Ultra Short & Shaped

In 1951 the girls in their last year at St Botolph’s began to opt for a hair style called Short & Shaped which the rest of us still burdened with plaits, bunches and ringlets thought enviably boyish. Wendy Selves and Jennifer Berryman both elaborately ringleted were decidedly more envious than the rest of us on account of regularly suffering the uncomfortable reality of curling rags which even my mother said was something you didn’t adjust to easily. She didn’t quite put it like that but I knew exactly what she meant because I had experienced the pain and horror of curling rags once or twice on the eve of the weddings of older cousins when it was important that I looked my best. Sleeping with them in situ on a regular basis was not something I was all that keen to try. Jennifer Berryman’s grandmother said that it took her a full half hour to prepare the ragged-up hair each night and she said it proudly adding that she didn’t mind because hair was a woman’s Crowning Glory. Jennifer herself didn’t say whether she minded or not. Wendy Selves maintained that her own hair had a natural curl in it and as a result her ringlets were not nearly as difficult to effect and maintain. Her best friend, Jean Taylor said when Wendy was out of earshot that it was a lie and Wendy’s hair was as straight as her own.

Molly from number 31 went to Northfleet Secondary Modern a whole year before me because of a well-timed birthday and during the week before she was due to start she joined the trickle of schoolgirls waiting for the attentions of Miss Joyce at Bareham’s in Northfleet High Street clutching a two shilling piece in her hand. I was inordinately impressed later that day, greatly admiring her newly styled hair which was the shortest and most shaped Bareham’s could deliver. Later my mother said it looked altogether too boyish for her liking and she was surprised that Miss Joyce would do such a thing on a child who didn’t know any better. But Molly did seem to know better and was delighted with her new style and her own mother said as long as she was happy that was the main thing as she was the one who was going to live with it. Predictably my mother sniffed several times and said not for the first time that some people had no idea as to how to bring up kiddies. All in all it didn’t seem the right time to campaign for the restyling of my own hair. In any case she had already reminded me several times that the recent Bareham’s price rise for children from one and sixpence to two shillings was Daylight Robbery especially since Beryl’s in Dover Road were still holding their prices down.

By the time Molly had been at the Secondary Modern for a month her own Ultra-Short & Shaped had grown enough for it to be cautiously admired even by some of the staff and she was told she had a beautifully shaped head that leant itself admirably to modern styles. The boost to her confidence was enormous and she could quite see why my primary aim in life became to sport a similar style especially when the main female contenders in St Botolph’s Eleven Plus exam that year began to follow the example she had set. One by one Jacqueline Haskell, Brenda Head, Pearl Banfield and Jean Taylor made visits to Bareham’s or Beryl’s after school and emerged with Ultra-Short & Shaped heads. They had mothers who were either aware of how important it was to be as similar as possible to every other girl of like age or, as I was firmly told, had money to burn. I knew we didn’t have money to burn even though my father was not due to die from Acute Hepatitis until December and that was some months into the future. The other thing I knew without question was that there was not much point in appealing to him because unless I campaigned for books or trips of an edifying nature such as a Saturday afternoon visit to Rochester Castle, he wasn’t ever much help to me. My cousin Pat who was a year my senior and whose father had already died at the end of the war by falling off a balcony in Italy in an inebriated state, frequently pointed out that fathers were not worth all the trouble they caused and she was very glad she didn’t have one. Then I felt obliged to argue with her although I did so half-heartedly being quite aware that my own was not altogether ideal due to his ongoing obsession with both education and Fancy Women. These fixations caused both the women in his life, namely my mother and myself to view him with some misgivings.

As far as hairstyles were concerned in any case Pat and I had very different ideas as to what was worthy of admiration as since the age of eight her own straight blonde tresses had been regularly subjected to what Aunt Martha, her mother said was a Wella Cold Wave. This meant that Pat’s head sported a halo of tight curls for several months before it grew a little, became frizzy and not nearly as attractive and the whole cycle was repeated. According to most of my aunts this attention to Pat’s hair cost a fortune and definitely indicated that she was Spoilt Rotten. My mother said it was only affordable because the positive outcome of the unfortunate death of Uncle Paddy had been a War Pension which meant luxuries could be afforded in their household. She did not of course say this directly to Aunt Martha. Other luxuries Pat had were hand knitted silk boleros edged with angora and the regular home delivery of the Dandy and Beano comics. Apparently the home delivery confirmed that Aunt Martha had more money than sense. I was definitely envious of Pat a lot of the time but not because of the Wella Cold Waves and only marginally because of the angora edged boleros. The home delivery of the comics definitely caused me some resentment because although my father was all in favour of reading matter, comics were not included.

