Description:
Interviewers: Francesca Davies and Bill Laws
Date of interview: 10/6/26
As a child on Holme Lacy Road, Hereford during the Second World War, painter and decorator Michael recalls black and white GIs and Indian soldiers on the eve of D Day, munition workers flocking to Rotherwas during their shift changes, and climbing Dinedor Hill to look at explosive or bomb damage at the factory. Also a radio detection unit near Ross Road, the building of Stirling Lines camp, its theatre and workers on the Camp billeted with his family including a military guitarist; US steam trains getting derailed, rationing, and Indian soldiers attending a circus performance. The son of Edgar George Rooke who worked for Corona soft drinks, and Florence Annie Rooke, daughter of an important figure in Michael’s life, Charles Arthur Blackford, manager of the city sewerage works in the early decades of the 20th century where municipal rubbish was converted into electricity, and boiler ash ground into mortar and sold to local builders. His paternal grandfather ran the Black Lion in Bridge Street, recalling one market day when they stabled over 100 horses and gigs.
