# 11. Social life for teenage boys 1960/70's

It is unfortunate to say that there was more going on in Monkton in my teenage years, 1960/70's, than there is today. A much smaller community then and we were lucky that there were quite a few adults who were prepared to help us teenagers.

We had an under 16's football team which was run by Alan Taylor and John Hougham. Our team was usually made up of anyone who could kick a ball between the ages of 13 to 16. We were often up against teams made up entirely of 16 year olds, losing 3-0 was considered a good result.

I was never into cricket, but there was John Holloway, a man of infinite patient, who loved cricket, and loved to teach kids how to play the game.

The adult football and cricket teams were just getting started around this time, the football teams results were often on par with the juniors. Some of the juniors, like Nick Cole and Mick Dunk would often be playing in the senior teams.

Another man who did a lot for the village in the 60's and 70's was Charlie Woodcock. Charlie held the keys to the Men's Institute (the building which Monkton Under 5's now use). The building had not been used for what it was built for, for several years. At the end of the 60's he asked me if I was prepared to run it as a place where us kids could go in the evenings and weekends. Inside it had a dart board, a billiard table, a few chairs and a table, there was a small gas fire for heating in the winter. Although the property owed Charlie money, my friends and I said yes. Over the next few years we met there , especially in the winter evenings when the alternative was being stuck indoors. We paid of the debt by getting in soft drinks and boards of peanuts and cheese biscuits and selling them for a profit. We all grew up and left school in the early 70's and the keys went back to Charlie. In 1976 the building reopened as an under 5's club.

Like all teenagers, when 16/17, it was a challenge to get out and get a drink of alcohol. Canned beer was in its infancy. We once got hold of a 'Party Four' (four pints of beer in a tin can, before the days of ring pulls), we took it back to the institute to drink, but without a can opener, by the time we managed to knock a hole in, we lost nearly half of it when it erupted out. There  was no way we could get a drink in the New Inn (before it became the White Stag) as the landlord, John Barlow, knew how old we all were. We would walk to Acol, to the Crown and Sceptre, where we always got served. We tried the Sun in St Nicholas, although we were all underage, I was a year older than my mates and got served but they were not.

Then we had hardly heard of drugs, let alone taken them. We never got drunk, a couple of pints was the norm. One thing we all did  though was smoke cigarettes.

*Terry Marsh*

Originally published in the Monkton News (July 2023).