NOTHING grabs the attention of customers of this column more than little anecdotes about the colourful characters who used to grace the St Helens scene in bygone years.

Most gloried under the most intriguing of nicknames and the list seemed endless. Yellowbird, Carpet Sam, Diamond Jim, China Reg, Kicker Reagan, Popeye Harrison, Billum Ormrod, Owd Salt, Billy the shuffle-along newspaper seller, and Rag-and-bone Lester were among those who helped to enliven the old-days in their own inimitable and peculiar ways.

And none inspires fonder thoughts among the middle-aged and upwards than pint-sized Cockney Bob Dudley who used to scutch around town collecting scrap metal in a rickety old tall pram.

A Rainford reader button-holed me the other day with yet another slant on Cockney Bob. He tells me: "He was certainly one of the best known characters in town, during times when my family had a business in the old market place".

Bob, who had developed a gor-blimey Cockney accent despite never having lived within 200 miles of Bow Bells, always had a large old treacle tin and a candle tucked into his 'business pram'. During his lunch break he'd dig these out, place the lighted candle in the tin and proceed to cook his bacon and egg breakfast on the inverted tin lid.

"I remember Bob Dudley", says Burma Star veteran Phil Reid. "He was a fine fellow who lived in Canal Street, opposite the old Bridge Hotel and he came from a lovely family, too".

No matter what the weather, you'd find Bob on his rounds, shirt open-necked through the seasons and with a cheerful, 'Awright, mite!' Cockney-style greeting for everyone he met. Marked out by his uruly mop of black hair, he was a familiar sight throughout the town, pushing his buckle-wheeled pram, often piled high with scrap.

And he was a tough little nut. "He certainly liked a pint or two", says Phil, and it often took policemen in number to subdue him when he had his dander up.

Regarded as a bit of a karate specialist, the story goes that after a lively session of the amber liquid he was not beyond chucking any unsuspecting young copper, bent on taking Bob to the cooler, right across Bridge Street.

Says Phil: "Alf Critchely, the fishmonger (famed for his slogan of 'If it swims, Alf's got it!') was fed up with picking coppers out from his shop doorway".

Time may have added to the legend, of course, but of such things are memories made.

And now, following my request for any further little anecdotal gems, the Good Companions writers' group of St Helens has been inspired to pen a smashing little poem featuring some of those larger-than-life personalities of yore.

Entitled 'The St Helens of My Childhood', it will also evoke nostalgic thoughts of the old market place, the sadly-missed Fleece (St Helens' only town-centre residential hotel) and the age of non-pollutive trolley-bus public transport. Here's how it goes:

The St Helens of my childhood

was full of carefree joys,

Of parks and swings and roundabouts;

of happy girls and boys

Games played in stone schoolyards,

'midst the tumult when all shout,

Life was fun -- yes, it was noisy,

that's what childhood's all about.

At weekends on the markets,

Woollybacks sold their veg,

From his van, Carpet Sam

vied with China Reg,

Reg rattled his plates and saucers,

'till teeth were set on edge,

Then, finally, to the sweet stall,

to redeem our Mother's pledge.

Then, when the daylight dwindled,

as the crowds began to waive,

Paraffin lamps were kindled;

Market became Aladdin's Cave,

That raucous voice ...it could only be Dave...

as we lingered before we homeward turned,

To hear his plaintive cry, 'Come buy, come save!'

For all prices reduced when home fires burned.

We had many St Helens characters,

turn back the pages, they await you there,

Old Salt sold from his harnessed handcart

Billy 'Liverpool Echoed' from Victoria Square,

'Stores' horses pawed at flinty kerbstones

'Till fed bread, they wouldn't depart,

Bob Lester gathered his rags and bones,

Now will those suffice, to start?

Our downtown shopping contented,

No one-way streets to nowhere,

Smart red-and-cream noiseless buses

Which put no pollution in the air,

A central hotel never known to''Fleece''

And Bobby Drysdale there to keep the peace,

Hospitals with casualty departments to spare,

Progress? Why didn't we stop right there?