Not like it is today sadly but back then things most young kids can only dream about seeing were common place for me on a daily basis. The number of different animals that I was surrounded by were astounding, magical and captivating. Even if a bit smelly at times?! lol.
What started out as a Tropical Fish store with no name, later someone painted S Haswell & Sons on the the store window, soon diversified into just about everything.
Before long it caught the attention of the media and both ITV and BBC entered the shop with a view to filming the Tarantulas that resided inside its dark and cavernous interior. Miranda in particular the resident Red Knee Tarantula.
Many newspaper articles adorned the tabloids of my father holding a Glass case housing Miranda and before long TV shows would feature all three of them. One in particular was a program called Today with Eamonn Andrews, of This Is Your Life fame, and Monty Modlin. The TV spot featured Monty Modlin leaving the jewellers, owned by Manny, next door and entering my fathers shop. As the door closed the camera gradually zoomed in on a notice that was centrally placed on the shop door stating... WARNING DEADLY TARANTULAS GUARD THE PREMISES, or something to that affect.
Once inside Monty Modlin speaks to my dad about the different animals to be discovered and my late grandmother, Joyce, stood next to him herself adorned with an Indian Python of about 10 feet in length around her neck. The subject moved onto Miranda, the Tarantula in the window when my father asks Mr Modlin that if he was impressed he could see Miranda's big brother. Excited Monty says yes and my father throws a large spider at him and he reels backwards in horror pulling the spider form his shoulder and onto the floor before removing one of his slip on shoes and beating it to death!! Only it was a fake spider from a joke shop that my father had used to scare the public. One particular story I will get to a little later.
Another time my father was asked to attend a TV studio up north for the version of what we in the south new as Nationwide but up there was called Look North.
He sat in a studio with an extremely large and solid round table with a hole in its centre and the studio was adorned with very large and very hot spotlights. For the piece my father had allowed Miranda out of her confines to walk about on the table. With her in the cage were some Crickets completely unaware of their imminent danger. These managed to escape after warming up under the lights and Miranda started to motor back and forth across the table, turning around 180 degrees when reaching my fathers hand to prevent her from running off. The Crickets were also now warming up and sprinting around like Dwayne Johnson.
Sometime after the show my father received a call, turns out that something went awry on the set that was not discovered til later. A male Cricket reached the centre of the table and crawled or fell into the hole only this turned out to house the microphone. No one new of the problem nor the presence of the Cricket until a live news bulletin was on air when it started off with...
"This is the 9 O'clock News .... CHIRRRRP CHIRRRRP!!!"
My father had to hold himself from bursting out with fits of laughter.
The table, even in the 70's, costing in the region of £10,000 had to be stripped to pieces to remove the Cricket with a sudden urge for TV infamy.
Miranda lived right in the window of the store, causing much attention from passers by and no one had seen anything like this before. My father and a few others came up with the idea of using a joke spider. So a large furry black one was purchased from a joke store complete with big eyes. Some fine string was tied to the spider and the other end was pinned dead centre above the store window on the OUTSIDE. The fake spider was then placed inside the shop hidden and on a hook.
When a large crowd gathered outside someone would be waiting by the door near the fake spider and at the most opportune moment set free. He would then swing out of the shop door and around before bouncing across the store window right in front of the staring faces peering at Miranda through the glass. Many occasion you would here several people in fits of laughter inside the shop while screaming people outside and nothing but waving arms and legs as a horrified crowd headed off in all directions.
Those were the days.
One time a car was passing by at the moment the spider was on its journey across the store window and the driver was staring at the spider to his right and when out if sight we all then heard a screech of brakes and then a car smashing into another one. Oops. That ended to joke spider routine.
An earlier time had a newly married couple outside and the new groom rather big. The spider was released and the woman raised her arms in horror. Only in doing this she managed to wrap the string around her forearm. She lurched backwards and as she did so the spider lurched forwards. She lurched back again this time with bigger strides and the fake spider duly followed. She then turned and sprinted off at high speed sprinting as she went with the fake spider in hot pursuit.
By now my father and a friend were now worried thinking that this rather large husband was going to give them both a good hiding but when they turned around he was rolling on the floor with laughter.
I seem to remember it was two miles before she stopped running?!
One time we was in the shop alone just to feed and check the animals when my father beat me around the ear and gave me a lecture on spitting which he assumed I had picked up from school. "But dad I did not spit..." WHACK! " and that ones for lying" when all of a sudden more 'spit' appeared on the floor only this time it was not me. He looked up and there were cockroaches running across a wooden beam and a group of Archer Fish in the show tank were shooting at them to knock them into the water so they could eat them, hence the name Archer Fish. "Umm Sorry son" came my Dad's response to this.
Tony, the Celebes Black Ape,did not like kids but loved my Dad and my grandmother and he always used to make a scene towards any children, including me. However I got away with this when my parents gave me these god awful shoes they made me go to school in, known as Beetle Crushers bizarrely, and I gained a couple inches in height. Suddenly Tony became my friend but my brother was not so lucky when he was waiting by the door asking if we were now going home when I spotted a small black hand reaching up behind his head. It reached his hair and my brother's head was repeatedly basked into the cage!! made of chicken wire it was a funny sight with my brothers head bouncing of with gusto.
Tony was reprimanded by my father and immediately went into a submissive sorry mode.
Those were the days!!
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