by Jim Wight
Many of the ‘gentry of the corner’ employed other means of earning a little supplementary cash, one way of which was by singing. The term is used in its loosest sense for there was little in the way of melody, there were seldom any words, and the singers were usually well under the influence of alcohol. These characters, however, gave their all, howling and droning away on the bare ground below the tenements. They were known as ‘back court singers’ and the occupants of the houses would throw down money to them. This was either in appreciation of the quality of music they were hearing or, more commonly, to gain some relief from the long, dreary wails issuing from below. They also ‘performed’ in the public houses in the city, staring unsteadily into a glass or two of whisky – groaning away interminably with no one taking the slightest bit of notice. It was just part of the scene in a typical Glasgow bar.
One of the corner boys had a unique sideline; he bit off puppies’ tails. He was a long, lean character with a patch over one eye, who hung around the Elderslie Bar, a public house in Yoker. One day, Alf enquired after his services as he had heard that this particular gentleman was a master of his craft. The charge was sixpence per pup but young Alf thought that it was half a crown – five times the actual sum. Having spotted him in the centre of a crowd of men on the street corner, he went up and asked nervously, ‘Please, sir, my friend has a pup that needs its tail off. Will you do it for him for half a crown?’
The man’s eye widened as he gazed down on the young boy. Then he looked around delightedly at his friends before stating his terms. ‘Hauf a croon? Tell ’im fer hauf a croon Ah’ll bite its fuckin’ heid aff!’ A chorus of laughing and spitting followed. The future veterinary surgeon did not seek further assistance from the one-eyed man.
During his future years in veterinary practice, Alf developed a gentle, sympathetic approach to his customers and to his patients – a quality, one suspects, that owed little to his experiences on the street corners of Glasgow.
The fulfilling times Alf spent in his boyhood were not confined to Glasgow. He enjoyed vast numbers of holidays. In the summer of 1933, his diary relates that he went away no less than four times – to West Kilbride on the Ayrshire coast, to a guest house on the Isle of Arran, on a camping holiday beside Loch Fyne, and to Sunderland to visit his relatives. The following summer, he went to Llandudno in North Wales, to South Devon to stay with an uncle, to Wiltshire to stay with an aunt, even to stay for a week in a London hotel – and, of course, to see the family in Sunderland.
With so many uncles, aunts and cousins in Sunderland, Alf had a busy time visiting them all, but it was certainly no hardship. When he needed cheering up, his Uncle Matt never failed to brighten the day, as did his cousin Nan Wilkins, daughter of his Auntie Jinny. Nan, who was like an older sister to Alf, was the cousin he saw the most of during his life.
In addition to the time spent with his relatives in Sunderland, there were holidays spent with family and friends in the high Pennine country of northern England, Appleby and Alston being favourite locations. They all stayed in guest houses or small hotels, and photographs taken at that time show the amazing size of these gatherings. They loved the wild but beautiful country of the hills and dales; it provided a relaxed environment which contrasted so much with that around their home close to industrial Sunderland.
Alf’s parents were very different in their attitude to holidays. Apart from these breaks in the Pennine country, Pop rarely took a holiday and was quite happy to stay at home with his piano. But Hannah, a dynamic woman who enjoyed travelling, was the opposite. As a result, mother and son spent many holidays with each other.
Alf, who worshipped his mother, was fully aware of the sacrifices she was making for him. Not many women in those days contributed to the family finances but she was an exception; she was the driving force in the family and Alf felt a deep and lasting respect for her. However, their relationship was complex, one that, throughout all the years I observed them together, seemed to fall short of open affection. He rarely appeared to be relaxed when in her company, suggesting an inability to display his feelings fully towards her, whereas with his father there existed an obvious and mutual fondness. Hannah Wight was certainly a force to be reckoned with. She dominated the family home, making many of the important decisions, while Pop seemed content to do as he was told. She was a lady with many fine qualities, but could never be described as a warm person. I, myself, remember finding her difficult to embrace.
There is no doubt, however, that she thought the world of her only son – and he of her. Alf’s adulation of his mother shows in some of the entries in his diaries: ‘There’s Mother laughing just now. It is the world’s greatest tonic to me when I know she’s happy.’ The mature Alfred Wight was certainly not a cold man. He displayed, to a remarkable degree, qualities of warmth and genuine concern for others, and I feel sure that these qualities were apparent in the young Alf, too. Perhaps, as a young man, his reverence towards, and concern for his mother was his way of seeking affection from her – something she was unable to give openly in return.
Alf was a boy who packed an enormous amount into his life but he never lost sight of the ambition that transcended all others. He was determined to do well at school and gain the necessary higher grades to qualify for entrance to veterinary college. And this he did. He left Hillhead High School on 29 June 1933, with a Higher Education Leaving Certificate asserting that he had obtained three highers – English (including Literature and History), Latin and French. To his amazement, he also attained a pass in Mathematics at lower level. He achieved results of 67% in English, 53% in French and 48% in Latin. His illness at the beginning of his final year decreed that he did not attain the marks in these examinations that he had worked so hard for, but they were good enough. He had achieved his goal.
