How to order
By Post: Mail to Lynn Davidson, The Memoir Club, 34 Lynwood Way, South Shields, Tyne & Wear, NE34 8DB cheque payable to Lynn Davidson.
Cheque payable to Lynn Davidson
By Email memoirclub@msn.com OR mOBILE 0755 2086888
By bank transfer: Lynn Davidson, Barclays, 20 83 69 83948145
Elizabeth Watson is
eighteen and from North Shields, a small fishing town in the North East of
England she moves to work in Yorkshire during the Second World War.
It is whilst working as a telecommunications operator that she meets Buzz Beurling, a tall handsome Canadian Spitfire Squadron Leader. She falls madly in love with him. Buzz is sent on a dangerous mission and his plane is shot down. Is he alive or dead? Elizabeth doesn’t know. After six months of receiving no news, Elizabeth is resigned to thinking the latter.
She returns home and it is there that she meets Charlie Millsap a shipyard welder and pigeon fancier. Elizabeth finds herself in a convenient relationship with a man she doesn’t love. She is forced to marry Charlie when her staunch catholic parents discover she is pregnant. Elizabeth enters a loveless marriage only on the condition that she makes all the decisions.
Elizabeth is determined to give her daughter Laura everything that she never had. Laura is warned from a very early age never to allow a man to have a controlling influence over her. Laura is ambitious and wants to get on in the world. She lands a highly sought-after job in the perfume department of Fenwick’s in Newcastle.
It is there that she learns how the other girls have men drooling over them. She is on her way home and awaiting a bus in the Haymarket when a young man taps her on the shoulder. Albert Kinnear is a librarian who has moved from Devon to live on The Ridges estate with his parents after his father lands a top engineering job at Parsons.
Albert likes the young girl and asks her out on a date. Laura likes him too but remembers what her mother has instilled in her and she treats Albert with contempt.
Elisabeth Millsap leaves behind a secret that is only revealed after her death.
AUTHOR
Terry Patterson was born in North Shields in 1956 and went to Ralph
Gardiner secondary modern school. He left with no formal qualifications and
began his working life at fifteen years old as an apprentice fish filleter on
North Shields fish quay. Terry was bullied at school because of his disability.
He wore a calliper and had one foot considerably smaller than the other. Termed
a congenital talipes or claw foot. He joined the North Shields Boys Club Boxing
Team in 1967.
It was there he was taught how to box by Joe Myers, a black
ex-professional. Terry's boxing career
would last twenty-two years with him winning national honours as a schoolboy
junior and senior boxer. He boxed several times as an international. A veteran
of over 200 bouts he passed the advanced ABA Coaching exam in 1982 and was
involved with coaching youngsters until 1986.
Until Terry sustained an industrial accident.
Terry undeterred
tried his hand at another sport; Snooker and won the area DSE Disabled Sport
England Snooker Championship five years in a row. In 1996 he qualified as a
professional snooker referee and travelled all over the country refereeing
matches. He refereed at the PIOS tournaments in Prestatyn in Wales and got his
England call up to referee the Maltese open in 1997. In 2002 Terry became North
Tyneside's first World Professional Snooker Coach. He'd been coaching
youngsters on a regular basis at Wallsend Supa Snooker for disabled and
able-bodied youngsters. He formed the combination challenge trophy whereby able-bodied
players could team up with disabled players and then compete against like-minded
competitors. He also created the Six Ball Shootout for disabled and beginners so
they could finish a game. Many wheelchair players found it too exhausting to
play a full game. Terry has given thirty-two years of his life to coaching two
different sports.
Terry threw himself into college work at North Tyneside taking A-level
fine art and design, English literature, history, sociology, and psychology. He
also did health social care courses 1.2.3 then went back to work as a volunteer
at Percy Hedley training centre working with clients who had Cerebral Palsy. He
stayed there for over a year and got to meet HRH Prince Andrew when he came on
a visit. He spent five years working in
various care homes until the injuries he sustained over the years got the
better of him and he had to have a pacemaker fitted. To fill the void Terry who
had always done bits of poetry and short stories as a young boy began to write.
To date Terry has written forty-eight novellas and two novels, Like
Mother like Son and He Who Rides a Tiger. He has written twenty-four plays and
continues to write every day.
REVIEWS
Jennifer Maughan - I've started reading the book Terry and looking forward to reading the rest I used to live on the Meadowell estate when I was a teenager I lived in Ripley Avenue so I can relate to your past and I hope you go far with your books.
Mawreen Hood - Well done for yesterday Terry. I enjoyed your talk and am so pleased I came. It was very interesting and I believe you had your audience captivated. I purchased your book and look forward to reading it.
Terry Christie - Terry Patterson is a pure gentleman. I met Terry when I was only about 11 years of age when I boxed for North Shields East End Boys Club and Terry gave up so much of his time to pass on to us the great boxing skills and knowledge he gained over the years. I don’t even know if Terry realises how much of a great impression and ambassador/mentor he was to us young boxing hopefuls. So many great fighters who did brilliantly are a credit to Terry.
I wish Terry all
the very best with his book sales. Terry my friend you are a legend.
Ralph Mason - Sometimes, once in a lifetime comes one person, one man. A man who I have the privilege of knowing, and a dear friend. Terry Patterson. A man who loves his roots, a man who writes these wonderful stories of everyday people, living everyday lives in and around North Shields. His stories portray events in the lives of fictional people, but also uses names of the friends he knows in the wonderful little town we all hold dear.
