While the article in the Meccano Magazinehad stimulated his interest, it was at Hillhead School, a few weeks later, that he became hooked on the idea. The principal of Glasgow Veterinary College, Dr A. W. Whitehouse, was invited to give a talk at the school about a career within his profession. Looking back, it must surely have been a stroke of immense good fortune that these two quite unrelated events occurred so close to each other; they were destined to have a profound influence on Alf Wight’s future.
Dr Whitehouse was a kindly and very approachable man with an infectious love for his subject. At the end of his talk, he extended an invitation to any of the boys who were interested to visit him at the college, where they could see for themselves the life of the veterinary student.
Enthused by both the article in the Meccano Magazineand the talk, Alf took up this offer and visited the college. Here, Dr Whitehouse, who himself saw the young boy, explained the job in greater detail. He told Alf that he would be unlikely to grow rich as a veterinary surgeon but that he would have a varied, active and rewarding life.
One thing worried Alf – Mathematics. ‘Is it terribly important that I pass in Maths to gain admission to the college?’ he asked.
‘Oh, Maths are very important to a veterinary surgeon,’ replied the principal solemnly. There were a tense few moments before his face broke into a smile. ‘But only to add up the day’s takings!’
Those few reassuring words were enough. Alfred Wight, the schoolboy, now had a goal. He knew what he was going to do with his life and he set about his schoolwork with a fiercer determination than ever. His later years as a veterinary surgeon would prove Dr Whitehouse correct in that he would, indeed, have a varied, active and rewarding life within his chosen profession, but the old Glasgow principal was wrong about one thing: the wide-eyed boy seated in front of him that day would also become rich. Throughout his remaining years at school, Alf was a studious and diligent schoolboy, and the excellent marks he attained in his best subjects reflected those happy days. Despite a high work-rate and the time spent playing his favoured sports, he had numerous interests outside the walls of Hillhead School, many of which he would carry with him into his adult years.
He had many friends but his closest was still Alex Taylor. Although after leaving Yoker School they went to different schools, they still saw a great deal of each other during their teenage years. On Saturday afternoons, they stood and shouted support for the football teams, whether in the big stadiums in the city or at the ground of the local junior team, Yoker Athletic. When there was no football to watch, there was the draw of the cinema, and this continued to be a favourite pastime.
There were numerous picture houses in the area around Yoker, so there were not many films that Alf missed. The Tivoli, the Commodore, the Rosevale, the Empire, the Regal, the Bank and many others were all within easy reach. Even after the introduction of sound to accompany the films, Alf’s father still found some work in the cinemas, many of which staged singing evenings and variety shows as well. A small orchestra was employed, in which Pop was the pianist. He played regularly at the Commodore and received complimentary tickets which he passed on to Alf; having to pay nothing to see a film added greatly to its appeal. He often wrote opinions in his diaries on the films that he had seen. One such entry is dated 11 March 1933: ‘In the evening, I went to see the much boomed film Grand Hotel. It was terrible and I was bored stiff. That woman Greta Garbo should be put in a lunatic asylum and kept under close observation!’ He had no complaints with the comedies. The films of Laurel and Hardy, who were to remain one of his all-time favourites, appeared regularly and he never tired of watching them.
Young Alf spent a large proportion of his time tramping in the hills around his home. He often camped with Alex Taylor and other friends – notably Jock Davey, Pete Shaw and Eddie Hutchinson – and frequently went off for whole days, sometimes walking over twenty miles. Another great walking friend was Jimmy Turnbull, a deaf boy who was the son of a great friend of his mother. Alf loved to visit Mrs Turnbull’s house since her expertise as a cook was unsurpassed. Not only could she elevate a simple meal of porridge into a gourmet experience, but her plates of ‘mince and tatties’ and succulent cakes were without equal. Those were certainly carefree times – walking for miles in the open air, with the mouthwatering prospect of Mrs Turnbull’s cooking to round off the day.
Despite being a city boy, his appreciation of the fine countryside around his home shows on many of the pages of his diaries. ‘Spent the whole day in a tramp to the “Whangie” and over the O. K. Hills with Jimmy T. and Jock Davey. It was simply wonderful. I can’t find words to describe it.’ These expeditions imbued Alf with a love of the great outdoors that was to shine through in the James Herriot books many years later.
Apart from tennis, Alf did not play any serious sport away from Hillhead School but, like many other boys of his age, he spent many hours playing football in the fields and parks, referring to this pastime as ‘kicking the wee white ba’ aroond’. As well as his friends from Yoker, he often played with the ‘gentry of the corner’. The ‘gentry of the corner’ or the ‘corner boys’, as they were often called, were terms used to describe a section of the unemployed of Glasgow. During the depression, gangs of men would loiter on street corners, with nothing to do. Spitting, swearing and, when they could afford it, drinking were their main pursuits. With the dole amounting to less than ten shillings per week, these men sometimes resorted to crime as a means of bolstering their meagre allowance. There seemed, however, to be some code of honour among them; although robbery with violence was commonplace, molestation of women and children was almost unheard of. When Alf was growing up – in contrast to the serious, often drug-related crime of today – the acquisition of money in any way to get a few decent meals or a drink was the prime motivation for breaking the law.
Many of the ‘gentry of the corner’ employed other means of earning a little supplementary cash, one way of which was by singing. The term is used in its loosest sense for there was little in the way of melody, there were seldom any words, and the singers were usually well under the influence of alcohol. These characters, however, gave their all, howling and droning away on the bare ground below the tenements. They were known as ‘back court singers’ and the occupants of the houses would throw down money to them. This was either in appreciation of the quality of music they were hearing or, more commonly, to gain some relief from the long, dreary wails issuing from below. They also ‘performed’ in the public houses in the city, staring unsteadily into a glass or two of whisky – groaning away interminably with no one taking the slightest bit of notice. It was just part of the scene in a typical Glasgow bar.
One of the corner boys had a unique sideline; he bit off puppies’ tails. He was a long, lean character with a patch over one eye, who hung around the Elderslie Bar, a public house in Yoker. One day, Alf enquired after his services as he had heard that this particular gentleman was a master of his craft. The charge was sixpence per pup but young Alf thought that it was half a crown – five times the actual sum. Having spotted him in the centre of a crowd of men on the street corner, he went up and asked nervously, ‘Please, sir, my friend has a pup that needs its tail off. Will you do it for him for half a crown?’
The man’s eye widened as he gazed down on the young boy. Then he looked around delightedly at his friends before stating his terms. ‘Hauf a croon? Tell ’im fer hauf a croon Ah’ll bite its fuckin’ heid aff!’ A chorus of laughing and spitting followed. The future veterinary surgeon did not seek further assistance from the one-eyed man.