Craven Park - but not as you know it!

Craven Park – but not as you know it

Most people in Hull know Craven Park as the home of East Hull’s finest, Hull Kingston Rovers. Not me though.  As a child, I spent most of my Thursday and Saturday evenings at the old Craven Park on Holderness Road watching greyhound racing. My best memories of the place include: racing my dad down to the bookmakers to see who had the best prices, sheltering in the railway carriages at the top of the main stand on cold evenings sipping a welcome cup of Bovril and cheering home our many greyhounds as they sped past the winning post.

For as long as I can remember, we had greyhounds at home. My dad always said, ‘they are not pets, just racing dogs’. Ours never came in the house, they lived in a vast run down the garden, which my dad had custom built. A shed, which you had to crouch to get into, had thick, luscious straw beds for the dogs and a cloying smell of creosote. A ramp from it led to a run built from pieces of corrugated iron and wire, just high enough for the greyhounds to put their front paws on and peep over the fence.

            Whenever my dad parked his car in the garage, left the house or they heard a hint of his voice and you would see them, three heads bouncing up and down like that game in the arcades Whack-A-Mole – Bobby, Jamie and Ben, clanging their tails against the corrugated iron in case he might be coming down the path to walk or feed them. A key to their paddock was hidden underneath an innocuous-looking brick near the gate. Greyhounds were priceless in our family.

            They were treated like canine kings and queens too. Each day was a pampering session – massages with liniment to ease aching muscles, brushes until their coat was gleaming, nails clipped and shaped, and the finest quality steak a butcher would be proud of. Our shed often smelt like a butcher’s shop, my dad had a mincer in there especially for the greyhound’s food.  My job, even when they were the same height as me, was to take them for the longest walks along the disused railway line at the back of our house, hoping I didn’t see any rabbits along the way or training them in the paddock at the end of the garden.

My dad built a trap out of wood, with a handle which made it fly open, just like at the greyhound track. The dogs would jump out and race round the paddock in circles, as if they were racing. I held a rabbit skin on the end of a long piece of twine and had to sprint as fast as I could away from them! In no time, I would be yanked back, and the rabbit skin torn to pieces a few seconds later.

It was inevitable I would work at the greyhound track. It was what I knew. I think my dad was prouder that I worked as a kennel hand, than he was when I qualified as a primary school teacher!

If you visited the old Craven Park on race nights, the rugby pitch lay sleeping and the track would be brightly-lit, taking its turn as the focus.  Spectators stood in the rickety stands with their wide, sloping steps or huddled around the railway carriages at the top of the main stand, which served as a café and the Tote bookmakers, full of machines that worked a little like old-fashioned telephones for singles, doubles, reversed.

The ‘best’ club smelt of beer and smoke when you walked in and punters would be hunched over their programmes, studying form, looking for a sign that this would be their lucky night – maybe a dog in a lower grade of race than it usually was or a loss of weight from its last race. Tables in the very best seats stood behind enormous panes of glass with a view of the finishing line.

 Back in the stands, at the bottom of the steps, in a line, stood wise bookies on their wooden boxes, urging in the crowds to part with their hard-earned money with their ever-changing odds, scribbled in chalk one second and wiped away the next with one large bet.

Their assistants would ‘take’ the bet, scribbling them down in a hard-bound ledger, with each bet’s value and odds noted, along with a punter’s name or nickname, which was consulted at the end of the race to pay out the sum of money owed.

 The ‘tic-tac’ men, who let the bookies know what their counterparts were offering, signalled using complicated gestures involving heads, noses and ears, their white gloves visible against the black of the evening.

In these crowded stands, a fortune could be made or lost by wily veterans or lucky first-timers. You just had to know what to look for.

            A wide tunnel ran underneath the main stand which led to a white picket-fenced area with black, painted, wooden kennels running around three sides. In front of this, was a concrete path and a grass area in the middle. On race nights, this area was alive, like worker bees producing honey.

Spectators hoping for an inside tip or the hint that a dog was ‘on’ leant with their elbows on fences watching all the activities: kennel hands looked after their charges, washing feet with disinfectant, lovingly putting on leather collars and leads and giving a quick nuzzle under the neck to a favourite, vets crouching as dogs were trotted up and down the concrete paths, ensuring that a dog was fit.

Trainers, and paraders dressed in long, white coats, readied dogs for racing - slipping on jackets and warm coats, putting muzzles on excited heads and vigorously massaged muscles so they were ready - and of course, the dogs themselves.

Greyhounds either loved or hated the kennels – some spent all night fretting, whining, scrabbling, others loved race nights. They could hear the hare racing around the track and couldn’t wait for their turn. These dogs howled and barked the place down all night during every race. Many bets were won or lost based on a dog’s behaviour in the parade ring.

