Blackpool Promenade Unveiled

Finally we get to see the new Promenade in its entirety this year after all the work on the sea defences. The final section up past the Tower and towards the North Pier has now been completed and the railings removed.

I am impressed. I went down on Saturday morning, just before high tide, hoping for a spectacular sea as I have a particular photograph I need to take for a project. I was to be disappointed in that. One by the sea itself not being quite as high as I'd hoped. Then by the fact that the Central Pier is now closed to walkers from the very front of the pier. At one time in the off season you could walk up the sides and around the back of the arcade building and the pier was closed from that point.

As I crossed the road, the sun came out, leaving me in the shadow of the Golden Mile buildings but lighting up the Tower and the horizon.

There are some new sculpture features on the Central Promenade in the shape of several huge swaying "tulips". Those long stems are flexible enough to allow the heads to sail across the sky, quite a sight if you stand beneath them and look up! You find yourself looking at the slender stalks and wondering about their strength!

And there's grass. I wonder how long it will remain green because if there's one thing the new "Spanish Steps" that replaced the old sea wall will not do, it is stop the sand being blown off the beach onto and over the Promenade. Close to, the grassed areas are sand with grass sticking up through it. Green when viewed from the side, sand coloured when viewed from above. I think the Council's workmen will have their work cut out to keep those areas green, but I hope they do. Grass and a touch of something natural rather than man-made has long been missing from Blackpool's sea front.

In the distance is the new Wedding Chapel with its distinctive shape and single window that, from within, frames the Tower for those witnessing a marriage.

This is one corner of the new Comedy Carpet. A huge expanse of ground set out in columns almost like a newspaper layout except that alternate columns face north or south, allowing people to zig-zag up and down, reading catch-phrases, one-liners, jokes and sketch scripts of comedians from the days of Music Hall and Variety all the way through to the present day. You can find all of Britain's comedy greats here from the Crazy Gang, to The Office with many forgotten snippets of shows, bits of business between double act partners and the words to both Charles Penrose's Laughing Policeman and Morecambe and Wise's Bring Me Sunshine.

It was deserted almost as I walked up and down and I only saw a fraction of it in the time I had. I've been told it is wonderful to look at when there are a lot of people there because all you can hear is the sound of laughter and chuckling. Priceless.

Return to Blackpool Promenade and Beach Index Page

Garstang Arts & Music Festival Part 2

Another day another gig!

We were back in Garstang today for our second spot at the festival. It was a busier day than Saturday and lots of people stayed for the entire afternoon. A few friends came to see us too. Old friends and brand new friends - it was nice to see John and Sue who we met on the cruise last week!

A few friends from Garstang Musical Productions (they used to be GLOG - Garstang Light Opera Group) came and Shelagh and Janet joined us for a couple of numbers. Apparently a Google search for GLOG finds my pages more than it did the light opera group - so now I've laid claim to the new name as well! Heh heh!

It was a great afternoon of music and some gentle comedy as David and I ribbed each other or told a few jokes.

The Mayor and Mayoress came for a word and a listen and the weather stayed just about fine until it was so close to our scheduled finish time that it made next to no difference. A couple of hours later though, the sky dropped so much water I think someone had scooped the sea up and thrown it! An excellent weekend in Garstang and great to see young folk dancing away to some of the 60s music!

Veteran Vintage Car Run to Blackpool 1985

Came across these on my way to the scanner today! The photos date from Summer 1985 and show the Veteran and Vintage Car Run from Manchester (I think!) to Blackpool.

The cars used to drive down Middle Walk on the North Promenade. In later years they parked at the Norbreck Hydro and the Promenade road was the best place to photograph them going by.

This particular year we saw comedian Les Dawson in the passenger seat of one of the cars, looking like he was enjoying himself, as well he might in this old Rolls Royce!

Return to Blackpool Attractions Index Page

Dailey and Wayne [2]

And I've got the spelling right this time too!

I mentioned the 1960s-70s comedy duo Dailey and Wayne quite a while ago after a relative of Billy Wayne sent me a signed photograph of the pair.

Recently Dinah, the daughter of Pat Dailey has been in touch, leaving a number of comments on the post linked above, but she was also kind enough to send me some fabulous memorabilia on the act some of which I reproduce here with her permission.

Having been brought up in a time when Variety was one of the major types of entertainment, both in live theatre and on television, it always seems a shame to me that some of the great acts I remember - even if only vaguely - are never seen or heard about. Variety now seems to mean half entertainment and half showing people on television solely so we can laugh at their naivety and lack of sense of reality on shows like The X-Factor. It's a cross between the exploitation of the likes of the Jeremy Kyle show and Variety.



Some of the posters and programme covers Dinah sent were from shows that my parents had taken us to see, such as the one above right, which starred The Shadows at the ABC Theatre in Great Yarmouth in 1964.



I have a feeling we saw the Val Doonican show at Great Yarmouth too and I remembered with great fondness another show Dinah mentioned - that at the ABC Theatre in Blackpool in 1963 following the theatre's refurbishment and renaming with Cliff Richard as the headlining act. We must have seen that show at least three times that year with various female members of the family swooning...

Pat Dailey is involved in a new website that is currently in development and he and Dinah are involved in charity shows to give artists the experience of some professional productions and a chance to appear at no less than the ultimate starred place on any Variety map - The London Palladium.

So is there any chance of meeting up with Pat and Dinah and having a chat with someone who gave me so much laughter during my childhood that I can remember their names with great affection, even without remembering details of the act? Oh, I do hope so! And dare I wonder whether the world is ready for the band to tread the boards at The Palladium? All will be revealed...

Dailey & Wayne

Quite a while ago, before I started the blog that you are reading, I put up a series of web pages about nostalgia.

They contain my own personal memories of the 1950s and 1960s rather than being another news archive but in one of them where I am recalling theatre and variety acts, I mentioned a comedy duo named Dailey & Wayne, who I remembered seeing in variety shows in Blackpool.

I'd searched the Internet and found nothing about them and so I suppose anyone else searching for them would have eventually found my page listed on Google.

And so I got an email from Claire, who's Dad's cousin was Billy Wayne. I replied asking her if she had a photo of the act as I'd found it impossible to find any and she promised to try to find one. She also mentioned the sad news that Billy had passed on some years ago.

Anyway she was as good as her word and the other day this autographed photo arrived and is now, as far as I know, at time of writing, the only photograph of Dailey & Wayne on the web!

Trevor Payne's "That'll Be The Day"

Last night Fran and I went with David and Jeannie to see "That'll Be The Day", a rock and roll extravaganza of a show at the Blackpool Grand Theatre.

Incredibly this superb show has been running 21 years - and it's that long since I first saw it! Personnel have come and gone but there are still a core of the original cast and the new version of the show now heads all the way from 1956 into the 1990s.

It includes hits from every decade in between those dates and a hefty helping of comedy too - ah yes... and Andy Pandy is back!!! If it comes anywhere near you, don't miss it!