Beverley was my best friend at Primary School, we kept in touch for a while, met up on some family holidays at Pontins, then lost touch.
These days when you talk about autographs it is assumed you mean the signatures of the rich and famous, of the celebrity, of names everyone recognises. Back in the late 1960s when I bought my first book you didn’t really stand much chance of meeting anyone like that, so I collected signatures of my friends and family. How could I have known back then that I would go on to keep this little book, and when I was in my mid fifties I would look back nostalgically at the little rhymes and messages that were gathered inside. As I look at the names I remember each one, different memories with each name, all a part of my childhood. So thank you, everyone who signed my little book, all except for one of you I don’t know what life has thrown at you or where you are, but I wish you all well and hope you are happy.
I think my favourite message is ‘My heart is like a cabbage, a cabbage cut in two, the outside leaves I throw away, the heart I give to you.’
Carole was a good friend, we’d meet up and play at one another’s houses often.
Karen sat at the desk behind me in school.
Cathie was my best friend then, and is still one of my best friends now.
- Karen Grieve was my neighbour, Karen Slade lived a few doors up the road.
Meeting my family 
Love this post. Thanks for sharing.
They aren’t very original, but I suppose it is better by far than:
Roses are red
Violets are blue
Let’s go to bed
Me and you!
You wouldn’t have kept that!
I’m going to look for my little brown autograph book. It seems that mine started out with one from my mother and one from my father ;).
Oh, my second and third autograph books were brown! My first one is white, and yes, my parents also signed in it for me!
Brown, kind of a pebble grain. Kids today wouldn’t even know what they were and would think they were strange, I’m sure!
Love this–takes me right back–and to the same era! Even the handwriting, and those pastel pink and blue pages. I love “my heart is like a cabbage,” too! I had some singularly unsentimental ones in my book, as well, even a variation on Roses are Red: It went something like this:
Roses are red
Violets are blue
Most poems rhyme
But this one doesn’t!
I wrote a story on my autograph book, too. Here it is, in case you’d like to read it: http://josna.wordpress.com/2011/10/21/125-my-autograph-book/
Thank you for visiting and following Tell Me Another. I’ll look forward to returning to yours.
Thanks for popping by, I looked at your post and really enjoyed it. I had no idea the autograph book had such a history! I never thought about looking for the history of the autograph book, and really enjoyed reading your post about it.
Funny, I was just thinking about the autograph book I had at junior school the other day and wondering what had become of a pair of twins from the year above me whose autographs I collected when they left to go to senior school. They were the most similar looking twins I have ever met except that they parted their hair on opposite sides. i realise now they must have been mirror twins.
Do you remember their names? Everyone’s on Facebook these days, I found some old schoolfriends through ‘Friends Reunited’ and found a Facebook group for my old school that has some great photos on it. It would be interesting for you to see what happened to the twins, I wonder if they got the same job?
These are really sweet!
Thank you 🙂
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