Writer's Notebook

Ivor worked his way slowly through the museum. Nothing much had changed. There were a few new exhibits and some of those he remembered from younger days were no longer there. Couldn't really expect much else from an ordinary, little local museum. Still, he had been proud to have been a founder member of the Triallyn Museum Assocation and of his work in helping set up the library.

Occasionally, his children came up to him with a question.

"Dad what's this...? What did they use that for?"

They were what made Ivor so excited and proud: his children. Never during the hours he used to spend inside these walls had he contemplated the idea of one day coming back with his children. Today, 20 years after leaving Triallyn, he was fulfilling a dream.

Ivor wandered slowly into the back room. The familiar Penny Farthing was still there and soon his children were looking on with wonderous eyes, not only at the muti-storeyed contraption itself but also at the photos depicting the folly of those who actually dared attempt to ride the thing.

Turning round Ivor let out a little yap much like that a small dog would have made on having to defend his bone against a hostile fellow canine.

"David, Wendy, Christopher, come here, quickly! Look, this is one of the first ever record players ever made."

The children stared at the object before them. The winding cylinder on top that looked somewhat like a foghorn; the thick arm at the side with a long, pointed needle sticking out at the bottom - it reminded them of the photo of granny at her sewing desk they had seen so often when they visited her - and the black shining disk placed in the middle of the contraption.

It was Wendy who turned the children's bewilderment into words.

"Daddy, what's a record player?"