Walker From 46 To The 70's

A Memory of Byker.

I was born in Walker 1946 to be accurate. They were slums even though the women did their best to keep them clean and rodent free. I remember my mum doing the washing in the wash-house in the back yard, she had to start a fire under this concrete bowl thing and fill it with water from the tap in the back yard. There were 4 families to a yard; if you lived in an upstairs flat you had an inside tap but the folks who lived downstairs had to get their water from the tap in the back yard. There were two toilets for four households, not to bad in our yard as there were no big families. Further up the street there were three families and one old lady; between them there were 20 people. Mice were a big problem and I remember my dad and brother trapping a lot of mice in the bedroom fireplace and my dad insisted on burning them. The part of Walker Road I lived on was nicknamed 'sickness row' because of the damp and and unsanitary conditions that caused all kinds of health problems. But we were some of the lucky ones who were rehoused and we moved to Losh Terrace - it was paradise with electric lighs and an indoor wc and the dreaded bath! I have lots more to tell about growing up in the east end of newcastle

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