In the 1960s, Aberdeen still had heavy industries, a busy fishing port and was a popular holiday destination.
Freedom, political and social change, as well as a youth revolution, swept Britain in the 1960s, and Aberdeen wasn’t entirely immune from change.
The city was slowly undergoing all sorts of changes; bomb-damaged buildings were gradually placed with modern ones, and the city’s first tower block rose from the ground.
New housing estates sprung up on the outskirts, with many in the post-war generation e enjoying sanitary homes with electricity and mod-cons for the first time.
In the evenings, people enjoyed downtime in the city’s dancehalls, at the bingo and the bookies.
Bookmakers’ shops illegal until 1961
Until May 1961, betting shops were still technically illegal in Britain, but the introduction of the Betting and Gaming Act was to change that.
The idea was it would take gambling off the streets and into regulated shops.
In Aberdeen, betting shops were inconspicuous outlets with frosted glass windows and doors going by the name ‘Commission Agent’.
Ahead of the change in law, the P&J offered a rare insight into this back-street business in Aberdeen in 1961.
The bookmaker told the P&J: “We don’t allow women or drunks in here. We’re very strict about that and we have a doorkeeper to stop them coming in.”
There were about 60 betting shops in Aberdeen at the time, each with about a dozen bookies’ runners who would place bets on behalf of punters.
1960s bingo boom continued in Aberdeen
While women were barred from the bookies, they found fun elsewhere – at the bingo.
Cinema was falling out of fashion by the 1960s as many people had televisions at home instead.
However, many of the old cinemas were turned into bingo halls.
The Art Deco Kingsway on the corner of King Street and Frederick Street opened as a cinema in 1939.
But it closed in 1962, and was swiftly turned into the biggest bingo hall in the north of Scotland.
Nearly 2000 people turned out for the opening night of the bingo at Kingsway.
The popularity of bingo in other parts of the country was said to be waning by the ’60s, but the bingo boom continued in Aberdeen.
But even the promoters were taken aback to see thousands of people queuing around Frederick Street awaiting the first “eyes down” in 1962.
In pictures: Aberdeen in the 1960s
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