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As a youngster, I used to go to the Temperance Hall in Curzon Street, Derby, in the late 1920s to see silent films on Saturday afternoons. It was mainly for children and my father used to give me 4d (2p) as pocket money. I could either spend 1d admittance to the ground floor and another 2d on liquorice sticks, or 2d on admittance to the balcony and 1d on one stick.

The Temperance Hall in Curzon Street

The attraction of the balcony was that you could sit next to the box from which the films were projected.This box was just a small wooden structure and the door was always left open so you could see all the activity.

The projector was very primitive by today's standards. I think it was hand-cranked. All sorts of things used to happen during the showing. Sometimes, the film would break and the poor projectionist had to suffer catcalls and boos from the audience until he got it repaired. Another time the film would come on upside down, accompanied by more abuse from the audience.

There was always a serial that finished with a cliffhanger, which made sure everybody went next week to see what happened. The hero of the cowboy films was often a chap whose film name was Nevada Smith. In later years, I used to visit the Cosmo cinema on Upper Boundary Road where the films had a more professional appearance.

I remember seeing the first talkie. I think it was The Jazz Singer at the old Whitehall cinema in St Peter's Street. With the advent of talking pictures, the need for audiences to shout out what the character had said before the words came up on the screen disappeared.

George Cabell, Alvaston.

• Memories of wathcing silent films

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