Late 1950s' Kaleidoscope

"LOOK THROUGH THE PEEP-HOLE AND YOU'LL SEE ~ PATTERNS PRETTY AS CAN BE"
"1001 PATTERNS!"
"MADE IN ENGLAND"

These are the legends on my beloved kaleidoscope, dating from the late 1950s. (Note the use of CAPITALS on the toy. These days, educationalists would advise using lower-case letters to help children as they learn to read.)

It was a present from a visiting aunt and uncle - well, my mother's second cousin, to whom she was very close: Auntie Mabel. They had come to stay with us over Easter.

I had never seen a kaleidoscope before and was utterly delighted. It gave me, literally, hours of pleasure. And as for the promise of '1001 patterns' that was certainly a number large enough to satisfy me, and I soon lost count. (Hooray for the days before the 'trade descriptions act'!) It's a posh one, too, as you don't shake it, you rotate the bottom section to move the bits of coloured plastic. And if you have a steady hand, and pass a particularly pleasing pattern, you can reverse (briefly) to restore it. Howzat?!

Poor Uncle Hugh must have been driven mad as I remember repeatedly showing him patterns, while we decided between us whether each was a new one or one we'd seen before! Here are four, to give you a taster; 997 to go ...!

My aunt and uncle are no more; the last time I saw my widowed aunt was when she visited my mother after my father died. I dug out the kaleidoscope to show her how I still treasured it. "What ever did you do to deserve that?!" she joked.

I dedicate this blip to the memory of Mabel and Hugh Gordon. RIP.

After yesterday's rainbow, the clouds were so dramatic and colourful. If you'd like to see them click here, or to see the moon sliding in and out of the clouds (or the clouds sliding across the moon, to be accurate), then have a look here at the moon reflected in the sea (albeit a tad grainy!)