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Desborough
Desborough maps
Historic maps of Desborough and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Desborough maps
Desborough area books
Displaying 1 of 8 books about Desborough and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Desborough
Displaying a selection of personal
memories of Desborough.
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or of a photo of Desborough.
Summer Hols
In our school holidays I used to go fishing and swimming down the brook below Pioneer Ave, that's where I lived, number 19 Pioneer. We moved to Windsor Ave in 1978. I used to knock about with Simon Loake, Barry Goodman, Dean Underwood, John and James Twelvetree. We also used to roam the allotments and the surrounding fields, armed with catapaults and our pockets full of stones. Towards the end of the 6 week hols the allotments were full of trees full of fruit calling out to us, waiting for us to go scrumping and try and not get caught by the allotment owner. Them words I used to dread to hear, 'Young Oram, I know it's you, wait till I see your dad'. All good harmless fun until you got home to a clip around the ear.
Northamptonshire memories
Working in Kettering Careers Office
I spent an enjoyable month in Spring 1988 working for Kettering Careers Office as part of my training during a post grad year for my Careers Guidance Diploma.
I remember Tresham College, lovely shops, friendly people, a comfortable bed and breakfast for the month arranged for me by the college, and my journey each Sunday and Friday evening by train from my Watford home to Kettering via Bletchley and Bedford. Although it was only March I remember cherry trees in blossom along the roadside!
I met some fascinating people in the most unusual jobs such as as fletcher and a jigsaw maker and a factory making bubble wrap!
The Bus Station
I have put 1970 as my year of recollection, but I was catching the 259 service from bay 5 at about the time this photograph was taken.
In 1970 I was working on the buses as a conductor and by 1974 as a driver.
You will see in the photo that buses reversed onto the bays, this changed in the mid 1970s, with the introduction of more fromt entry buses, from then we drove onto the bay and reversed off.
At the far end was a cafe (near bays 1 and 2) and at this end a waiting room and a boking office.
A block of flats now stands on this site, but the bus garage is still there, just to the left of the photo.
Bakehouse Hill
The bakehouse was a regular visit for us on Saturday mornings - when we used to go to the morning picture shows - and we would call in to buy freshly baked crusty rolls to eat during the film, but were usually consumed long before we got to our seats.
The picture still shows the roading with its cobbles still in place.
Silver Street 1955
I first started work for Colliers Cabinet Makers in School Lane and as an apprentice I had to go for the cakes and biscuits at a bakers shop in Silver Street which was situated just around the corner from School Lane.
When this picture was taken, I was in the Merchant Navy and when on leave, regularly purchased a suit from Burtons' "Fifty Bob Tailors', which is just in view to the extreme right.
The street has not changed much physically during the past fifty years or so, but some of the old pubs have long disappeared.
Hairdressers/Barbers
Would anyone remember the name and exact location of a hairdressers/barbers shop in Kettering Regent Street area? Looking at late 1920's onwards.
Young Corby, Once Called Corbie.
This photo must have been taken early in the morning because that play area was always packed with wee yins in the 1960s. I know because I was one of them. There were lots of what I used to call swing parks in Corby in the 1960s. Corby was a very young place in 1965, not just the new town but its people as well. The expanding steelworks attracted thousands of young migrants, mainly from Scotland. I remember I was on a bus with my mum travelling to Kettering, the nearest town to Corby. I was about four. I remember this very strange woman getting on the bus who had lines and wrinkles all over her face. I stared and stared till my mum told me off for being rude. The woman smiled at us. She said, in what I was to come to recognise as the local Northamptonshire accent, that I was to be forgiven. She remarked that I probably had never seen an old person before. She... Read more
