Remembering the legendary Rugby toy shop opposite the cinema

Former Advertiser reporter John Phillpott recalls happy days of childhood spent in two much-loved Rugby shops
Websters was opposite the Granada cinema, seen here in the days when
it was called the Plaza.Websters was opposite the Granada cinema, seen here in the days when
it was called the Plaza.
Websters was opposite the Granada cinema, seen here in the days when it was called the Plaza.

Pocket money day is still presumably the highlight of any modern child’s week, just as it was during the 1950s.

I seem to recall that there was a sliding pay scale according to age.

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The starting salary might be sixpence, and by the time I was nine, it might have risen to the princely sum of two shillings, then widely called a florin, or more colloquially, a couple of bob.

Back then, many small boys in Rugby might spend their riches on Meccano or on modelling kits obtained from Moore’s, that paradise of balsa wood, aeroplane dope, polystyrene glue or boxes of plastic components that, with patience, could be miraculously transformed into a Messerschmitt 109 or Supermarine Spitfire.

Ah yes, make sure you don’t seal up the cockpit up before putting the pilot in place. Easily done, eh guys?

But this would all come about later. For back in the early days of my childhood, with that shiny florin gripped tightly in my hand, I would make a weekly beeline for Webster’s shop at the bottom of North Street.

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Like many other small boys of around the same age, I would look forward to this expedition every week.

And when the big day arrived, accompanied by my mother, I would catch the bus from Churchover, stare out of the window… and daydream about the delights that lay in store on arrival at my destination.

My mission? To inspect the scores of plastic soldiers drawn up in parade ground formation inside their glass cases. And not only that… for some of these smartly turned-out troopers would inevitably be returning home with me later that day, wrapped in brown paper, and all ready for action.

Even for a young shaver like me, Webster’s glorious emporium of all things military was incredibly yet deceptively small.

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But what gave it space and magnitude was the vastness of the array of Dinky and Matchbox motor vehicles, and most of all, the sheer profusion of plastic armies on display.

Desert Rats, Afrika Korps, Apache and Sioux warriors, cowboys, covered wagons, British Tommies clutching rifles, firing sten guns and throwing grenades… you name it, and they’d answer the small boy’s roll call.

Knights in armour, archers with bowstrings stretched taut, Foreign Legionnaires, Riff tribesmen, think of the period in history, and there it was, magnificently represented in shining paint and plastic, each individual frozen in time on their very own stand.

Best of all were the Swoppits. Do you remember them? The joy of these was that Swoppits came apart – heads, legs, arms and clothes could be interchanged, and even featured miniature six-shooters that slotted into tiny holsters.

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These were prized above all others, but sadly, I suspect that many have not survived the passage of time. Frequently the temptation to ‘mix and match’ would prove irresistible, resulting in a gunslinger suddenly acquiring a Comanche’s head or vice versa.

And if that didn’t bring about their downfall, then the chances were that they’d meet their end in a pitched gun battle near your Dad’s vegetable patch, somewhere between Deadman’s Gulch and the broad beans.

But two whole shillings… that could buy four plastic combatants, so as time went by, small boys like me had soon raised their very own private army.

Some of those models, if in good condition, would be highly prized by collectors these days. But sadly, and perhaps also foolishly, I gave away my entire collection to an admittedly deserving lad.

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But I wonder what became of Mr and Mrs Webster? They ran the shop for a number of years, a veritable magnet tucked away in the corner just down from the Saracen’s Head pub opposite the Granada cinema.

As time went by, and lads like me outgrew model soldiers, Moore’s handicrafts shop on the corner of Bath Street and Clifton Road became the main port of call.

The positioning of this shop could not have been more ideal, facing Lawrence Sheriff School… Mr Moore must have rubbed his hands with glee when that school bell chimed at four in the afternoon, because within a few minutes, boys in caps with griffon badges on their blazers would be thronging outside, peering through the windows, and wishing their birthdays or Christmas weren’t so far away.

Rugby men of a certain age will readily recall Moore’s shop. Although it also sold relatively easily followed construction kits, the shop really catered for the serious modeller, the boy who might labour long and hard on countless winter evenings to finally emerge, triumphantly clutching a Tiger Moth with a six-foot wingspan and still smelling of aeroplane dope, that strange concoction which smelled like pear drops.

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Once upon a time, most small boys played with toy soldiers before graduating to model kits. These were the rites of passage that preceded the onset of adolescence, when nothing would ever be the same again.

To say that it is a lost era gets nowhere near… but it is still undoubtedly remembered with great affection by those of us of a certain age.

John Phillpott’s third book titled Go and Make the Tea, Boy! published by Brewin Books, is now on sale.

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