The Jewellery Lady

In 1976 my lovely Mum died. There was just my sister (10 years my senior) my brother (8 years older than me) and myself present, and at least that was an improvement on when my Dad died 4 years earlier, as at that time I was alone with him. My mum knew me very well. Too well in some ways. She had little money, but left me a huge legacy of love and happy memories, and I didn't need anything else. What she did do, though, and this was only applied to me and not my siblings, was leave me £50 'to do as much good as I could for as long as I could' with. I knew from conversations we had had in the past that this was not meant to just be put in some charity collection box. No, my mum was far too subtle for that. My brother  & sister did indeed put their £50 in their pockets and I have no idea what they did with theirs - but no doubt they would have given the money to some good cause or other.

As for me, well I pondered. I thought and thought and kept silently asking what I was meant to do with this money. £50 back in 1976 was not a kings ransom, but it was worth more than it is today in 2012.

Every year, since I was about 18, and learning to walk again, I had given myself an aim from the clocks going back in October till they went forward in March to learn a new craft I had not done before. This usually meant getting a library book out, and getting myself equipped to try something I had not tackled before. My mum died in March, so the following March, 1977, I got a book out of the library on jewellery making. I started with very simple things, like earrings and pendants, and gradually, after about a month, I had begun to make some pretty things. Friends then asked if I would make things for them to give as Christmas gifts. Now I had the germ of an idea. This is what I could do with Mum's £50! I bought enough findings and semi-precious stones to start off, and the profit I gave to charities. Then I asked if a friend would host a party, and I would give the profit to her chosen charity. Because I had no intention of keeping a penny profit, this sort of rubbed off on my friends. They too were more than happy to raise funds with my help. I would sit up nearly all night making the pieces that had been ordered, then make the quick journey over to Stockport, and Manchester Minerals as the small shop that I always used to buy my supplies from was called.

I still have the diaries for those years, and my heaven's I was busy. I only ever kept the £50 going, and wouldn't have dreamt of taking any expenses out - it was my way of carrying out my Mum's wishes. I then decided that I could probably make more for the charities if I bought in some of the things - tiny silver earrings were all the rage back in 1978, and those were beyond my skills to make, so I found a very wonderful Jewish jewellery wholesaler who allowed me to buy from them. I also decided to have a market stall in Knutsford, which enabled me to give even more money away to charities.

I had a ball with that market stall. I had never realised before what fabulous people ran market stalls in those days. There was the couple selling underwear and household linen, the wife of course selling the underwear, the husband the sheets and towels etc. They would go away on exotic holidays - and Kenya was very exotic back in 1979! I remember so well when they came back and showed the rest of us their photos. One couple who ran the fruit & veg stall next to the underwear were rather disparaging. 'Cor, it looks just like Knowsley Safari Park' was all the wife could say, in a very broad Scouse accent. I just fell about laughing, because that remark just did not go down at all well, and in fact it was months before the 'knicker lady' spoke to her again!

I had a brilliant man next to me and he sold socks. Alan (and his family) became one of my best friends. He would turn up late at the market (I was always there at 7am to set up - he would saunter on at 9am, reverse his car with box trailer onto the busy market, then gradually unload). He was always laughing, and such fun, so I would start setting up his stall for him. He used those elastic luggage straps as clothes lines, and a bag of old pegs to hold the socks up for display. I would usually tell Alan that if he fetched me a coffee, I would finish off his stall for him, and he would be off like a whippet. He hated setting up, and had me well trained. One day I was busy doing this for him when an older chap wandered along to the staff. 'How much are your pegs?' he asked. '25p a dozen' I replied in a flash. 'Can I have 2 dozen?' he said. I was just putting these old 2nd hand pegs into a bag when Alan arrived back. He looked puzzled, but said nothing.  The old boy went off, happy as a sandboy with his 'bargain' pegs. Alan was helpless with laughter. 'Well, I've seen it all now' he said 'selling second hand pegs at 25p a dozen, and new ones are on sale on the inside market for only 20p a dozen!'. It became a standing joke with us, rather akin to selling fridges to Eskimos in Alan's eyes.

There was another character (but they all were in their own way) who came along selling shoes. Every couple of hours he came round talking to us all, moaning how it was a rubbish market and that he hadn't sold a single pair of shoes yet. Eventually, I was detailed to go and have a look at his merchandise. No wonder he hadn't sold anything, he only had shoes in sizes 2s and 9s - and ladies wanting high heels in those sizes were rather thin on the ground. He didn't come back after that first week.

My party evenings were still going on all this time, and getting busier and busier. It was becoming a 5 night a week job, with the days spent either driving to Manchester or Stockport and making up orders.

By the end of 4 years I had also added, thanks to profits made on my market stall, gold chains to the range of jewellery. I still gave all profits away, of course, from the parties, and started to wonder how much longer I could keep up the pressure I was under. Remember, I had two children and a husband at home to care for, so all this was on top of my other domestic duties. After exactly 5 years I finally did a party at a place outside where I normally did them, and it was not until I was packing things away that I discovered that a whole card of a dozen gold chains had gone missing. I felt very strongly that this was my sign from my mum that I had done enough for her. On checking back through my books, I had given away £5,000 in that 5 years, from the £50 she had left me. I had made so many wonderful friends, and was known throughout the area as 'The Jewellery Lady'. I was so pleased that I had been able to meet so many very wonderful people who had helped to support many different charities, and the satisfaction was more than compensation for all the hours spent creating their jewellery.