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Mar 2022

Last Updated: 05/03/2022

Community

Roller skating, Woolies and Carrington's: Memories of the Harrogate diaspora

by Thomas Barrett

| 06 Mar, 2022

There are Harrogatonians living in almost every corner of the globe. Five of them tell the Stray Ferret about why they left, their favourite haunts in Harrogate from back in the day, and whether they would ever return.

For anyone who has moved away from their hometown it will always have a special pull.

There are Harrogatonians living in almost every corner of the globe.

Five of them told the Stray Ferret about why they left, their favourite haunts in Harrogate from back in the day, and whether they would ever return:

Hilary Bottomley: Germany since 1988

I initially left in 1982 to study modern languages at university. It wasn’t until 1988 that I got a job in Germany and moved away from Harrogate permanently.

What I miss most about living in Harrogate are the people and their warm and friendly nature. Germans are much more formal and reserved.

For example, it would be unthinkable to get on a bus here and strike up a conversation with your fellow passengers, whereas that always used to happen to me in Harrogate. Germans find it much harder to let their barriers down.

When I was still at Harrogate Grammar School, I had a Saturday job as a sales assistant at Woolworths on Cambridge Street.

I remember working on the front cash desk and being able to listen to the singles being played at the record counter. The girl who worked on the music counter was a fan of The Police, so even now whenever I hear the song “Message in a Bottle”, I’m immediately transported back to my early days at Woolies.

Meanwhile, down in the basement, the boys who worked in the stockroom would start having loo roll fights the minute they were left unsupervised, so you’d often have to dodge a flying pack of Izal toilet paper whenever you ventured down there.

I also used to love going to Annabella’s nightclub at the base of Copthall Towers (now The Exchange) on the nights when they played rock music and heavy metal.

I was only just 17 and looked even younger, so I went to all the trouble of having a silver pendant engraved with a false date of birth in case my age was ever queried. In actual fact, the bouncers didn’t take their job too seriously and I always got in without any questions asked.

Lisa Sullivan: Florida, USA since 1990

I studied for my A-levels at Harrogate Grammar School. Unfortunately, I wasn’t very academic so I ended up failing my A-level exams, which meant I was unable to go to university in London, as planned.

However, I was restless to leave Harrogate. Fortuitously, a friend from HGS offered me the opportunity to spend the summer of 1990 in the US working at a summer camp. I jumped at the opportunity.

At the end of the summer when it came time to come back to Harrogate, I decided I didn’t want to return home. Instead, I wangled my way into staying in the US. 32 years later I’m still living in America!

Failing my exams at 18 felt like the end of the world. However, if I had passed my A-levels I would have attended university in London and my life would have been very different. I’m a firm believer that when one door closes, another one opens.

I live in Jupiter, which is a relatively non-touristy town on the east coast of Florida. Many well-known people have made it their home over the years like Burt Reynolds, Tiger Woods and Olivia Newton-John. The beaches are unspoiled, the water is aquamarine and there are many restaurants on the water. Dining by the water while the sun is shining is an enjoyable way of life in this part of the world.

Over the years I have contemplated moving back to be close to family. What stopped me from moving back were my pets: I didn’t want to risk transporting my dogs across the Atlantic.

I’ve been in Florida too long! Sadly, after living in the US for 32 years, I have come to the realisation that the US is my home.

I worked at various places around the town, waitressed at Pinocchio’s restaurant and the Damn Yankee; bartended at Legends nightclub, and helped in my parents’ wool and clothing shop on Cheltenham Parade.

When I wasn’t working, I hung out at discos at the Royal Baths, the Chequers pub, or at Picasso’s nightclub. I spent Sunday mornings at the roller skating events in the gym of Rossett High school, watched my school friends breakdance in Harrogate town center, or drove around town in my banana yellow car. Thinking back to those times always brings a smile to my face!

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Graham Steele - Maryland, USA since 1997

I loved the Valley Gardens. My dad used to take me to play on the swings and slides, and as I got older, I played 9 hole golf. This was my weekend treat.

We also used to go to the little pond next to the ice cream stand and play with sailboats. I can still smell the sulphur from the stream that ran down the side of the gardens and the little path that used to run down the side of it. The Pinewoods was also fun too, me and my brother used to ride our bikes up through there and play French cricket.

