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Basildon
Basildon maps
Historic maps of Basildon and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Basildon maps
Basildon area books
Displaying 1 of 18 books about Basildon and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Basildon
Displaying a selection of personal
memories of Basildon.
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Band Meeting Place
I can remember in my youth, meeting here as a member of the Basildon drum and trumpet corp, we used to march up the slope and into the town square where we did our display. That was in the 1970s.
I Still Live Here
My mum and dad came from Tottenham and Edmonton, they moved to Danbury Down, my mum and dad were offered the house because my dad worked for Mobil Oil. The nearest shops were Staceys Corner, the 16 shops. Then on a bike ride my dad found Little Bentley, he asked the foreman who was building a 4 bed house if he could have one and he said yes (that would be nice these days). Then my brother and my sister were born at the house... then I came along in 1972. We all went to Springfield, my sister and brother went to Fryens and I went to Woodlands in 1984, it was a girls school for a year or two then it was mixed. There have many changes in Basildon, some quite bad..... My dad died in 1998 and my mum in 2010 and we sold the house this 2011, it was a very sad time as it's been a lot of memories, 50 in total.. I still live here,... Read more
Before The Town Centre Was Built ...
My family came to Basildon in 1957 as part of the overspill from London. My late father was a toolmaker and was offered a job and a house.
Money was tight and we made out own entertainment. Collecting wood from the fields where the town centre now stands, fruit picking from the cleared lots waiting for development.
When the shops started being built (my memory is that Woolworth was the first opened in that first block) we would go down there to watch them being constructed.
My mother had to use the only shops available which was Staceys Corner (I think) and all the different vans that would visit individual streets.
Both my parents became teachers - Mrs White at Manor and Bryn schools and Mr White at Nicholas.
I am proud to have been involved with Basildon since the very beginning of its development and to watch its growth into a vibrant town.
First Families
We moved to The Gore, in about 1962. My brother was born here. Our family lived at number 83, and up until 2000, no other family had ever lived there. We moved in when the other end of the road was still being finished. I went to Gyhllgrove School, and can remember my first teacher, 1965, being a Miss Mehtha, an Asian lady. On special occasions she would bring in saris for us to try on and teach us dancing, all back in 1965! One of my favourite teachers ever was in the junior school. His name was Mr Wrankmore, a South African man. He had beautiful skin, and we all used to wonder if he ever changed tone! We were such innocent little 9-year-olds then!
I Hate Basildon
Having moved at the horrid age of 13 years to Basildon from Hornchurch in the early 1960, I found the surrounding countryside a wee bit scary. Now I love the countryside and could never live in a town again and with that moved to the S.W. I hate Basildon because what started as country town ended up as a thug-filled town full of dimwits who never respect the good things in life. We who came from the hell hole of London in the early 1960s got a better start in life because of Baslidon and the schools within it. The wholesale destruction of this town is due to the poor planing of the planners with small minds and less life experience. I am sorry those idiots have wrecked a little piece of heaven that once was Basildon and Laindon. You who live there make them fix it for the sake of the children to follow, let them enjoy the good things that were once Basildon, not the hell hole and suburb... Read more
All Countryside
When I was born, Basildon was not built. I was born in Pitsea, when it was all country side. Although my mum took me back to London after the war, I returned to Pitsea often to stay with my grandparents. It was the happiest time of my life, the freedom of walking across the fields and buying fresh eggs and getting the old noisy bus to Pitsea market on a Wednesday. We got the water from the well outside the back door, no flush lavvy, no electric light, just oil lamps. But I was far happier than the kids nowadays.
Essex memories
Laindon High Road
This photograph shows a car with a lady coming out of a shop.This car belonged to my neighbour Arthur Pearman who now lives in Billericay. The lady was his wife who is now no longer with us. Arthur had bought this car as a wreck and rebuilt it.Obviously he was and still is proud of it because few people had cars in those days it was indeed a luxury.He is also sad about the High Road no longer being there,it was over a mile long with shops all along both sides. It was compulsory purchased by the then Basildon Corporation so he says.Evidently his family owned much of the land in Laindon.On the other side of the road there is a white van from which goods are being sold. this man is the same man who kept lions along the Crays Hill Road for many years and became very famous because of that.
