Recollections: Dance Halls

Recollections

Frank Ferri

Newhaven, Edinburgh

Thank you to Frank Ferri, now living in Newhaven, Edinburgh, for sending me these memories of living in Leith. Frank adds that Leith had plenty of places for dancing.

Frank wrote:

The Eldorado

"The Eldorado in Mill Lane had two halls, one for Tuesday night Wrestling, with such names as:

- The Goul

- Le Masque Rouge

- Kendo

- Les Kellet

- Shirley Crabtree and even

- Jimmy Savile of 'Top of the Pops' fame'

The dance hall featured the big bands of the time:

- Ken Mackintosh

- Harry Gold and his Pieces of Eight,

- Renaldo

- Johnny Dankworth

- Ted Heath with his Singers

- Lita Rosa

- Dick Valentine

- Dennis Lotus.

On some Saturday nights they would have a twelve A.M. to Four AM. Dance session. So you could go to the Palais De Dance at Fountainbridge until 11.00 P.M. then make your way down to Leith for the 'Eldo'."

The Assembly Rooms

"The Assembly Rooms, or 'the 'Rooms' as we called them, at the foot of Constitution Street, were a very popular venue with Alexander’s resident band.

Most kids learned the basics of dancing before graduating to the Assembly Rooms. I went there about three nights a week."

YMCA

"There was also the Y.M.C.A for the very young in Junction place (Fire Brigade Street to a Leither)."

The Lansberry

"Then there were the Lansberry halls for more mature people.

This was former Labour Party offices where Lord Hoy first started as an M.P., on the corner of Duke Street. and Academy Street (old name, Morton Street)

As a boy of fourteen, I joined the Labour League of Youth here and canvassed etc. for the Labour Party and met Lord Hoy many times."

The Palace Ballroom

"The Palace Ballroom was above Woolworth’s and had a small entrance in Constitution Street. I remember this is where, at the age of fourteen, I heard my first live band, 'Archie Semple and his Dixieland Band'.

On Sundays, there was little for teenagers to do. My friends and I, hearing the music, crept up the stairs towards it. A man appeared. We turned and were about to run, then plucked up the courage to ask if we could get in.

Surprisingly, he said 'Certainly'. There was no dancing, just listening to the music, and our first experience of live music.

I thought the noise was ear-splitting. But it was like chamber music to to-days standards.

For one shilling and nine pence (1/9d ) they threw in a cup of coffee and a couple of cakes. We felt so grown up. I’ve been hooked on New Orleans jazz ever since."

Stella Maris

"The 'St. Mary’s Star of the Sea' church (Stella Maris) had a Sunday night Youth Club. This was for members of the parish only.

To get my non-denominational friends in, I had to tell them what the colour of the priest's vestments were on that Sunday because old father Fitz (Fitzpatrick) would be at the door to pose the question."

Private Functions

"Other private function venues for weddings etc were:

- The Bakers Halls: North Fort Street.

- The Corner Rooms: on the corner of North Junction Street and Ferry Road

- The Unionist Halls: at the foot of Leith Walk

- The Eagle Rooms: at Tower Street, along the Shore,

- No 5 Masonic Club Rooms: at Queen Charlotte Street, off Constitution Street.

- Coop Halls: the old school / church on the corner of Cables Wynd and Great Junction Street.

- Leith Town Hall: Ferry Road.

- Market Halls: in Market Street, off St Andrew Street, Leith. This later became The Crossroads Club, run by the late Eric Gardner. There, they had five-a-side football among other things. At half time, you paid two pence and got a jam piece and a cup of tea."

Juke Box Cafes

"Michael’s Cafe (early 1950s) in Tollbooth Wynd was the first to have a jukebox.

This was another gathering point, listening to:

- Frankie Laine (High Noon Theme)

- Johnny Ray (Cry)

- Rosemary Clooney (Cammona My House)

- Doris Day (Canadian Capers)

- Billy Eckstine (If)

- Mario Lanza (Be My Love)

- Nat King Cole (Unforgettable)

- Tennessee Ernie Ford (Shot Gun Boogie fame)

and many others.

Johnny’s Cafe, next to the State Cinema and the Cabin Cafe next to Leith Central Railway Station at the foot of Leith Walk, (now the Job Center) were other juvenile hangouts, and also Albert’s Chippy at the top of the Kirkgate and Lannie's cafe in Henderson Street."

Stewart's Ballroom

"I went to Stewart's Ballroom at Abbeymount on a Saturday morning, aged about fourteen or fifteen. This is where you went, to make you feel grown up.

Stewart or his wife would give a couple of whirls around the floor to demonstrate, then grab you by the hand introduce you to some wee girl and insist you got on with it, a bit like learning to swim by just being thrown in."

The Palais

"After going to Stuart's Ballroom and the 'Rooms' (the Assembly Rooms) you graduated to the Palais in Fountainbridge (the haunt of Sean Connery.

You had arrived, big-time:

- Fights with the Valdor Gang

- Jealousies with the Yanks from Kirknewton Air Base

- Dancing to Basil Kirchen Orchestra

- The revolving stage with the Jeff Rowena Quartet on the other side.

The Palais was an enormous dance hall, capacity probably 3000, oblong in shape, with a surrounding balcony, where we would sit, eye up the talent, spot someone you fancied and make a beeline downstairs to get them up to dance.

