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Wednesday, December 03, 2008, 13:21
Pauline was born in Kingsmead Street in the heart of the city in November 1921. She started life, as she says, when the houses no longer belonged to the wealthy but were occupied by working class families such as her own.
But although the buildings looked pretty gloomy by today's standards, Pauline's account is anything but.
With what is obviously a sunny personality she paints a vividly colourful picture of life, first on Kingsmead Square and then a move to Avon Street to open a cafe long before anyone had even dreamed of creating a cafe society in Bath.
In Childhood Memories: Growing Up in Kingsmead and Weston Pauline – who was born Pauline Quintin – relives her schooldays with all their joys and tribulations and describes events which took place within her own family. It is very much a story of how ordinary people in Bath lived during the twenties and thirties.
The story ends at the outbreak of the Second World War when she was working in Todd's Tailoring Factory in Twerton as well as taking an active part in the work of the Red Cross.
Pauline paints a vivid picture of life on the square for young children. She says: "For us children, the square was a favourite playground. We had plenty of room to play hopscotch and happily skipped with yellow ropes that were used to tie up orange boxes which were given to us by the fruiterer. We played with our prams and dolls and we girls would hold our own if the boys came along and teased us."
At that time the street leading off Kingsmead Square was Avon Street and this was where Pauline had her second home. Her parents decided to move there to open the Alpine Cafe.
One of the best-selling items there was her mother's spotted dick selling at a halfpenny which was placed in the window on a willow pattern dish. So great was the demand for it her mother often had to make more during the day.
But one day Pauline returned home to find an ambulance outside the cafe and her mother being taken on a stretcher to hospital.
It lead to the family giving up the business and moving nearby to a house that cost 15s a week. but then the family took over the tenancy of 7 Primrose Hill at Weston.
There then follows an account of a more rural existence for the Quintin family in the wilds of Weston.
As well as a chatty description of life in Bath Pauline's book is packed with many seldom seen photographs of the city centre and the people living in it.
Childhood Memories costs £6.50 from Good Buy Books, North Parade, Mr B's Emporium in John Street, Oldfield Park Bookshop on Moorland Road, Topping &Co, in the Paragon or direct post free in the UK from Akeman Press, 58 Minster Way, Bath BA2 6RL.
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