A greyhound is built for speed. They are tall, slender dogs with a long, narrow head, which tapers to a point at its muzzle. Their ears are small and tucked up, except when they prick up in excitement, and their long neck leads to a perfectly streamlined body, with defined shoulders and a deep chest. They have a broad, muscular back and powerful hind legs with a bony tail, used for manoeuvring their way around the bends.

My job, as parader, was to lead the dogs out from the enclosure, through the tunnel and out onto the track itself. Each dog wore a jacket corresponding to its trap number, depending on the position the dog liked to run in. Number 1 the inside runner in red, followed by blue for 2, white for 3, black for 4, orange for 5, black and white stripes for 6, the outside runner.

Under the spotlights, the stars were led in front of the stands, so that punters could get a good look and make choices based on the dog’s colours, whether a dog was jumping up and down or even which dogs had been to the toilet before a race!

This was my favourite part, stroking my companion’s ears to keep them calm, giving their legs a rub to keep them warm and whispering words of encouragement. Often, I knew if a dog would give a good account of itself by the way they felt on the lead. My dad watched from the stands to see if I gave him a nod and then he’d scamper off to the bookies with a wad of notes ready to make a fortune.

When the parade was over, it was time to put the dogs in the traps. Depending on its nature, this could be like trying to heave an elephant into a small box or trying to keep control of a bouncy ball!

The lids closed, a flag was waved to show the dogs were ready; the whining monotone sound of the hare started to wind itself to a crescendo up to racing speed, sending the dogs into a frenzy.

Some dived repeatedly for the front of the traps hoping for a flying start, others just waited with keen eyes for the hare on its wire to bounce past, others would perform ‘tipple tails’ (the unluckiest ending up facing backwards!), before the traps flew open and the race began!  

Handicap races were the greatest entertainment. In these races, dogs of differing abilities could come together in the same race. The fastest dog would be ‘off scratch’ at the back of the field, with others given a few metres start, depending on their speed.

 Traps would be ‘staggered’ with the slowest dog given the largest start. When the traps opened simultaneously, the race developed when each dog gradually caught the others to end in a grandstand finish.

I often used to watch through half-closed eyes, hoping that my dog would not be jostled at the first bend, end up at the back, or worse, knocked over. Some greyhounds were renowned ‘fliers’ from the traps, others would come with a late run. Greyhound racing is never dull!

It was our job to run across the rugby pitch to collect our dogs at the end of the race. In the time it took you, the race would almost be over. You just had time for a last cheer before the dogs flashed across the finishing line and tried to claim their prize at the end of the race, when the hare flew off its wire to be pounced upon by six greyhounds. Never should anyone get in between a greyhound and the hare, unless you want to be knocked up into the air as if you were a feather!

Winners or losers, every dog got a well-deserved pat and kind words, before jackets and muzzles were removed, coats put back on and the long walk back to the kennels to be greeted by delighted or sombre faces, depending on the size of your bet. After a disinfect wash to remove sand from the greyhound’s feet and a good check-over to make sure there were no injuries, the whole process would start again for the next race.

At the end of the night, tired racers were retrieved from their race-night home and returned to their kennels, situated further round from the parade ring, a world visited by few.

Three trainers were in permanent residence at Craven Park – in my time, these were Kevin Rushworth, Jack Bentley and John Tollafield. Others made the long journeys from as far as Malton and Middlesbrough at the end of the night.

Each trainer had their own grassed area, which greyhounds could go out in groups to play, race around and peer at each other through the mesh, and kennels, housing around 30 dogs.

Black wooden gates stood at the entrance to a trainer’s domain.  Through these was an area exclusive to kennel hands, a cosy room with a heater on the wall to warm frozen hands, photos of famous residents, a table to eat at or read the Greyhound Star and a kettle to make strong brews. Leather collars and leads hung from the wall on nails. Next door were our charges.

A sloping concrete area, leading to a drain, ran down the centre, with greyhounds housed in singles and doubles on either side in black wooden enclosures, a raised platform bed in each, full of succulent straw. Bleach and liniment scents were overwhelming as you walked in, these areas spotlessly clean, scrubbed several times daily with hot water and stiff brushes.  

A cacophony of barking greeted any entrance with scrabbling paws and bobbing heads visible through bars on each door.

Mealtimes were the quietest time of the day. Silver-coloured bowls were dished out through each kennel door and meals were slurped and guzzled by hungry mouths in mere seconds, the bowls clattering across the floor chased by thrusting tongues eager for any tasty morsel left.

