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Tag Archives: Blackpool (England)


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Birth of Irish Tenor Josef Locke

Joseph McLaughlin, Irish tenor known professionally as Josef Locke, is born in Derry, County Londonderry, on March 23, 1917. He is successful in the United Kingdom and Ireland in the 1940s and 1950s.

McLaughlin is one of ten children of Patrick McLaughlin, butcher and cattle dealer, and Annie McLaughlin (née Doherty). He starts singing in local churches in the Bogside at the age of seven, and as a teenager adds two years to his age to enlist in the Irish Guards, later serving abroad with the Palestine Police Force, before returning in the late 1930s to join the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC).

Known as The Singing Bobby, McLaughlin becomes a local celebrity before starting to work in the UK variety circuit, where he also plays summer seasons in English seaside resorts. The renowned Irish tenor John McCormack (1884–1945) advises him that his voice is better suited to a lighter repertoire than the operatic one he has in mind and urges him to find an agent. He finds the noted impresario Jack Hylton (1892–1965) who books him but is unable to fit his full name on the bill, thus Joseph McLaughlin becomes Josef Locke.

Locke makes an immediate impact when featured in “Starry Way,” a twenty-week summer show at the Opera House Theatre in Blackpool, Lancashire, England in 1946 and is rebooked for the following summer, then starring for three seasons at the Blackpool Hippodrome. He appears in ten Blackpool seasons from 1946 to 1969, not the nineteen seasons he later claims.

Locke makes his first radio broadcast in 1949 and subsequently appears on television programmes such as Rooftop Rendezvous, Top of the Town, All-star Bill and The Frankie Howerd Show. He is signed to the Columbia label in 1947, and his first releases are the two Italian songs “Santa Lucia” and “Come Back to Sorrento.”

In 1947, Locke releases “Hear My Song, Violetta,” which becomes forever associated with him. It is based on a 1936 tango “Hör’ mein Lied, Violetta” by Othmar Klose and Rudolf Lukesch. The song “Hör’ mein Lied, Violetta” is often covered, including by Peter Alexander and is itself based on Giuseppe Verdi‘s La traviata. His other songs are mostly a mixture of ballads associated with Ireland, excerpts from operettas, and familiar favourites.

In 1948, Locke appears in several films produced by Mancunian Films, usually as versions of himself. He plays himself in the film Holidays with Pay. He also appears as “Sergeant Locke” in the 1949 comedy What a Carry On!

In 1958, after Locke has appeared in five Royal Variety Performance telecasts, and while he is still at the peak of his career, the British tax authorities begin to make substantial demands that he declines to meet. Eventually he flees the country for Ireland, where he lays low for several years. When his differences with the taxman are eventually settled, he relaunches his career in England with tours of the northern variety clubs and summer seasons at Blackpool’s Queen’s Theatre in 1968 and 1969, before retiring to County Kildare, emerging for the occasional concert in England. He later appears on British and Irish television, and in November 1984 is given a lengthy 90-minute tribute in honour of the award he is to receive at the Olympia Theatre commentating his career in show business on Gay Byrne‘s The Late Late Show. He also makes many appearances on the BBC Television‘s long running variety show The Good Old Days.

In 1991, the Peter Chelsom film Hear My Song is released. It is a fantasy based on the notion of Locke returning from his Irish exile in the 1960s to complete an old love affair and save a Liverpool-based Irish night-club from ruination. Locke is played by Ned Beatty, with the singing voice of Vernon Midgley. The film leads to a revival in Locke’s career. A compilation CD is released, and he appears on This Is Your Life in March 1992. He performs in front of the Prince and Princess of Wales at the 1992 Royal Variety Performance, singing “Goodbye,” the final song performed by his character in the film. He announces prior to the song that this will be his final public appearance.

Locke dies at the age of 82 at a nursing home in Clane, County Kildare on October 15, 1999, and is cremated at Glasnevin Cemetery. He is survived by his wife, Carmel, and a son.

On March 22, 2005, a bronze memorial to Locke is unveiled outside the City Hotel on Queen’s Quay in Derry by Phil Coulter and John Hume. The memorial is designed by Terry Quigley. It takes the form of a spiraling scroll divided by lines, representing a musical stave. The spiral suggests the flowing melody of a song and is punctuated by images illustrating episodes in his life, including Locke in police uniform, Blackpool Tower, Carnegie Hall, and the musical notes of the opening lines of “Hear My Song.”

