The day my dad’s love of the Railway Bar died

It was a fine spring day in 1973 as we boarded the school bus home. Upon taking our seats, the driver explained that the town centre and certain other areas had been brought to a standstill by a series of bomb scares.

“Hey, Cass, I hear your dad’s place got it the day,” somebody flippantly remarked.

I arrived home to an empty house. The key was in the usual place but there was no one home. Something wasn’t right and I got a hollow, nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach... all I could think to do was to get myself to the bar as quickly as possible. I ran the whole way without stopping.

I could tell from afar that my worst suspicions were about to be realised. In the midst of that crowd of strangers, I found my mum and dad quietly observing. In their own very different ways, these two people had devoted the last forty years of their lives to the building that lay crumpled before them... there it lay strewn across the road like a deck of cards shaken from its carefully balanced tower.

Luckily, it was one of my brothers who had been serving in the bar at the time the men sauntered in with their box of tricks. Had my dad been there, he would undoubtedly have confronted them and tried to stop them; not a good idea.

Instead, they placed their surprise package expertly and told the customers they had fifteen minutes before the device would go off.

And, so, the warning was phoned through to the security forces in the usual way, the area was evacuated, and the colossal bomb went off as planned.

Half a pound of gelignite, in the right hands, can obliterate a family saloon, so you can imagine what 150 pounds of the stuff can do.

The impressive, three-storey edifice imploded, a lifetime’s attentive care sucked in and blown away in an instant, like a casual drag on a cigarette.

My dad’s love of the Railway Bar ended that day. His heart was broken by the sight of it, collapsed on the pavement like so many drunks. As we walked silently away from the scene, he had already taken the decision to sell the site and not, as so many others would have done, get compensation and rebuild.

He was a stubborn son of a gun and, rightly or wrongly, that hasty resolve was final.

‘Get Beethoven!’, by Paul Cassidy, can be purchased online at www.troubador.co.uk. Check out his website at paulcassidy.org.