Alexander and J.S. Jones

Next to the air raid shelter that once stood at the end of Ffordd Bryn Melyd there used to be a green bench with arrow-tongued serpent ironwork. Half a century ago we enjoyed sitting there to watch the world go by and one of the passing sights was a vintage car driven by a man known to the whole village—Alexander.

Alexander lived in a tin-roofed shed next to the Talargoch engine house that was near the Sea View Garage. The stories about him were legion, due in large part to his shunning the company of all but the selected few. He knew Phyllis Hughes, the Meliden Postmistress because he had shares, the details of which he kept in a little green tobacco tin that would be opened up in the Post Office and the contents discussed.

Alexander made a friend of my mother because she too came from Aberdeenshire. He was from fishing folk but moved down to Birkenhead as a youngster to serve an engineer’s apprenticeship. It was said that he started on the same day as the son of one of the bosses and was actually mistaken for the son. He was given right royal treatment until the error was discovered and then they tarred and feathered him.

His shed-house may have been part of J. S. Jones’s works on the mines. There were two rooms and a workshop with a covered outside area where he cooked his tatties in a black cauldron. Regarded as a bogie man, the children were uncertain about him and demonstrated their contempt by throwing stones onto his tin roof. Nevertheless, he was a kind man and would repair anything for anybody. On one occasion he welded my tricycle and my mother still has a memento of that visit, an 1890s edition of the Poetical Works of Robert Burns. It still automatically opens on page 155—To a Haggis! (Great chieftain of the sausage race.)

In 1961, after much cajoling he promised to attend the Meliden OAPs’ Christmas Party in the old school but had no suit to wear, so Phyllis Hughes provided him with one. He said it was too good and would sew patches on it! Alexander never arrived at the party. I seem to remember that he was in Mostyn and walked out from behind his car, was run over and killed. He is buried in Meliden. R.I.P. WILLIAM JOHN ALEXANDER died 11 December 1961 aged 75 years.

Mentioning J. S. Jones brings back memories of the 1950s Prestatyn Rotary Club Christmas Tree. It was carried on a war-surplus RAF aircraft recovery trailer provided by J. S. Jones of the mines—I think they called it a Queen Mary. When not out and about, it played carols outside the Scala but the trouble was that it could be heard inside too and Saronie, the owner, would stand outside wringing his hands.

When in motion, the huge tree lay flat and as it approached, the festive Tannoys would draw the crowds, lured no doubt by the sweets thrown by Father Christmas and his helpers who inhabited a grotto at the rear. Even before it stopped, some concealed machinery or human muscle raised the illuminated tree—which could have easily held its own on the Blackpool Promenade.