A biography of the singer, entitled Josef Locke: The People’s Tenor, by Nuala McAllister Hart is published in March 2017, the centenary of his birth. The book corrects many myths that the charismatic Locke circulated about his career.


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Birth of Reg Ryan, Irish Footballer

Reginald Alphonso Ryan, Irish footballer also referred to as Paddy Ryan, is born in Dublin, County Dublin, on October 30, 1925. He plays for West Bromwich Albion F.C., Derby County F.C. and Coventry City F.C. He is also a dual international, playing for both Ireland teams – the FAI XI and the IFA XI. He is the last player to represent both teams. He is considered more of a goal creator then a goalscorer.

Ryan initially plays Gaelic football for the Marino School in Dublin while growing up, but then switches to soccer after moving to Blackpool, Lancashire, England, during the early years of World War II. He then plays with Claremount School, Blackpool Boys, various factory teams and has trials with both Sheffield United F.C. and Nottingham Forest F.C. before joining Nuneaton Borough F.C.

Ryan has two spells with Coventry City. In April 1943, he signs for the club as an amateur and during the 1942–43 season he plays two games in wartime regional leagues. He then turns professional in August 1944 and makes a further four appearances for the club during the 1944–45 wartime season. After playing for West Bromwich Albion and Derby County, he returns to City in September 1958. He then helps the club win promotion from the newly formed Football League Fourth Division, after they finish as runners-up in 1959. During his second spell with City he plays 70 times in all competitions.

In April 1945, Ryan signs for West Bromwich Albion and, during the 1945–46 season, makes 17 appearances in the Football League South. He makes his debut for the club against Millwall F.C. in November 1945. Together with Davy Walsh and Jackie Vernon, he helps West Brom gain promotion to the Football League First Division in 1949. In 1954, together with Ronnie Allen and Frank Griffin, he is also a member of the West Brom team that finishes as First Division runners-up and FA Cup winners. He also helps West Brom gain a share of the FA Charity Shield when he scores in a 4–4 draw against Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C.

Ryan signs for Derby County in June 1955 for a fee of £3,000. He is appointed team captain by manager Harry Storer, Jr., and during his three seasons with the club misses only three matches – two because of injury and one because of international duty. He is a member of the side promoted as champions of the Third Division North to the Football League Second Division in 1956–57. In 1955 he also plays for an English Division Three North XI against an English Division Three South XI. He plays 133 league games for County, scoring 30 goals. He also plays a further six games for the club in the FA Cup, scoring a further goal.

When Ryan begins his international career in 1949 there are, in effect, two Ireland teams, chosen by two rival associations. Both associations, the Northern Ireland–based Irish Football Association (IFA) and the Republic of Ireland–based Football Association of Ireland (FAI) claim jurisdiction over the whole of Ireland and select players from the whole island. As a result, several notable Irish players from this era, including Ryan, play for both teams.

Between 1949 and 1955 Ryan makes 16 appearances and scores 3 goals for the FAI XI. He makes his debut in a 3–1 defeat to Sweden on November 13, 1949, in a qualifier for the 1950 FIFA World Cup. He scores his first two goals for the FAI XI in October 1953 during the qualifiers for the 1954 FIFA World Cup, one against France in a 5–3 defeat and the second, a penalty, against Luxembourg in 4–0 win. On November 7, 1954, in a friendly against Norway, he scores his third goal, again from the penalty spot, and earns the FAI XI a 2–1 victory. He makes his last appearance for the FAI XI on November 27, 1955, in a 2–2 draw with Spain.

Ryan makes his one and only appearance for the IFA XI in a 0–0 draw with Wales on March 8, 1950. As well as being part of the 1950 British Home Championship, the game also doubles up as a qualifier for the 1950 FIFA World Cup. Ryan, together with Con Martin, Davy Walsh and Tom Aherne, is one of four players born in the Irish Free State, included in the IFA XI that day. He earlier plays for the FAI XI in the same competition, and as a result, plays for two different teams in the same FIFA World Cup tournament. This situation eventually leads to intervention by FIFA and, as a result, Ryan becomes one of the last four Irish Free State–born players to play for the IFA XI.

After retiring as a player in November 1960, Ryan works as a pools supervisor for both Coventry City (1960–1961) and West Bromwich Albion (1961–1962). Between September 1962 and October 1976, he is chief scout for West Brom. He later works as a scout for various clubs including Aston Villa F.C., Derby County F.C., Hereford United F.C. and Leeds United F.C. before retiring in 1994.