He wrote in the diary on 30 June 1933: ‘What a day! What a day! I awoke this morning a poverty stricken youth and I am going to bed a rich man. This morning we had the prize giving and I got 4s 6d for being runner up in the championship. I then took my departure from Hillhead for ever. I feel sort of sorry to leave the place and all the pleasant things connected with it but, on the other hand, I am glad to have got my highers at the age of 16 years and 8 months and to be able to get on with my job. I’ll join the F. P. (former pupils) Club, of course, and keep up my connection with the school … Afterwards, Mother presented me with ten bob for getting my highers!’
His parents were extremely proud that their son had gained admission to the veterinary college, and all the relatives in Sunderland and every friend for miles around were posted with the news. One day, shortly after the results came through, the coalman was filling the bunker and Hannah could not resist telling him about her son’s achievement.
‘We’ve just had some good news,’ she said.
The coalman paused. He looked at her and Pop. ‘Aye, that’s great, Mrs Wight! Whit’s the news?’
‘My son is going to go to the veterinary college!’ she replied, bursting with pride. ‘He is going to become a veterinary surgeon!’
Bright eyes shone out of the grimy face. ‘Ach!’ he replied, ‘some tart’ll get a haud o’im!’
In one of the last diary entries written while he was still at school, Alf wrote: ‘It’s a blinking nuisance having to write this blessed book in the early hours of the morning but mebbe when I’m Prime Minister, I’ll sell the copyright for £5000!’ Little did the young man realise, as he left Hillhead High School to set out on the next step of his education at Glasgow Veterinary College, that many years later he would have a copyright to exceed all his expectations.
Chapter Four
The veterinary profession today is enjoying a wave of enormous popularity. At the time of writing this biography, there are three different television programmes currently showing about veterinary activities – all achieving high viewing ratings. James Herriot has been held to be largely responsible for the public’s seemingly inexhaustible fascination for all things veterinary.
This is a predictable opinion as the television series ‘All Creatures Great and Small’, first shown twenty years ago, was a runaway success and was enjoyed by millions. James Herriot’s books, the inspiration behind that series, are widely believed to have been the main reason for the spotlight that now seems to be permanently upon the veterinary surgeon.
My father, however, repeatedly expressed his opinion that he was not solely responsible for the high profile of his profession and the headlong rush of young people entering the veterinary schools. When I applied for entry in 1960, ten years before the first Herriot book was published, there were, even then, three to four hundred applicants for around forty-five places on the course. With the general public’s enduring fascination for animals, a career in veterinary medicine has been a natural choice for an ever-increasing number of young people. The enormous popularity of his books may have inevitably improved the image of the profession, but there are other factors involved and I agree with my father’s assertion: James Herriot is only partly responsible. I feel sorry for the youngsters nowadays who aspire to be veterinary surgeons. The competition to enter the veterinary schools is intense, with dauntingly high academic achievements needed – three ‘A’ Levels in the science subjects, with at least two at ‘A’ grade. Many listen with envy when I tell them that, back in 1960, I needed only two ‘A’ Levels to gain entry to Glasgow University Veterinary School. Admittedly, they had to be in the science subjects – chemistry, physics and biology – but an ordinary pass was enough and it was a modest challenge in comparison with the ferocious competition of today. I wonder what they would think of the requirements in my father’s day!
Alfred Wight gained admission to Glasgow Veterinary College in 1933 with passes in English, French and Latin – hardly ideal subjects for a future scientist, but the situation then was very different. With comparatively few wishing to enter the veterinary profession during the years of the depression, the veterinary schools were only too pleased to welcome anyone to fill the courses. While still at Hillhead School, he had telephoned the veterinary college to tell them that, provided he gained the basic entry requirements, he would like to pursue a career in veterinary medicine.
The principal himself, Dr Whitehouse, had answered the telephone. ‘Good!’ he had replied. ‘When can you start?’
At the time of Alf’s entry in 1933, Glasgow was unique among the veterinary schools of the British Isles. It was receiving no financial aid from the government, and its survival depended solely upon the fees received from the students, together with local authority grants and donations from various organisations. A government report of 1925 had decreed that only one veterinary school was needed in Scotland, resulting in the grant upon which the school depended being ruthlessly terminated. Glasgow Veterinary College defiantly carried on functioning through the sheer determination of the chairman of the governors, Professor John Glaister, and the principal, Dr A. W. Whitehouse. As a result, it took a fierce pride in its very existence, and the students emerged from the five-year course feeling a real sense of achievement.
Alf received a Carnegie Bursary of £18 a year together with a Glasgow Education Authority grant of £10 towards his fees, but the real cost was much more. Books, materials and living expenses multiplied the drain upon the students’ resources many times over. As at Hillhead, Alf received the full support of his parents throughout the six years he spent at the veterinary college – years that were to provide him with unforgettable memories and life-long friendships.
He began his education at the college on 26 September 1933 and he wrote in his diary at that time: ‘A momentous day! This morning I started in the veterinary college. Crowd of new fellows waiting outside – seasoned veterans swaggering in – stamping of feet in lecture rooms – big thrill when I went into a room full of dead animals. There’s some queer fish here!’
