Dustbins were sold at the rate of one every two minutes during a Watford High Street ironmonger’s first hour of opening on Friday morning. This was typical of the “panic” demand for galvanised goods following news that zinc was to be diverted from domestic to rearmament needs.

Buckets, pails and baths were all being snapped up like hot cakes at a time of year – just after Christmas – when trade is normally quiet.

A curious thing was the exceptional demand for aluminium and enamelware – some people asking for several sets of saucepans at once. Apparently the Minister of Supply’s new restrictions had been interpreted as applying to metal in general, and people meant to be on the safe side.

[From the Watford Observer of January 5, 1951]

A  taste of days gone by is being revived by Watford brewers, Benskins.

The brewery is bottling a limited edition of Colne Spring, a barley wine first introduced almost 100 years ago. It will be available in pubs throughout Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire. There will be just 11,000 bottles produced, making the brew a likely collectors item.

Production of Colne Spring was halted in the 1940s, when wartime regulations prohibited strong ales. It was reintroduced, briefly, in the 1950s. It has an original gravity of 1082 degrees and will sell at around £1 a bottle.

[From the Watford Observer of January 4, 1985]

The name Neil Sedaka probably means nothing to the majority of disc buyers.

Yet that is the name you’ll see under the title of Connie Francis’s hit records Stupid Cupid and Fallin’.

It belongs to a 19-year-old Brooklyn boy who, now he has a foot in the door of the music world, has himself turned from composing hits to singing them.

He has appeared on Broadway in a musical, has won a scholarship for piano playing and has had a best-selling record in America with his song The Diary. This has been released on RCA. A rival is Britain’s Barry Barnett, who has recorded it for HMV.

[From the Watford Observer of January 30, 1959]