Ryan dies at the age of 71 on February 13, 1997, at Sheldon, West Midlands, England.


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The Shipwrecks of the Trevor and Nonpareil

Two hundred passengers are lost in the shipwrecks of the brigs Trevor and Nonpareil on October 20, 1775. Among the casualties are The Hononorable Major Francis Caulfield, Member of Parliament (MP) for Charlemont, his wife, and daughters. Also lost is John French, Member for Roscommon County.

On Thursday, October 19, 1775, the brig Trevor, with Captain William Totty at the helm, and the brig Nonpareil, with Capatin Samuel Davies, sail from Parkgate for Dublin. That evening, as the vessels are near Holyhead, the wind shifts about from the south southwest to the west, and so violent a hurricane arises that they cannot carry any sail, but are obliged to lie to, and drive before the wind. In this situation, the Trevor drives upon the banks near the Lancashire shore and is totally lost.

Everyone on board perishes, except Samuel Fairclough, a mariner, who miraculously saves his life by leaping aboard another vessel named the Charming Molly, under Captain Joseph Holloway, which is transporting coal from Chester to Newry. The Charming Molly accidentally runs afoul of the Trevor and carries away the Trevor‘s foretopmast and, at the instant the two vessels come together, Fairclough makes his leap. He was the only survivor of the 30 to 40 passengers and crew aboard the Trevor.

Captain Holloway states that his vessel and the Trevor came together at some distance from the coast. They parted at the time Fairclough jumped across, and the Trevor subsequently went to pieces. A great many chests, boxes, some of which are broken, and quantities of East India goods are strewn along the shore, all wet with salt water. These items are in the custody of Mrs. Hesketh, Lady of the Manor of this coast, secured by Mr. Standen of Rossall Hall. The East India goods had arrived by land from London. The cargo and coins aboard the Trevor are estimated to be worth £15,000.

The Charming Mary runs ashore at Blackpool with most of her sails carried away, but otherwise with little damage.

The Nonpareil is lost in the storm between Parkgate and Dublin, driven on shore near Hoyle-sands and lost. There are no survivors. The wife of Captain Davies states that her husband sailed from Parkgate with very low spirits as he did not like the appearance of the weather. He is pressured to put to sea, which he does, and is turned back twice, but gets off on the third attempt, and is never seen again.

Between them, the Trevor and the Nonpareil reportedly carry nearly 200 passengers, the majority being on the Nonpareil. They carry cargo valued at £15,000.

On Tuesday evening, October 24, the Collector of the port of Chester receives the melancholy account of the loss of the Trevor by a letter from the Collector of Poulton, in Lancashire. This is immediately communicated to the Merchants, who are concerned in shipping the cargo, and they set out as soon as possible to give assistance and to secure each part of the cargo as might come ashore.

The merchants from Chester reach Poulton late on Wednesday night, October 25. The following morning, they set out along the shore from Blackpool, where the Charming Mary is stranded. The greatest part of the hull of the Trevor lay scattered along the shore at a great distance. On their arrival at Rossall Hall, about six miles from Blackpool, they have the satisfaction to find that Mr. Standen, who is Steward of the Manor of Bold Fleetwood Hesketh, now a minor and son to the deceased Fleetwood Hesketh, on whose estate the wreck is taken up, has taken all possible care of everything that can be saved from plunderers.


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Death of Irish Tenor Josef Locke

Joseph McLaughlin, Irish tenor known professionally as Josef Locke, dies in Clane, County Kildare on October 15, 1999. He is successful in the United Kingdom and Ireland in the 1940s and 1950s.

Born in Derry on March 23, 1917, McLaughlin is the son of a butcher and cattle dealer, and one of nine children. He starts singing in local churches in the Bogside at the age of seven, and as a teenager adds two years to his age to enlist in the Irish Guards, later serving abroad with the Palestine Police Force, before returning in the late 1930s to join the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

Known as The Singing Bobby, McLaughlin becomes a local celebrity before starting to work in the UK variety circuit, where he also plays summer seasons in English seaside resorts. The renowned Irish tenor John McCormack (1884–1945) advises him that his voice is better suited to a lighter repertoire than the operatic one he has in mind and urges him to find an agent. He finds the noted impresario Jack Hylton (1892–1965) who books him but is unable to fit his full name on the bill, thus Joseph McLaughlin becomes Josef Locke.