When my occasional friend Margaret Snelling arrived at our house one Saturday afternoon to show off her new bike and sporting her new Short & Shaped hair I was at a very low ebb and beginning to feel extremely infantile compared with my peers. Having plaits that when unplaited became a mane of hair that almost reached my waist was no longer the source of any degree of pride no matter how often people mentioned Crowning Glories. When I burst into tears after Margaret had gone home my mother said there was no use crying like a baby simply because I didn’t have a bike and refused to believe me when I said that I didn’t want a bike, all I wanted was to have my hair cut. My father tentatively suggested that surely it wouldn’t be the end of the world for me to have a bike if I should actually make him proud by passing the Eleven Plus. But my mother looked very doubtful and said she didn’t think I really had what it would take to become a Grammar School girl. He snorted a bit and told her that in his opinion I was as Bright as a Button and that The Grammar should be glad to have me. My own opinion was that what I wanted most in life was not a bike but Short & Shaped hair and to go to The Secondary Modern with Molly. But my opinion was not sought.

Over the next few days my father talked a lot about me being able to cycle to school and saving on bus fares and dropping into The Rainbow Stores to talk about time payment with them. My mother continued to express doubts and said a bike was an expense they could well do without and in case he hadn’t noticed she was still saving up for a budgie in a cage like the one the Bennetts of Buckingham Road had. She fancied a blue and yellow one because they were said to be good talkers.

The Rainbow Stores had always sold bikes and was opened in Stone Street in 1921 by Arthur Ernest Barnes who later branched out into radios and television sets and provided an excellent after sales service. Later still you could buy almost anything at The Rainbow and as Hire Purchase was becoming extremely popular and the selection of household goods impressive the business went from strength to strength. At the time of which I speak, however, I was much more interested in a Short & Shaped haircut than anything else although Molly said that was just silly and I should definitely accept the idea of a bike if one was being offered. Both the haircut and the blue and yellow budgie being saved up for could wait for a more auspicious moment. But of course I didn’t see it quite that way. It was all very well for her with her Short & Shaped hair firmly in place and the regular upkeep of it now accepted.

Eventually I was allowed to have my Crowning Glory cut to just above my shoulders and even my grandmother shook her head and told my mother she hoped she wouldn’t regret it because it was hair that helped to make a girl beautiful and some needed more help than others. My new semi-short hair was tied with ribbons into unattractive bunches and I did not feel that much progress had been made toward the modern world and of course hated them. In the interim my father announced that he had come to an arrangement with The Rainbow and if I passed the Eleven Plus I would definitely be getting a bike. He began to give me tests in arithmetic and the capitals of countries on Sunday afternoons which was a horrifying development, well at least the arithmetic was.
Despite the extra coaching my mother was proved right and I was not destined to become an exam success and so did not become the owner of a bike. I felt she took some degree of pleasure in telling me that I had broken my father’s heart. Back in those days parents were less indulgent than they are now and actually meant what they said. My cycling future had depended one hundred per cent upon academic success. However, this was not as traumatic to me as it might have been had I been born fifty years into the future.

It was not until after my father’s sudden death that I actually found myself in Beryl’s of Dover Road with two shillings in my pocket because they had now matched Bareham’s prices, having been instructed to have something done about the length of my hair that now hung untidily about my shoulders, still too short to properly plait. Controlling my excitement I told my mother that I would definitely make sure I came back with it much shorter and much tidier. She, being still distracted by the recent bereavement, barely looked up from the afternoon tea session she was sharing with Mrs Bennett from Buckingham Road. Half nodding she went back to the discussion on the shock a sudden death brings with it and how she was in a way relieved with regard to my exam failure though my poor father had set his heart on The Grammar. The problem was that I definitely favoured her side of the family rather than his. Her family had never been good at passing tests. It was in the blood and there wasn’t much that could be done about it. Mrs Bennett nodded in agreement and said her Joan was exactly the same.

Beryl of Dover Road settled me into the freshly adjusted chair and said she supposed I wanted Short & Shaped like all the other local girls. It had been all the rage for nearly a year and certainly had kept her busy. I told her Yes, I wanted it as Short & Shaped as possible – Ultra-Short & Ultra-Shaped and as thoroughly modern as she could make it. So that is what she did. On the way home I felt distinctly nervous but elated and strangely light without my thick hair. I had prickly armpits but I admired my thoroughly modern self in every shop window. New bikes and going to The Grammar might be all very well for some but Short & Shaped was more my cup of tea!

Cups of tea were still being consumed at number 28 and Mrs Bennett observed that my hair was certainly very short but now much tidier. My mother absently agreed with her and then said that I looked more grown up somehow. Well with my father gone I would need to grow up a bit and take on more responsibility, perhaps look after my brother more she added. Mrs Bennett said you could never tell what bereavement might do to a child but at eleven it was probably time I grew up a bit. Then they began to talk more about budgies, blue and yellow ones, that were reliable talkers.