OH we do like to be beside the seaside… with many holidays on hold, let’s take a look at the time when all many people could look forward to was a day out at the coast.

And where better for the family to head off to for a few hours than GREAT Yarmouth.

These lovely old photographs from the Mike Adcock Collection, looked after by Norwich Heritage Projects, illustrate the way it was back in the 1920s.

One woman who spoke so well about those times was dear Ethel George, in her book The Seventeenth Child written with Carole and Michael Blackwell back in 2006.

Ethel was born in Norwich in 1914, the youngest of 17 children, living in a small three-bedroomed house. Her words were recorded and Larks Press published the local best-seller.

“The men didn’t have a week’s holiday when I was growing up. But they musta had Monday and Tuesday for August Bank Holiday. Monday was father’s day out, but he always kept the Tuesday for our day trip to Yarmouth,” said Ethel.

She recalled the excitement of this very special day. Her mother packing a little toilet pot, the children having a “pail” and spade. The tram ride to the station – singing on the way.

When in Yarmouth mother and father called in the big pub on the right as you left the station. He had a pint while she had a stout.

“They wouldn’t be there for long. It was just their little treat and they’d get a stone bottle o’ pop for us to share.”

Ethel recalled: “On the way to the seafront mother went into a baker’s shop and got two lovely crusty long loaves. And she’d buy some ham to go with them. She brought the marge from home.

“When we got to the beach, she would spread the tablecloth on the sand, and father and all us children sat round. I can see her now, sitting there, prim and proper in a black coat over her black skirt and a hat. Always a black hat, big-brimmed and tall. And my father, very smart in his trilby, grey tweed suit and buttonhole.”

After their meal they would go for a paddle. “The sea would come over your feet and then draw away. You felt you were flying,” said Ethel.

They couldn’t afford a donkey ride but would then get on an open landau which took them to the Pleasure Beach, the funfair, and then back. They didn’t go in… as there was no money for the rides.

“When it was time to go home, we’d walk to the station. There were no toilets on the trains in them days. So, going and coming back, this little pot was always available. I think we all had a little tinkle in it. Then mother would throw it out the window.”

And she added: “We were a bit tired when we got home, but that day was really, really a lovely treat. It was like Christmas all over again.”

Dear Ethel died some years ago… but her memories live on.

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