Locke makes an immediate impact when featured in “Starry Way,” a twenty-week summer show at the Opera House Theatre in Blackpool, Lancashire, England in 1946 and is rebooked for the following summer, then starring for three seasons at the Blackpool Hippodrome. He appears in ten Blackpool seasons from 1946 to 1969, not the nineteen seasons he later claims.

Locke makes his first radio broadcast in 1949 and subsequently appears on television programmes such as Rooftop Rendezvous, Top of the Town, All-star Bill and The Frankie Howerd Show. He is signed to the Columbia label in 1947, and his first releases are the two Italian songs “Santa Lucia” and “Come Back to Sorrento.”

In 1947, Locke releases “Hear My Song, Violetta,” which becomes forever associated with him. It is based on a 1936 tango “Hör’ mein Lied, Violetta” by Othmar Klose and Rudolf Lukesch. The song “Hör’ mein Lied, Violetta” is often covered, including by Peter Alexander and is itself based on Giuseppe Verdi‘s La traviata. His other songs are mostly a mixture of ballads associated with Ireland, excerpts from operettas, and familiar favourites.

In 1948, Locke appears in several films produced by Mancunian Films, usually as versions of himself. He plays himself in the film Holidays with Pay. He also appears as “Sergeant Locke” in the 1949 comedy What a Carry On!

In 1958, after Locke has appeared in five Royal Variety Performance telecasts, and while he is still at the peak of his career, the British tax authorities begin to make substantial demands that he declines to meet. Eventually he flees the country for Ireland, where he lays low for several years. When his differences with the taxman are eventually settled, he relaunches his career in England with tours of the northern variety clubs and summer seasons at Blackpool’s Queen’s Theatre in 1968 and 1969, before retiring to County Kildare, emerging for the occasional concert in England. He later appears on British and Irish television, and in November 1984 is given a lengthy 90-minute tribute in honour of the award he is to receive at the Olympia theatre commentating his career in show business on Gay Byrne‘s The Late Late Show. He also makes many appearances on the BBC Television‘s long running variety show The Good Old Days.

In 1991, the Peter Chelsom film Hear My Song is released. It is a fantasy based on the notion of Locke returning from his Irish exile in the 1960s to complete an old love affair and save a Liverpool-based Irish night-club from ruination. Locke is played by Ned Beatty, with the singing voice of Vernon Midgley. The film leads to a revival in Locke’s career. A compilation CD is released, and he appears on This Is Your Life in March 1992. He performs in front of the Prince and Princess of Wales at the 1992 Royal Variety Show, singing “Goodbye,” the final song performed by his character in the film. He announces prior to the song that this will be his final public appearance.

Locke dies at the age of 82 in Clane, County Kildare on October 15, 1999, and is survived by his wife, Carmel, and a son.

On March 22, 2005, a bronze memorial to Locke is unveiled outside the City Hotel on Queen’s Quay in Derry by Phil Coulter and John Hume. The memorial is designed by Terry Quigley. It takes the form of a spiraling scroll divided by lines, representing a musical stave. The spiral suggests the flowing melody of a song and is punctuated by images illustrating episodes in his life, including Locke in police uniform, Blackpool Tower, Carnegie Hall, and the musical notes of the opening lines of “Hear My Song.”

A biography of the singer, entitled Josef Locke: The People’s Tenor, by Nuala McAllister Hart is published in March 2017, the centenary of his birth. The book corrects many myths that the charismatic Locke circulated about his career.


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Ruby Murray Has Two Singles in the British Top 20

Belfast-born Ruby Murray has two singles, “I’ll Come When You Call” and “Evermore,” in the UK Singles Chart on October 22, 1955. Her much quoted achievement is that she has five hits in the Top 20 in a single week in March 1955, a feat only matched by pop singer Madonna four decades later.

Murray is born near the Donegall Road in south Belfast on March 29, 1935, the youngest child in a Protestant family. She has surgery at six weeks of age due to swollen glands, and as a result, has a very husky voice. She tours as a child singer and first appears on television at the age of twelve, having been spotted by producer Richard Afton. Owing to laws governing children performing, she has to delay her start in the entertainment industry. She returns to Belfast and full-time education until she is fourteen.

After being again spotted by Afton, Murray is signed to Columbia Records and her first single, “Heartbeat”, reaches No. 3 in the UK Singles Chart in December 1954. Afton offers her the position of resident singer on the BBC‘s Quite Contrary television show, to replace Joan Regan. “Softly, Softly“, her second single, reaches number one in early 1955. That same year she sets a pop chart record by having five hits in the Top Twenty in one week, a feat unmatched for many years. In 2014, the Guinness Book of World Records issues three certificates confirming that at the date of issue, nobody has beaten this record, although it is now shared with three other singers.

