THE1950s
0067 Butlins 2 - Barman
While I was at Butlins, to make more money, in fact most of the money in earned in the time I was there, I worked on the bars in the evening. This was despite the fact that I was under the age at which I should have been allowed into a bar! I started as a barman in the Coronation Bar -- which was the most 'upper class' of the bars on the camp.
I should explain, at this stage, that the camp was divided into a number of parts. Thus the West camp, where the Coronation Bar was located, was for the ‘better class’ families. These were identified by the addresses they came from, in their cases it was as a couple from the Wirral. Accordingly, the whole atmosphere of West Camp was quite select. The cabins were still very basic, but were well-kept. They had separate toilet blocks, which was normal in those times (en-suite facilities were only for toffs!). The whole area was nicely planted, with flowers and rockeries so that the environment was quite pleasant.
The South camp was more for mere mortals, couples from the suburbs of Liverpool, and had some landscaping.
East camp on the other hand was for the yobs! Again they were selected by address, and by age, they were the single teenagers coming from the slums of Liverpool. Though their part of the camp still had the same basic huts, between them there was no hint of greenery. There was just bare beaten earth and guard patrols ran backwards and forwards between them all night long. In addition, to facilitate this, it was floodlit at night. It was very much like a German prisoner of war camp. These were the inmates from whom our own high barbed wire fences protected us!
Anyway, in the Coronation Bar I served behind the bar and rapidly developed skills in the serving of beer -- albeit from bottles, since we didn't serve any draught beer whatsoever. If an 'undesirable' came through the door, they would almost certainly ask for draft beer. When this happened, we would very carefully say “We don't have any of that” followed by "What you do is go out, turn left and you will find a bar that does just 200 yards down the road". They were never allowed any choice; since they would only spoil it for the (better class!) rest. If that approach failed, though it rarely did, we bar staff would all stare at the offender until he got so embarrassed that he left anyway. As a result it was a very select bar and we never had any trouble.
In one of the other bars, which had pillars along the bar itself, the bar staff each kept an empty bottle hidden behind the nearest pillar. The rule was if one guy grabbed you over the bar - which did happen - you grabbed the bottle and hit him over the head with it. If more than one grabbed you, you smashed the bottle on the edge of the bar and jabbed it in their faces! In another bar, with lots of small windows, the lights once went out and - by the time they came back on, five minutes later - the campers had broken every window in the place. It was a tough life.
My friend was a security guard, and the technique he was taught for dealing with the many trouble-makers was to seem to nervously clasp his hands together in front of him, but then suddenly jab their opponent (all campers were opponents!) in the pit of the stomach. As the opponent pitched forward, in agony, he then brought his fists down on the back of the trouble-makers neck to knock him out!
It was easy to identify who were going to be the worst trouble-makers; and this was routinely done by the end of their first (Saturday) evening in the camp. The ensuing routine was that, at three am the following morning, the guards would break the door of their cabin down, beat them up and throw them out of the main gates. Being Sunday, there was no bus to anywhere so they had to walk five miles or so with their luggage to Pwllheli. They didn't get their money back either. Even so, to the best of my knowledge none of them ever complained. It was what they expected of an exciting holiday! Drunks, of whom there were many more, were simply tossed into the bushes to sober up over night! It was through this mayhem that I carried the night's takings - hundreds of pounds of it - to the accounts office.
The Coronation bar itself was tastefully decorated, as a cocktail lounge. It had originally been next to one of theatres, and held the record for sales; when the audience poured out into it – it was carefully positioned at the main exit! But now it was quiet backwater, a select one. There I learned my trade. In particular I learned how to deliver a short measure. The 'correct' way to give a short measure, it turned out, was to do it right in front of the punter's nose. We used ‘optics’ to measure out the spirits and there always was some hidden before the optic finished delivering its load. We could save something like one in six or eight measures this way. We had to do this because the bar supervisor said we had to cover our losses, but I always suspected it went into other people's pockets.
More ethically, I learned to make all the various cocktails, and to do it expertly. The bar supervisor was a small woman, I guess I would now call her a girl, who was not especially attractive; but I was very attentive to her -- and everyone else thought that I was getting too close for. Eventually my uncle moved me to another bar. I suspect rumours about our behaviour were getting to him! The reality was very innocent, nothing happened between us at all. Indeed, I maintained my innocence until I met my wife; I was still a virgin when I met her. This was normal at the time, you had to 'save yourself' for your wife! The miracle was that I saved myself even at Butlins -- because so many people came to Butlins specifically lose their virginity!
I went to party soon after getting there, where there were three or four boys and three or four girls and we drank and drank all night. I later calculated I had the equivalent of 16 measures of spirits! I guess they were trying to get me drunk and 'into bed'. But I and my friend managed to get back into the staff lines without being raped. I thought we were not too drunk but, en route I was rather surprised to find him wandering around women's toilets, quaintly called 'lasses' (where the men's were called 'lads'), muttering that he could not find 'them'. I guess I was not on top form either, since it took me a few minutes to realise he was trying to find the urinals. But I got back safely to my bed, and so it seemed that I had survived that first real drinking experience.
Even when I got in to work the next day, and up to as late as ten o'clock in the morning, I felt absolutely fine. I began to wonder what people meant when they talked about hangovers. Then at ten o'clock the worst hangover I have ever had in my life struck me! I guess actually it was more like alcohol poisoning! Anyway it quite literally lasted for the best part of a week. Immediately my fellow workers realised what was happening, they sent me back to the Coronation Bar; where everyone fed me their favourite concoctions for a hangover. I guess it might have been those that prolonged it rather than the alcohol itself! Many years later I was attending a medical convention with a friend, and he got a stomach bug. His big mistake was to mention this to some of the doctors - and they each gave him a different remedy -- and he was ill for a much longer time as a result!
I enjoyed my time in The Coronation Bar. I did have something going with the supervisor, though nothing sexual. I even took a day out, to buy a record -- of a singer in the camp -- she wanted. The one I found most fascinating, though, was my dishwasher. To increase productivity we all had someone washing our glasses for us. Mine was a Welsh girl, who I thought of as a Welsh witch. I remember she had just had a baby and was drinking stout to build up her milk supply! But she was attractive in a very strange way. I could just imagine her on a Welsh hilltop playing a harp as she cast her spells!
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