Wicksteed Park memories: My First World War veteran grandfather helped dig Wicksteed Lake

One family's long connection with Wicksteed Park
Five generations of Roy's family have worked at Wicksteed ParkFive generations of Roy's family have worked at Wicksteed Park
Five generations of Roy's family have worked at Wicksteed Park

Roy Tebbutt's family has a long and close connection with Wicksteed Park throughout its 99-year history.

Writing to the Northants Telegraph, Roy, 76, said he was sad to hear of the park's current situation after it announced that Wicksteed Park Limited had gone into administration.

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Roy said: "I started (working) at Wicksteed on Good Friday in 1959 at the end of my first term at Kettering Technical College aged 15, the third of five generations of my family to work at the park.

"During the next seven summer holidays and weekends the park would be a part of my life and education and what I jokingly later called my 'first university'."

The first generation of Roy's family to work at the park was his grandfather.

Roy said: "My grandfather, Fred, returned from World War One a broken man. Having been gassed and wounded in the hand, digging Wicksteed Lake in the 1920s was easier than digging trenches under fire.

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"In later years, Fred would leave Wellington Street at 5.30am during the summer months to pick up litter in the park. In the afternoons he would stand on the wooden pontoon at the bottom of the water chute and guide the chute trolley back on to its rails as it was pulled from the water full of happy visitors.

"He would then walk home via a local pub."

Roy's mother also worked at the park, he said: "My mother went to work at Wicksteed mainly to pay for me to stay on at the tech to do my O and A-levels.

"Having started in the Party Room serving tea and cakes, she moved to be in charge of the wardrobe, kitting park employees out in their outfits in the summer and making sure all the laundry was clean for the tables at the winter dinner dances."

On Roy's first day of working he remembers washing down Picnic Corner before settling into a routine, he said: "On Saturday mornings we would arrive at 9am to make the outside staff tea and make sure Ralph, the picnic manager, was comfortable before us boys busied ourselves to read the paper, play chess, or did a little bit of tidying and cleaning until the South Room waitresses arrived.

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"At 10.30am the girls, mostly sixth formers at the high school, breezed in through the main picnic entrance while we looked on longingly.

"We would then make picnics for the children who came on coaches to the park and prepare the tea urns for the lunchtime rush."

Making enough tea for the park was a big effort, Roy said: "On Whit Monday in 1961, we made over 1,000 gallons of tea by brewing and refilling 67 fifteen gallon copper urns from 10am until 6.15pm."

Even during quiet days, Roy said there was plenty to do from learning Latin verbs from a friend and games of chess.

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In winters, Roy worked as a waiter at dinners and dances and could serve up to 200 people in a night before serving breakfast at 2am.

One of Roy's last jobs before going to university was to help Ralph, the picnic manager, to scrub the ballroom floor after a summer of spillages when it was used as a tearoom.

Over time, things started to change at Wicksteed. Roy said: "Times were changing. Other parks and package holidays were attracting people away from Wicksteed.

"When I returned from VSO (Volunteer Service Overseas) in Fiji for the 1964 season, both I and Wicksteed had changed.

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"The old picnic counter had been renovated into a self-service cafeteria and a new modern gas boiler for making tea had been installed.

"The self-service counter was relatively successful but the attraction of jugs of tea had gone. The number of people visiting the park also seemed to drop as other venues and foreign holidays became more popular."

Roy's nieces and grand-nephews followed in his steps by working at Wicksteed, which has provided seasonal employment for many teens in Kettering over the years.

Roy said: "When I visited in 2016, I realised how much the park had changed, almost 100 years since it had opened."

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Do you think you are Wicksteed Park's number one fan? Share your memories of the park and what it means to you at [email protected].

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