Fanny and Gert’s fruity rivalry!

Keith Lawrence, a previous contributor, has written his memoirs of growing up in Moggerhanger during the 1930s and 40s and remembers George very well.

“Regular as clockwork...we would come running out of school and on certain days there parked outside the council houses would be Mr Whitby’s Trojan van...painted in red, white and blue.

“The van had a headboard mounted over the top of the cab in the centre of which was secured a working alarm clock. Also on this board were slots to allow the day and the date to be changed and displayed. He had a zinc-plated tank that shone like chrome. This was filled with his supply of paraffin and was mounted at the back of the van with its brass tap sparkling like new, and there were three varying sized zinc-plated measuring jugs hanging in a row.

“Mr Whitby sold many useful things ... from Zebro grate polish to elastic, from pins to paraffin. There was something for everyone and if he hadn’t got it, then he would bring it the next time he called. “

Keith also remembers Bumsy Johnson, the ‘Steptoe’-like rag and bone man with a wooden leg who would visit Moggerhanger on his rounds.

The mystery of his wooden leg was solved by Keith who explains that he lost it during combat in the First World War.

“He was an ex-soldier and serving in the trenches left him in poor health. He toured the district in his tatty old cart drawn by a mule and would call out at the top of his voice “Rag a’ bones!” His call was for people’s cast off clothing, their old stewed bones and any type of scrap metal. You would receive a penny or two for them.”

Bumsy would typically pay a penny for a rabbit skin and three and ha’pence for a bag of rags. He would sell the scrap metal to Larkinsons, the Biggleswade scrap merchant. The bones would be sold to Beestons at Blunham Mill where they were ground up to make bonemeal fertiliser and the rags were shredded and mixed with shoddy from the mills to be spread onto the fields.

Fred Punter had a family connection to Bumsy. He explains: “My maternal grandmother, Kate Fensome, lived at 1 Ivel Road, Sandy which was within a large farmyard containing onion lofts and various sheds.

“Bumsy operated his business from one of these sheds, using it to store his collections of rags, bones and scrap, and to keep his cart and mule. I used to often visit my grandmother and therefore saw Bumsy quite often at close range.”

Don Flint, who first alerted Memory Lane to Bumsy Johnson, can also recall another colourful character in Sandy during the 1930s when he was around 11 or 12.

Fanny Armond helped run her husband’s wholesale fruiterers J Armond & Sons in the High Street.

“She was known for being loud and cantankerous” recalls Don.

They had three children – two sons who worked in the business, and a daughter Vera who Don describes as “neat, tidy and sophisticated” and able to play the piano beautifully. “Vera would be 90 by now” he says.

The shop had a double frontage and a wet fish section.

In 1934 Gert Gaylor opened up a rival fruit shop opposite and Fanny would often be seen standing outside her husband’s shop hurling insults at Gert’s shop to put off potential customers across the street.

One day, Don recalls that Fanny’s eldest son Les, aka Duke, got so fed up with her that he took a bunch of flowers out of a display bucket and emptied it over her head which left her apoplectic with rage.

“There were more rough diamonds around in those days,” chuckles Don.