Joan Howard's memories
By Sarah Woods
I was born at 1pm in Pier Place at my grandparent’s house. My name is Joan Naomi Howard. We moved to Kitchener Road until I was 7 years old, we then moved to Albion Rd. My first school was Northgate Infants, but when we moved to Albion Rd, I went to Nelson School, I didn't stay there long as I went on to Priory Girls School.
My mother’s maiden name was Elsie May Watson; my father was Arthur Edwin Howard. When he left school he worked at Hills Restaurant on Kings Street and then he got a job on the dining cars for the railway until the general strike. After several months on the dole (out of work) he got a job in Grouts Silk Factory, where he stayed until retired. Locally I had two sets of grandparents and great grandparents. Mother's parents lived in Pier Place and fathers on Nelson Rd Central.
In 1939 I worked the summer holidays at the Floral Hall Gorleston, selling ice creams and cigarettes around the swimming pool. I worked 7 days a week for 7/6p, then war broke out. PriorySchool had to go to SwindellSchool because we had no air raid shelters. We could only go half days, which was OK for us. I was 14 that October and left school that Christmas; I got a job a Grout's Silk Factory. I can't remember how long I was there, but I recall the German Nazi Propaganda Minister, Lord Haw Haw as he was called, saying on the radio that the German Armies would be picking tulips from the gardens on Great Yarmouth sea front.
My grandparents, auntie, my mother and I were evacuated to Bradford. I found work in a woollen mill, but it was hard work for a 14 year old girl. We didn't stay there long before we came back to Great Yarmouth. I went back to my job in Grout's, that's when the real war started. The factory was bombed and there were several near misses. Once a week we had to do what was known as 'fire watch', we had camp beds set up around the billiard table in the factory's clubhouse. It wasn't all doom and gloom though as there were soldiers billeted in the Garibaldi Hotel and lots of us girls and soldiers used to go out dancing. I met my husband at the Goode's Hotel.
I was surprised to learn his name was Derek Howard, so I didn't have to change my name when we got married.