I doubt many SVers have memories of the horrendous winter chill of 1963 as featured in a recent TV Documentary. But in brief it was the freezing temperatures coupled with record snow falls that caused chaos throughout the country.
As a youngdter of 13 at the time I was along with others able to relish the fun of using my hastily built sledge on the slopes of Torrisholme Barrow and escaping with a few minor cuts and bruises as I and others ended up in the stone wall at the bottom of the hill. Great fun at the time as school was shut and thrill seeking was the order of the day.
However the main memory other than the above was the lack of nationwide football and in particular the lack of competitive games at Christie Park. But our BoD at the time played a master stroke and somehow financed the ground being covered in a mixture of soil and sand ( ) which enabled the ground to be used on a very limited number of occasions for games between North West based football league club so that they where able to maintain the fitness pf their players to a certain degree. The retention of fitness was no where near as scientific it is today but no doubt the actions of our BoD at the time was of benefit to those involved.
Can't recall the exact teams involved in these 'friendly' fixtures but it was good to see a number of relatively well known footballing faces benefit from our clubs action.
Wonder how many other SVers recalled the games and the winter of 1963 which if my ageing memory serves me well lasted for 3 months...and then the floods followed which brought there own horrendous problems....