How many old Poole-ites remember where Corona Soft Drinks (Thomas and Evans) were situated? You don’t? I’ll tell you. In West Quay Road where Westover Motors now stands – opposite Sunseeker. On one side stood Pender Plating, on the other was Blue Boar Lane. The railway ran down the road from Poole Station, along Nile Row and down to the Quay.
The glass Corona bottle was unique with its flip top and four bottles filled each wooden crate. However, I’m not here to talk about the drinks, but the bond between the drayman named Fred (whom I knew well) and Corona’s beautiful Shire horse named Frank, whose stabling was between Pender Plating and Edith Lyle Hall.
As a boy in the late 1930’s, on Saturdays I had the good fortune to travel with Fred and Frank on deliveries, when Fred and I would have some fun and laughs. But one particular Saturday morning he was strangely quiet. Later he explained why.
The depot was to be relocated and mechanised, which meant the loss of his job and beloved horse.
Well, I thought, no more fun on the horse and cart, I would miss it. The time came to do the final delivery with him and to my surprise he seemed rather buoyant. How strange…. Then he proceeded to tell me the good news. All we folk in Old Poole and Hamworthy knew of ‘Walter Curtis’ who owned a horse-drawn haulage business and covered land in the Turlin Moor/Sandy Lane area. When Fred heard that Walter Curtis had purchased Frank at an auction, he decided to approach Mr Curtis for a drayman’s job. To his delight he was accepted.
Once again Fred and Frank were re-united, but their new work was very different. The Corona transport was the Rolls Royce of wagons, with red paintwork and pneumatic tyres, but the draycarts and wagons that Fred and Frank were now familiar with were basic and sported green rimmed wooden wheels.
The pair now transported timber for Sydenham’s, pebble stone for Carters, sacks of grain for Bradford’s and did various other tasks. I was so pleased to be able to travel with them again.
Sitting below Fred, him at the reins, Frank would swish his tail, badly stinging my legs – uncovered in those ‘short trousers’ days!
When the rain started, my retreat was to sit under the wagon on the rear axle housing, but I needed to be alert and lift my feet well up if the horse did a poo!
Fred once allowed me to back Frank into the shafts at the Carter site. This massive shire stood on my foot. I was in agony and my left big toe has suffered ever since!
“Frank, let’s go home,” were always Fred’s words at the end of a hard day’s work.
The horse would break into a lovely trot along Blandford Road, Hamworthy, turning into his field by a row of Almshouses, now called Old Rope Walk opposite Riglar Road.
After removing his harness, Fred would throw me up onto Frank’s back, give him a whack and the horse would go galloping off with me hanging onto his mane – the highlight of my day!
Although I‘ve not been on a horse again since those days!
