I am Billy's niece and retrieved this journal from a hitherto undiscovered heap of memorabilia which his sister, my mother, had kept some fifty years after his sudden death in a road accident.
This ebook began because I wanted a memorial for him, but as I read it I realised ow well he has captured the essence of how it felt to be a young man leaving England for an exciting new future in America, in the 1960s . His descriptions of the jazz clubs, the social life and the scenery made each page zing.
At the time his travel journal began he was twenty-six, and he was a qualified architect. His appreciation of building design is evident from the many references contained within his journal, although at times he definitely seems more excited by music than architecture.