- and Andy's reply
- Andy Roberts
Dear Ian
This was all a long time ago now, but I think it was 1968 that
I went to Percy Parslow's Hamster Farm. The visit was set up
by, and in company with, John Peel. Someone had written to John,
who had a hamster of his own called Dandelion, and alerted him
to the existence of Percy's farm, and John recruited me to accompany
him with a view to recording the visit for his late night radio
show. He knew I also had a hamster, called Burdock in an unsubtle
imitation.
We went in John's Land Rover. I distinctly remember the Lantern
Café being part of the directions, and also the fact that
we had to stop at a public phone box to get further instruction
on finding the Farm. How different from today, when we'd all
reach for the mobile phone! I can still see the 5-barred gate,
and the track winding down to the house and buildings.
We were met by Percy Parslow, who explained that he was a retired
jeweller, with a passion for small rodents. He showed us spiny
mice, curly-coated rats, steppe lemmings, waltzing mice (which
he didn't approve of), an owl in a cage, which had been injured
and which he was helping recuperate, and, above all, the most
glorious hamsters I have ever seen. They were the size of small
cats, with magnificent colouring, tortoiseshells, chinchillas,
blue hamsters - beautiful goldens. His trademark logo was the
Greedy Guzzler, a golden with full cheek pouches.
Somewhere I have a letter from him still, with the logo at the
top, thanking me for the letter I had written to him, which I
imagine is the one you have found. He asked permission to reprint
the lyrics in the Journal of the National Hamster Fancy, which
of course I was very pleased about!
Anyway, John got his interview, and, as we left, Percy presented
me with a magnificent Japanese Hooded Rat, black and white, which
became my treasured companion for the next 2 years. This was
because, in Percy's opinion, the rat was the most intelligent
and companionable animal, far outstripping all other rodents
as suitable pets, and he was keen for me to experience this wisdom
at first hand.
On seeing my rat, a dear old lady called Mrs Wakerley, who had
looked after me as a small child, exclaimed, "Ooooh look,
a Hampstead!" And so Hampstead got his name. He was quite
at home in my Liverpool bedsit, and for most of his life had
the door to his cage left open, in order that he could come and
go as he pleased. He used the curtain to get up to and down from
the shelf which he inhabited. Many times he went to the pub with
me, often sitting on my shoulder at the bar.
Once we were visited at home by the famous war photographer Don
McCullin, who was an old friend of Adrian Henri, the poet and
painter, who lived at the top of the same house as me. Don, unknown
to me, has a mortal fear of rats, which he had got from his experiences
in Vietnam and Biafra. He ran from my room, and upstairs, to
get away from Hampstead! He wouldn't come down until I had shut
the rat in its cage, and locked the door to my room. And this
was a man who the Americans thought crazy, as he would run backwards,
taking photos of the US Army advancing in the Tet offensive in
Vietnam!
When Hampstead finally died, we held a funeral that had over
30 attendees, with full hippy rites!
So, you see, the great Percy Parslow is associated in my mind
with a wonderful visit to the farm, followed by years of pleasure
from a succession of small rodents, which were all looked after
according to advice from his own handbook on hamster-keeping.
I returned to Great Bookham around 1987, and believe I found
the farm from memory alone. The gate was as I remember it, but
it was padlocked, and sadly, the farm appeared to be no more.
So your email to Paul Cary's magnificent website has stirred
a flood of memories. I send fond greetings to Audrey. I was 20
when I went to see Percy, and I shall be 56 in June this year,
so the remembrance of that day is coloured by a great distance
in time.
But I shall never forget the extraordinary man who gave us Percy
Parslow's Hamster Farm.
Warm regards
Andy Roberts
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