He was soon to discover that the big difference between Hillhead School and the veterinary college was that, here, no one seemed to care whether he did any work. In keeping with the regimented discipline at Hillhead School, his teachers had seemed fiercely determined that he should pass his exams, with the reputation of the school being at stake. At the veterinary college, however, the whole atmosphere was almost one of apathy. During his first term, large amounts of time, especially in the afternoons, were spent playing table tennis in the common-room, visiting the cinema, or just going home to do exactly as he liked.
This was not really surprising. The college was only too pleased to have the students there, paying their fees; if they did not work and took fifteen years to complete a five-year course, that was their problem. In fact, there was little incentive to qualify since there were very few jobs waiting for them when they eventually achieved their goal. For the student whose parents were wealthy and willing enough to continue their support, the way of life at Glasgow Veterinary College was an attractive proposition. To some of the students, money did not seem a problem and they did, indeed, take up to ten, twelve or more years to complete the course. Some of them never made it at all, finishing up in a variety of jobs. In the years following his qualification, Alf used to see some of his old college chums during his visits to Glasgow; one he saw serving in a textile shop, and he was startled to see another of his old pals directing the traffic at Charing Cross. Some of these long-serving students became such a part of the establishment that when they eventually took their leave, Dr Whitehouse and his staff bade them farewell with a tear in the eye. In the introduction to his book James Herriot’s Dog Stories, published many years later, Alf described the professor’s reaction to the departure of one of these ‘permanent students’:
One chap, McAloon by name, had been there for fourteen years but had managed to get only as far as the second year in the curriculum. He held the record at the time but many others were into double figures … The fourteen-year man was held in particularly high esteem and when he finally left to join the police force, he was sadly missed. Old Dr Whitehouse, who lectured in anatomy, was visibly moved at the time. ‘Mr McAloon,’ he said, putting down a horse’s skull and pointing with his probe at an empty space, ‘has sat on that stool for eleven years. It is going to be very strange without him.’
The building in which Alf received his veterinary education was an uninspiring one, situated on a steep hill on the corner of Buccleuch Street in the Cowcaddens District of Glasgow. This old establishment, formerly a pumping station for Glasgow Corporation, was built of dull stone with rows of tired-looking windows, and bore more resemblance to a high-security prison than a recognised seat of learning. Gloomy tenement buildings looked down on the college from all sides, and there was not a sign of any greenery for as far as the eye could see.
Despite its forbidding appearance, there was a warmth and friendliness within those grim walls. Alf felt a great affection for his old college, but one of the interesting things about the James Herriot books is the absence of stories about his life there. In the years following publication of The Lord God Made Them All in 1981, he swore that he was not going to write another one. This disappointed me, as I knew it would his fans, and I often reminded him that he still had plenty of material left, including his years as a veterinary student. Apart from a handful of people, everyone was under the impression that he had written nothing about those days apart from the section in the introduction to James Herriot’s Dog Stories. This is far from the truth.
In the early 1960s, when he first began writing in earnest, he wrote a series of stories, some of which were based on his experiences at Glasgow Veterinary College and which he pieced together into a novel. The abandoned typescript, which lay forgotten for many years, has been very valuable in nudging my memories of the veterinary college experiences that he so often recounted to us. In this novel, which was written in the third person, he called himself ‘James Walsh’.
After only three weeks at the veterinary college Walsh knew his life had changed. He had thought that learning to be a vet would be a kind of extensio
n to his schooldays with the same values holding good and the same scholastic atmosphere. True, it would be rather a slummy extension because his first sight of the college had been a shock: a low, seedy building covered half heartedly in peeling, yellowish paint crouching apologetically amongst grime blackened, decaying apartment houses. In Victorian times the district had been the residential quarter of the prosperous city merchants and many of the houses had imposing frontages and pillared entrances but now, it was a forgotten backwater, the haunt of broken down actors, purveyors of dubious trades and pale, stooping women.
It was rumoured that the college had once been the stables for the horses which drew the first tram cars and there was no doubt that the outside appearance of the place lent weight to the theory. A single arch led into the yard around which the classrooms and laboratories were grouped, rather like a lot of converted stables and it was under this arch that Walsh first met his fellow students. His first impression was that they did not look like students at all, at least he couldn’t see any fresh faced young men with blazers and bright scarves around their necks. Later, he found that many of them were countrymen, farmers’ sons, some from the valleys of Forth and Clyde and a large sprinkling from the Northern Highlands and it probably explained the tendency towards dun coloured hairy tweeds and big, solid boots. Two turbaned Sikhs provided an almost violent contrast and the first year intake was completed by a solitary, frightened looking little girl.
There were no frills. No cool cloisters to pace in, no echoing, picture-lined corridors, no lofty, panelled dining hall. There was a common room with a few rickety chairs and a battered grand piano which was mainly used as a card table and a hatch in the corner which served tea, meat pies and the heaviest apple tarts in Scotland. This was the social nerve centre of the whole building and all functions were held there.
