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Val McSkimmings remembers .
"My grandfather, a pitman sitting on his back doorstep in Lonnen Drive, Swalwell cleaning his boots with Dubbin."
"When I was six years old, sitting on our back doorstep with my brothers and sisters waiting for our grandfather to call on his way home from his shift at Blaydon Burn pit. He always saved some of the jam sandwiches from his bait to give to his grandchildren. We waited and waited but he didn't come that day. Later we were told that he was dead, killed by a roof fall at the pit."
"My mother telling me about her and auntie Elsie walking to Swalwell Bridge to catch the Venture bus (because it was cheaper) to travel to Robertsons in Newcastle, where they both worked as dressmakers. They did this to save a ½p a journey, one old penny a day. The money they saved was used to pay for a week holiday at Whitley Bay!"