No booze was sold there in there in those days, just coffees, tea and soft drinks in the wee cafes:

- Cupid's Bar

- Knights' Corner

- The Spanish decorated upstairs snack areas."

The Palais

Americans

"Usherettes were positioned to give you directions. On the right-hand side of the Palais stage was considered the Yankee Corner. This was the area the Americans from Kirknewton Airbase would congregate and attract the bottled blonds looking to marry a Yank for a better life in the States, much to the envy and anger of the local lads.

Generally speaking if a local lad asked these girls to dance, they got a knock back. I remember having returned from a 12-month trip to the United states during my Merchant Navy days (1954). I had developed an American accent that I could slip into quite comfortably, dress in appropriate clothes that I’d bought in America, and I could pull the birds in this disguise easily.

But if I let my guard down, I was dropped. I didn't care though, it was their loss. Such was my arrogance in those days. I'd been around the world and seen it all. I was 'Jack the Lad'. So who care about the yanks?"

The Palais

Revolving Stage

"The Palais had a revolving stage. When one band went off for a break playing their signature tune, the other band would revolve round playing theirs, and I thought this was wonderful.

In the 60s when I played there with the 'Jokers' band, I was amazed to see the mechanism that activated the revolving stage was none other than a big wheel that you hand operated like your mothers old mangle for wringing clothes. I thought it would be a sophisticated electronic device.

When I saw this, you would have thought I’d just been told John Wayne was a poof!"

Fashions

"Drape suits were the order of the day, made to measure by Jackson’s the tailors Leith Street, paid for in cash, no credit in these days and it took six to eight weeks to have one made.

The jacket had a one piece back, single-breasted with one link button. The length of the jacket had to be at least thumb length, or the extreme fingertip. Tight legged trousers, measuring sixteen or fourteen inches at the turn-ups, were the fashion of the day.

We wore:

- white shirts with a black knitted ties. (The Teddyboys wore the longest jackets with velvet trim collar and cuffs on the sleeves and broad waist-banded very narrow trousers.)

- black gabardine raincoats with patch pockets (murder to clean off the tan Pancake makeup from your collar after a nights snogging in the back stair) with mandatory yellow scarf or the 'Packamac', a very thin black plastic raincoat, that you folded up neatly and placed in a pouch

- crepe soled shoes.

- Cussons Imperial Leather after shave, or Old Spice if you could get it.

- Tony Curtis haircuts with the (DA) score down the back of your head and kiss curl at front, by Bob's gents hairdressers of the West Port. He was a Polish guy who then moved to Brougham Place, Tollcross. He was the only gents hair stylist in town, expensive, but worth it for the best styles.

In the late 1950s, the fashion was:

- 'Munrospun' (a wool company at Kemps Corner, Loganlee area) woollen ties, generally mustard, red or bright yellow in colour

- a red or mustard waistcoat, worn with a charcoal grey suit

- Perry Como haircuts. We were getting a bit more sophisticated."

In the early 1960s, the fashion was:

- longer hair, Beatles style.

- high collard button-down shirts

- narrow ties

- boots with pointed toes and high Cuban heels

- mohair shiny suits

- Italian style three-button, narrow lapels

- bum-freezer short jacket, with cloth covered buttons

- tight-bottom trousers with no turn-ups."

The Manhatten Cafe

"We were very impressed with everything American in those days, perhaps influenced by the movies and the attention the Kirknewton American airmen got from the local girls.

There used to be a cafe near the west end of Princes Street named the Manhattan. It was next to the old Jacey cinema.

It was a long narrow premises, furnished like a mini American Diner, with boothed seating and swivel stools at the counter and displaying mirrors with etched scenes of New York, like the Empire State Building and Brooklyn Bridge. My friend Billy Harper and I would pose in there for ages until asked to vacate our booth."

Other Venues

Other venues were:

- Tony’s, Picardy Place or

- Fairleys, Leith Street.

if you had no taste.

- The Cavendish, Tollcross

- The Plaza, Morningside, for the nurses who frequented it.

- The Excelsior, Blackfriars Street

and many more.

On our way home from the Palais in the 1950s, we stopped at the bakers near the old Alhambra Cinema for a hot mince pie.

Sundays

"On Sundays, cinemas and dance halls were all closed. All you had were:

- Milk Bars and the West End Cafe in Shandwick Place

- Listening to Jazz and at Victoria Halls Victoria Street, George IV Bridge, and

- The Oddfellows Halls in Forrest Rd, listening to Sandy Brown and his Dixieland Band."

Entertainment

"In the early 1960s, dancing was at beat clubs:

- Gamp and The Place, Victoria Terrace

- Top Story, Leith Street

- International, Princes Street

- Casablanca, Rose Street Lane

- Luna Park, Tollcross Street

- Magoos, High Street

- Bungees, Fleshmarket Close, High Street

- Walkers, Shandwick Place

- Tiffanys, Stockbridge

- The Gonk, High Riggs.

Bands of the time were:

- Saracens

- Embers

- Boston Dexters

- Jokers, Rhythm and Blues band

- The Crusaders

- Hunters

- Cult, Images

- Hipple People

- Fayne & The Cruisers

- Phil & The Flintstones

- Tam Paton Show Band

- Athenians

and many more."

Entertainment

"We had all this entertainment and a couple of dozen more picture houses at our fingertips. Spoiled rotten, we were!

However if you were a Leither, you never really had to leave the area."

Frank Ferri, Newhaven, Edinburgh: June 12, 2008