadcasts from the US to London on July 11 and 23, 1962.]
■ October 26, 1962, Friday
Took potential buyers of car riding. They pay £10 deposit.
■ October 27, 1962, Saturday
Drowned 32 baby mice. Sold 23 at Shepherds Bush market.
[Flushing newborns down the loo seems harsh but we were heading to France three days later and they didn’t have passports. We took 23 to the vendor from whom we had bought our original pair. He was not amused, but begrudgingly gave us a shilling a mouse. On the international front, the Cuban missile crisis was still volatile. The US navy depth-charged Russian submarines off the coast of Cuba. Soviet sub B-59 almost launched a nuclear torpedo in retaliation. It didn’t because all three commanding officers had to agree on the action. One, Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov, refused. World War III was averted. For those of us familiar with conspiracy theories and the “Butterfly Effect” though, a question remains. Did the Cape family’s decision to drown and sell mice play a part in this global drama? Is this a story of mice and men? John Steinbeck might agree.]
■ October 30, 1962, Tuesday
Couldn’t cope with packing and got away to a very bad start, thinking that the car-ferry left Dover at 2.30. Went (unwisely) through the centre of London, and got stuck in a traffic jam.
Kent lovely, autumn colours and no time for photographs. Arrived at Dover at 2.20 to find boat left at 2.15 – had a Guinness, and discovered that I’d left the children’s overcoats behind. Did some shopping and drove 70 miles home again. Bed at 10 with alarm set at 4.
[It would be a 10-day trip through the continent. According to my father’s report to the Imperial Relations Trust, we would have just six days after returning to London to pack and catch our ship back to New Zealand on November 16. We made an early pre-dawn start. Ahead of us France, Germany and Belgium offered new colours, languages and lifestyles.]