Greyhounds were exercised in their allotted areas and in sixes or eights around the perimeter of Craven Park. It’s a delicate skill, putting on plastic muzzles, threading four leads on each hand and keeping eight dancing dogs under control!

Our route took us in a circle around the back of the stadium, under the tunnels located under each main stand and the most dangerous part – the front of the stadium with its busy car park and the possibility of seeing other dogs. The greyhounds were not bothered by this, but pets seemed to find the sight of eight sleek dogs very exciting.

I liked to scoot quickly past the scoreboard, greyhound offices underneath, back into the safety of the stadium.  All was eerily quiet when there was no-one else around, just the sound of clipped nails tapping on concrete as they trotted along.

On Sunday afternoons, we kennel hands would lock up the dogs from the inside, leave a radio on to distract them, then sneak past the security guards so we could watch Hull Kingston Rovers for free.

Those memories are now distant. When the rugby team moved to its new home on Preston Road, the old Craven Park was knocked down to pave the way for a supermarket complex. Greyhound racing lived on at the new ground, but for me, it wasn’t the same. No longer would greyhounds live ‘on site’.

 I still think of them when I go to Morrisons or recycle cans and bottles. Years of fond memories buried under the fresh food aisle. ‘A night at the dogs’ has died out in Hull now, my dad died too in October 2015. What I wouldn’t give for one more night under the lights.

My cancer story

The story of how I was diagnosed with cancer is not conventional in any shape or form. No finding a lump, no anomaly in a blood test, no symptoms, it came out of the blue. And changed my life forever.

In September 2017, I was on a school trip to Beamish in Durham with the class of children I taught.  Beamish is a historical museum, a town reincarnated to represent how it was. The class and I had visited a house, a train station and were now preparing to go down the mine by donning safety helmets with lights. Down the mine, at the furthest point from the surface, I caught my helmet on a beam in the roof, causing my foot to catch against a rail beneath me and tripped, falling over in the process. When I tried to get up, I realised something was badly wrong; the top of my leg was wobbling and I was unable to get up. The children were very concerned, and I had to pretend all was well, so as not to alarm them. In reality, I was terrified. Several staff were called to assess the situation and I had to be carried from the mine by Evac-Chair. My leg was swelling quickly, so an ambulance was called. In no time at all, a paramedic appeared. Gate staff had spotted a training vehicle and asked them to come and see me.  By this time, my leg was even bigger and my jeans had to be cut open. It took the ambulance half an hour to arrive and strangely, I felt no pain. 

Transfer from the Evac-Chair to an ambulance trolley was bad enough; when the leg was put in traction, I thought I might just hit the roof of the ambulance. On a scale of 1-10, I’d put it at 20! Because of this, there was a further delay as morphine was delivered from another ambulance. Staff from school kept walking by and I just waved, pretending everything was fine.  By now, I was using gas and air frequently, as the pain was intense. Shock had set in and my whole body was shaking, my teeth were chattering. An injection of morphine was now administered, and we were able to get on our way, slowly initially because of the cobbles on the way out of Beamish. Morphine had taken over my brain and all I remember on arrival at the hospital was passing lights as we went down a corridor, something like you’d expect on a hospital drama. Faces standing over me asked for information from the ambulance staff, but everything was blurry from my point of view. After another painful transfer to a hospital bed, a doctor arrived. My leg was x-rayed at my bedside and the doctor asked lots of questions about my health and how I had fallen, as he had seen x-rays like this before, but usually if a person had a motorbike crash at 70mph, not an innocuous fall.
I was transferred to a ward for femoral nail surgery the following morning. However, the operation didn’t happen as the orthopaedic surgeon said they needed to investigate why my leg had broken so easily. I remember him saying there was a small chance it could be cancer, but that it was unlikely. Even though it had been said, I thought it would be something else, osteoporosis or please something else. During the next couple of days, I had a full-body bone scan, a CT scan of my body, a MRI of my leg, x-rays of my chest and various blood tests. These were the most painful experience so far.  Each separate visit involved a team of people to slide me from one bed to another. Each was excruciatingly painful. No amount of morphine means that you do not feel the grating of broken bones.

When Mr. Gregory, the orthopaedic surgeon returned with a cast of doctors later in the day and drew the curtains around my bed, I knew the news would not be good. The curtains seemed to draw in like the walls were retreating. I had kidney cancer and a further tumour on my femur bone, which had caused the break. Nothing prepares you for the devastation of a cancer diagnosis. The world stops, your mouth dries up so it feels like a desert, you can’t comprehend words any more. The surgeons carried on speaking, but I was no longer listening. My whole life has been defined by cancer; my mum spent the first sixteen years of my life battling the bloody thing, until she died. Now I had it and life was never going to be the same again.