Dedication is a
really special word. For a really special man... My good friend. A treasure living amongst us...
Carla M Junghans - Was lovely for my mam Joyce Junghans to see her and my dad's old time friend Terry Patterson. I love hearing their stories from the 'olden days'. Well done Terry I look forward to reading the book after mam.
Mary Hodgson - I am halfway through this book and absolutely love it and brings back memories of Bridge Road South and The Ridges the club on stilts, Collingwood youth club and various other clubs that have been mentioned in your book. An absolutely brilliant read and I definitely recognise people and places.
Shawn Fenwick - You gave a great talk today, Terry. You’re a very powerful storyteller and you may not have noticed, but we all sat in silence listening to every word you said. Your memory is amazing! Maybe you should start writing your biography.
Christine Harris - Absolutely fantastic just love reading these.
Margaret Tait - I'm on the edge of my seat
Alan Hassell - Wonderful read, thank you.
Jackie Davis - Brilliant, this story would make a fantastic film.
Interview with ALIKIVI
KNOCKOUT with former boxer Terry Patterson
Terry Patterson had one foot considerably smaller than the other so wore a calliper.
“It’s known as a clawfoot. I was bullied by school gangs so decided to fight back”.
From gutting fish, to boxing to heartfelt poetry – this is Terry Patterson’s story.
Born in North Shields in 1956 Terry attended Ralph Gardiner Secondary modern school, he left with no qualifications but was taken on as an apprentice fish filleter at North Shields fish quay.
“Working on the fish quay was hard but good fun. Weighing, icing and boxing salmon to begin with, then learning how to fillet various types of fish and how to drive a popper lorry. I tell ya’ the smell took some getting used to”.
With school bullying still fresh in his mind, Terry joined North Shields Boys Boxing Club where he was taught by ex-professional Joe Myers.
His boxing career lasted a total of 22 years, in that time he worked in the shipyards and had been a school caretaker.
A couple of years ago I interviewed ex-boxer now coach Preston Brown from Sunderland.…”Yeah I know Pasty Brown very well” said Terry. “Over the years I fought a few Sunderland lads. Derek Nelson was a classy boxer who turned pro. I fought two ABA finalists in Gordon Pedro Philips and Willie Neil. I fought Pedro in the North Eastern Counties final but lost. Both lads were well schooled”.
“Willie’s coach asked if I’d fight him one evening because his opponent hadn’t turned up. I weighed in at 10st 6lbs (welterweight), he was heavier than me by 6lbs. I knew his reputation for knocking people out. Norman Fawcett negotiated with his team and £50 was slipped into my hand for taking the fight”.
“Willie could bang a bit – so could I – but he had me down three times during our bout. We set about each other unleashing hell for three fierce rounds. I had him going at one point after landing a good left hook but the bell sounded and my chance to finish him had gone”.
“Gordon and Willie are still good to this day – it’s been 36 years since we shared a ring. I see them at boxing dinners and Boxing Club Reunions. Both of them bought my novel ‘Like Mother Like Son’.
In over 200 bouts Terry won national honours and passed the advanced ABA coaching exam plus he was involved with coaching youngsters until 1986.
After an industrial accident left him unfit to continue his love of boxing, Terry was determined to focus on another sport and won the Disabled Sport England Snooker Championship five years in a row.
“I qualified as a UK professional snooker referee and got a call up to referee the Maltese open in 1997” said Terry.
In 2002 he became North Tyneside’s first World Professional Snooker Coach. He coached at Wallsend Supa Snooker for disabled and able-bodied youngsters, but after a fall on icy roads, not only had he injured his back, he suffered from a dark depression.
Terry added “I was diagnosed as clinically depressed. It’s something I just try to get on with. A surgeon advised me to take up knitting – no I didn’t – but I was determined to excel at something.”
Throwing himself into a number of academic courses at North Tyneside College Terry volunteered at Newcastle’s Percy Hedley training centre working for clients who had cerebral palsy.
He spent over five years working in various care homes until the injuries he sustained over the years got the better of him.
“Depression is something I’ve dealt with my whole life but I feel life still holds challenges for me”.
With an interest in poetry and short stories he began to spend his time writing. To date Terry has produced 46 novellas and three novels ‘Like Mother like Son’, ‘He Who Rides a Tiger’ and ‘Living with Grandpa’. His writing is free to read on Movellas.com.
“I’ve also written plays – two of which have been staged in various theatres. ‘Reaping the Benefits’ and ‘The Redundant Blade’ which was written as a tribute to Tom Hadaway”.
“We were only four days from staging ‘The House Across the Road’ when covid broke and we lost cast members. Eighteen months later we tried again and two days before the production two young cast members took ill. My producer and I lost a lot of money and we decided to walk away and the group disbanded.”
Prolific North East Writer and theatre producer Alison Stanley and cast will be reading one of Terry’s plays at Laurels in Whitley Bay, at 2pm on Thursday 22nd August. ‘A Home for Willie’ raises awareness of dementia.
Terry explains “At 68 years of age I’ve never done any for personal gain, never made anything from it but would love to have one of my books or plays made into a television programme or series”.
“I would like to follow where Catherine Cookson and Tom Hadaway left off. I hope that one day when I’m no longer around I’ll be remembered like the people who inspired me”.
Alikivi August 2024
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