The 1950s are a busy period for Murray, during which she has her own television show, stars at the London Palladium with Norman Wisdom, appears in a Royal Command Performance (1955), and tours the world. In a period of 52 weeks, starting on December 3, 1954 and lasting until the end of November 1955, she constantly has at least one single in the UK charts, this at a time when only a Top 20 is listed.

Murray appears in her only film role, as Ruby, in A Touch of the Sun, a 1956 farce with Frankie Howerd and Dennis Price. A couple of hits follow later in the decade. “Goodbye Jimmy, Goodbye“, a No. 10 hit in 1959, is her final appearance in the charts.

In 1957, while working in Blackpool, Murray meets Bernie Burgess, a member of a successful television and recording vocal quartet, the Four Jones Boys. Shortly afterwards she leaves Northern Ireland to marry him and live with him in England. The couple includes a song-and-dance segment in her act during the 1960s.

Murray struggles with alcoholism for most of her life and this contributes to the breakdown of her marriage in 1974. The divorce is finalised in 1976 and she moves to Torquay to live with an old friend, Ray Lamar, a former stage dancer and theatre impresario, who is 18 years her senior. They marry in 1991 and spend the evening with a small party of friends and family at an Italian restaurant in Babbacombe.

Although her days as a major star are long over, Murray continues performing until close to the end of her life. Spending her last couple of years in Asprey’s Nursing Home, she often delights her carers with a song, and is visited by her friend Max Bygraves. She dies of liver cancer at the age of 61 on December 17, 1996.


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Birth of Alistair Cooke, Journalist & Broadcaster

alistair-cooke

Alistair Cooke, British journalist, television personality, and broadcaster, who describes himself as a “Lancastrian Irishman,” is born in Salford, Lancashire, England on November 20, 1908. He is best known for his lively and insightful interpretations of American history and culture.

The son of Samuel Cooke, a Wesleyan Methodist lay preacher, and Mary Elizabeth (Byrne) from County Sligo, He is educated at Blackpool Grammar School, Blackpool and wins a scholarship to Jesus College, Cambridge, where he gains an honours degree in English. Later he wins a Commonwealth Fund fellowship to study in the United States, first at Yale University (1932–33), then at Harvard University (1933–34). His cross-country travels during the summers of these years have a profound influence on his professional life.

Following a brief period as a scriptwriter in Hollywood, Cooke returns to England to become a film critic for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and later serves as London correspondent for the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) of the United States. In 1937 he returns to the United States, settles in New York City, and becomes an American citizen in 1941.

From the late 1930s, Cooke reports and comments on American affairs for BBC Radio and several major British newspapers. His weekly 15-minute program, Letter from America, broadcast from 1946 to 2004, is one of the longest-running series on radio. The texts of many broadcasts are collected in One Man’s America (1952) and Talk About America (1968). From 1956 to 1961 he hosts and narrates the weekly television “magazine” Omnibus, which wins numerous broadcasting awards.

Cooke’s interpretation of the American experience culminates in his BBC-produced television series America: A Personal History of the United States (1972–1973). In thirteen installments, filmed on location throughout the United States, he surveys some 500 years of American history in an eclectic and personal but highly coherent narrative. Alistair Cooke’s America (1973), the book based on the award-winning program, is a best-seller in the United States. From the 1970s to the early 1990s, as host of Masterpiece Theatre, he serves as an interpreter of British culture through the presentation of BBC dramatic television programming to American audiences.

Cooke’s other works include the critical biography Douglas Fairbanks: The Making of a Screen Actor (1940), Generation on Trial: The USA v. Alger Hiss (1950), based on his coverage of a celebrated Congressional investigation, The Vintage Mencken (1955), The Patient Has the Floor (1986), America Observed (1988), Memories of the Great and the Good (2000) and, with Robert Cameron, The Americans (1977).

On March 2, 2004, at the age of 95, following advice from his doctors, Cooke announces his retirement from Letter from America—after 58 years, the longest-running speech radio show in the world.

Alistair Cooke dies at midnight on March 30, 2004 at his home in New York City. He had been ill with heart disease, but dies of lung cancer, which had spread to his bones. He is cremated and his ashes are clandestinely scattered by his family in New York’s Central Park.