Peter Walker
gone but not forgotten
KEEP A RECORD - that’s my advice.
I think it was at school that I was encouraged to start a diary, although long before that my Nanny Walker, born Diana Clifford Allen in 1884, started a diary, and she kept most of her diaries from 1932 (the year before I was born) until she died in 1975. I inherited them as next of kin. Although I wouldn't like to show them to everyone, they are a very helpful check on exact dates of various things I vaguely remember, as well confirming my suspicions of some of her prejudices. They have been of priceless value to me in the last few years, while I look through the events of my childhood.
Nanny Walker gave me my first diary as a Christmas present in 1942, when I was 9½, without pressurising me to keep it, as I remember. But I did so conscientiously, although I was always a bit worried about who might look at it, so I soon started to use a sort of code. (Samuel Pepys did the same thing 280 years previously, but he had more reason!). The habit was formed, and I continued until after I moved to London in 1959.
Meanwhile, I also kept notebooks, as we had to for school subjects, But I often used school stationery. In 1946 I started on a “Light Railway Handbook”, based on some booklets produced by amateurs for amateurs even during WW2, but with cuttings pasted in. By 1949, when I was in the Upper Sixth doing the equivalent of A-Levels, I started a notebook on Birmingham trams, always my consuming passion. From 1950 I was a student at the School of Architecture in Margaret Street, where we were encouraged to keep a personal record, as an essential business tool. From then onwards, the notebooks were more important than diaries. After I started work in 1955 I decided to scrap my oldest diaries, from when I was a measly little brat, and only kept the later ones, although for 1950 and 51 I had done a sort of spreadsheet version, which I still have, although some of the pencil notes are no longer legible.
After I had moved to London, the notebooks predominated over the diary. There were the work books, and others, particularly for my tramway activities, particularly historical research. I only kept a pocket diary if someone had given me one. Then in 1985 I bought an Amstrad PCW computer, and since then have been on disk, although I have lost more, and haven’t yet got to getting my old Amstrad disks converted.
It's amazing how much history is locked up in these secret places, and I think it is worth putting it where other people can see it, if they want to.
Peter
I think it was at school that I was encouraged to start a diary, although long before that my Nanny Walker, born Diana Clifford Allen in 1884, started a diary, and she kept most of her diaries from 1932 (the year before I was born) until she died in 1975. I inherited them as next of kin. Although I wouldn't like to show them to everyone, they are a very helpful check on exact dates of various things I vaguely remember, as well confirming my suspicions of some of her prejudices. They have been of priceless value to me in the last few years, while I look through the events of my childhood.
Nanny Walker gave me my first diary as a Christmas present in 1942, when I was 9½, without pressurising me to keep it, as I remember. But I did so conscientiously, although I was always a bit worried about who might look at it, so I soon started to use a sort of code. (Samuel Pepys did the same thing 280 years previously, but he had more reason!). The habit was formed, and I continued until after I moved to London in 1959.
Meanwhile, I also kept notebooks, as we had to for school subjects, But I often used school stationery. In 1946 I started on a “Light Railway Handbook”, based on some booklets produced by amateurs for amateurs even during WW2, but with cuttings pasted in. By 1949, when I was in the Upper Sixth doing the equivalent of A-Levels, I started a notebook on Birmingham trams, always my consuming passion. From 1950 I was a student at the School of Architecture in Margaret Street, where we were encouraged to keep a personal record, as an essential business tool. From then onwards, the notebooks were more important than diaries. After I started work in 1955 I decided to scrap my oldest diaries, from when I was a measly little brat, and only kept the later ones, although for 1950 and 51 I had done a sort of spreadsheet version, which I still have, although some of the pencil notes are no longer legible.
After I had moved to London, the notebooks predominated over the diary. There were the work books, and others, particularly for my tramway activities, particularly historical research. I only kept a pocket diary if someone had given me one. Then in 1985 I bought an Amstrad PCW computer, and since then have been on disk, although I have lost more, and haven’t yet got to getting my old Amstrad disks converted.
It's amazing how much history is locked up in these secret places, and I think it is worth putting it where other people can see it, if they want to.
Peter
