WE SOMETIMES say that this column brings people together. Peter Dyson’s reflections on his 1940s rough-and-tumble childhood in Bradford, published in the T&A on July 19, prompted a response from somebody he used to play with in the quarries near Bolton Woods.

Deidre Littlewood, as she was then, now Mrs Deidre Stone of California, USA, may not have given a thought to the boy who lived in the back-to-back cottages of Livingstone Road, up by Wrose. But let Mrs Stone take up the story: “One of my school friends from long ago sent me an article from the T&A series Remember When?

“The person who provided you with that information, Peter Dyson, was my neighbor (American spelling). He lived across the street from me. I lived at 422 Livingstone Road and we both played over the quarries.

“People used to ‘dispose’ of unwanted litters of pups and cats by filling the sack with rocks and then throwing them over.

“One of the Swain House students accidentally threw himself over; he was trying to throw an old car door over and the handle caught him and dragged him over.

“I left home very young and eventually came to the US. I heard rumors that Peter actually married one of my adopted cousins! If you have any way of contacting him would you let him know I never forgot him, or the ‘cat’s whisker’ radio he gave me? Tell him Deirdre Littlewood was asking after him.

“The article brought back a lot of memories. I remember Ms. Clarkson and her car. I remember the day she broke her wrist while trying to crank it! Memories...”

That way of getting rid of unwanted pups and kittens was only a variation of what people used to do.

Drowning them in a pail of water was another. But for the cruelty to cats and dogs now, it would be tempting to moralise that people were less sentimental about animals in those days.

Mrs Clarkson was a teacher at Swain House School in the late 1940s. The article in July was accompanied by a photograph of Swain House pupils with car-cranking Mrs C sitting at the front.

Peter Dyson left Bradford in 1967 after a period of National Service in the Army. He now lives in Bideford, Devon. We did indeed remember Deidre Littlewood to him, passing on her email address.

“I might send her a photograph of me and the wife,” he said.

l Will Mrs Audrey Rhodes, of Apperley Bridge, please send me her full address as I have a letter to pass on that may be of great interest to her.