As I got older I loved the nightlife around Harrogate. Fridays and Saturdays were always buzzing and there were so many unique pubs in such a small square footage.

I enjoyed The Rat and Parrott, West Park and the Blues Bar. Then there was Carrington’s, which was a Harrogate icon for so long. I also loved the uniqueness of the shops around the town, no big chain stores, local and friendly.

When I was younger, Saturday mornings at the Odeon was my highlight, watching westerns or kids shows.

The Crow’s Nest on Knaresborough Road and Graveley’s has some fond memories and of course who can forget Pinocchio’s? Bettys has always been a constant but was too civilized when I was young. Today I order from Bettys every Christmas, it's my piece of home.

What do I like about the US is it's so diverse and a melting pot of different cultures, foods and ideas. The US also offers plenty of opportunities to make something of yourself. People here work hard and play hard and depending on where you are there is some beautiful scenery.

Unfortunately, I have not been back to Harrogate much as I wanted, probably about four times in the last 25 years. There was so much to see over here and it was expensive to fly back, especially with two kids in tow, but you cannot touch God's county.

My favourite memory was going to The Great Yorkshire Show. It was always something I loved to look forward to.

Gemma Abdullah: Cyprus since 2004

I left Harrogate in 2004 after the birth of my daughter and emigrated to North Cyprus to try something new. I had always fancied living abroad, trying a new language and embracing a new culture. When my parents moved over here two years before, it seemed the right time.

Most of all I miss my daughter. She lived in North Cyprus her whole life and is fluent in Turkish. In 2020 she flew back to the UK to further her studies. We are so close and this has been incredibly hard to come to terms with, I miss her desperately.

Living in North Cyprus offers me and my husband a much more relaxed and less stressful lifestyle. It's a very slow pace here, where you have time for long lazy lunches with friends and family and enjoy a much simpler less fast pace way of life. We have our own olive grove so this has been interesting to learn how to harvest these.

We do still visit the UK regularly. Primarily to see my daughter and family, but also to just get a fix of civilisation for a short while. We tend to come back for Christmas as it's just never the same here. I couldn't live in the UK again now, it's too much hustle and bustle for me.

Harrogate will always hold a very special place in my heart. I have a lifetime of memories from living in Pannal as a child, going to school and college and living there right up to being 28.

My Nanna is also born and bred in Harrogate and is now 96. She used to drive me and my brother around the Stray around this time of year to see the spring flowers in all their glory!

My beloved Dad, who sadly died when I was only 7, let me have my first shandy at the Black Swan in Burnbridge.

There is a lifetime of memories!

Susan Croft: Christchurch, New Zealand since 2002

I first left Harrogate when I was 24 but I only moved to Ripon, where I lived for six years with my children.

My family were all still in Harrogate. I moved to Ripon to be near a very dear friend who helped me through my early years as a single parent of two babies. Then I moved to Cambridge when I was 30. This was for my career, a very good move in that respect, but we never felt settled there.

We lived in Cambridge for 12 years and I had met my second husband while living in Ripon, so Cambridge was where we raised our children. In 2002 our children were grown up and had left home and I was a school principal. I didn't enjoy my work by that time, it was stressful and I missed teaching and teacher training.

We loved the outdoors life and so we decided to go to New Zealand for two years. I got the perfect job there and we love where we live.

We're right on the ocean, with the water just at the end of our road . We have hills behind our house where we can go walking for hours, and the mountains are our backdrop.

Covered in snow, they look beautiful against the sea and a blue sky. It's a 90-minute drive to the mountains. Unfortunately a couple of huge earthquakes destroyed the city in 2011 and 11 years on, we're still in demolition and rebuild mode. It takes a very long time to rebuild a city.

As for Harrogate, I miss my family there, of course. I miss the Valley Gardens, the Nidd Gorge, and the surrounding dales. Until Covid hit, I flew home three times each year, spending about four and a half months in England.

My time there was split between the midlands where our children and grandchildren live and Harrogate. Because of Covid, I haven't seen my family for two years and the separation is awful. My health is quite precarious and the journey home is difficult for me so once the Covid situation settles down, we will probably move back to England.