White Webbs Park, The Pond c1955, Enfield
White Webbs Park, The Pond c1955, Enfield Ref: E179020
Memories of White Webbs Park, The Pond c1955, Enfield
Whitewebbs Lake And Second Woods
Wonderful walks from Clay Hill, past the golf course and on over the bridge on the stream and up through the woods. Little children with their mothers clutching bags of bread to feed the ducks and swans on the lake. An adventure for any small child.
One winter the lake froze over completely and we were able to skate on the lake and also feed the hungry ducks and swans. Unfortunately in the late 1950s one of the swans died and although many attempts were made to introduce another swan, it would not be accepted as swans mate for life.
Across Flash Lane lay "second woods" and we as children used to pick blackberries and find our way to the centre where "Ranger's Tomb" was situated. Ranger was the much loved dog of the gamekeeper some time during the late 19th Century.
Just across the way from the Lake is Whitewebbs House, a name that is linked to Guido Fawkes and The Gunpowder Plot. The original... Read more
Enfield & local memories
Read and share memories of Enfield and Middlesex inspired by Frith photos.
Hilly Fields
Situated at the top of our road, as young children Hilly Fields was something quite magical. During winter time we would trek our home made sledges over to toboggan hill and hurtle down to the brook at the bottom of the hill at breakneck speeds. Summer time, climbing trees, fishing for stickle backs in the brook. The game known to us as "jumping dags" which entailed jumping over the brook without getting your feet wet, but many a time falling in and getting soaked. The park keepers hut next to the putting green where you could play 18 holes for 3d, followed by an ice lolly for 1d from "Gaylers" the shop then attached to The Rose and Crown. The glorious long summer evenings where we, as very young children, would play over Hilly Fields until it was to dark to see. There was never anything to be afraid of in those days. When the grass cutter mowed the huge expanses of grass and we would collect huge piles of... Read more
Lancaster Road.
Henry Waits the butchers, small shops that sold sweets from a jar and fireworks. Penny for the guy, small children waiting at bus stops with the 128, 231 and 144B to try and pry a penny towards fireworks. Girlfriend (Rose Gritty) down Drake Street. Rag and Bone merchant towards 'The Hop Poles' pub. Doing the weekly shopping on my bicycle and taking everything home in a couple of shopping bags hanging on the handlebars. Going down early in the morning to collect the papers from Wilmotts to do my morning paper round when I was only 10 years old. The oil shop at the bottom of Browning Road and next door the 'Seed Shop' for flower pots and garden plants. Gosetts, the haberdashery shop. Garetts the pharmacy close to 'The Hollybush' public house. The doctors' waiting room, Dr. Dalzeil (pronounced DL), Dr Ben Ridge and his brother. Boy, was that waiting room cold, and everyone seemed to be coughing and sneezing, but nobody talked. Collecting old newspapers and taking them... Read more
Sat Morning Shopping Trips.
I spent my childhood living in Hillside Crescent, and will always remember doing my mum's shopping in Lancaster Rd on a Sat morning. Down Browning Rd to Lyons the grocer, then often for a hair cut next door but one, from the Oil shop in Lancaster Rd, next door to the Seed & Pet shop, then Henry Waits the butcher, sometimes to the grocer next door. Across the road to the cake shop, then along the road to McFisheries for cat pieces, I sometimes took my neighbour's accumalater next door to the fish shop for a re charge. Off home then along Birkbeck Rd to the Stumps, up to Hilly Fields and home. Very fond memories. I also belonged to the Life Boys at Armingale Rd, 60 years have gone, but those days I'll always remember - especially my friends at the time, Ron Arrowsmith/Brian Ryder/Alfie & Duncan Wooten & Gerald Turner.
Local Shops Even in The 1990's
I moved to Enfield in 1990, and lived just oppostie the Hop poles in Baker Street. Lancaster Road had a wide variety of shops even then. Three Greengrocers and a Butchers to start with, as well as several bakers. Next to the Co-op, an old lady sold eggs from a half barn door...nothing else, just eggs. I thought I had gone back in time. Chaplins video shop, The Art shop, dress shops and photographic studios....and of course A to Z, who sold everything. You could get many things without ever having to go in to Enfield town. Apart from Budgens and the Co-op and A to Z of course, many of those shops have gone in twenty two years. Mainly fast food shops, now. Four supermarkets in the area have opened in that time!
St Andrew's Church.
My parents Phyllis Bramley of Falmer Road and William Davis of 1st Avenue Bush Hill Park were married in St. Andrew's Church in the 1930s and both I and my sisters were Christened in St. Andrew's Church in the late 30s and early 40s. My parents, once married, purchased a house in Hillside Crescent, close to Hilly Fields for the sum of 400 pounds.
It is quite frightening that coming from two large Enfield families, not one of their offspring has remained, the last being my cousin Betty Clayton of Windmill Gardens who died some years back.
What a pity that families move on and leave their home towns. Even though I left England in 1966, I still regard Enfield as my home as they say - home is where your heart is and my heart is in Hilly Fields and Whitewebbs Park.
St Andrews Parish Church
I was christened in the parish church around 1955/56. They used to send you a postcard every year until you were 5 years old to remind you of the event - unfortunately having moved several times during my life I no longer have them. My brother also got married there in 1959 and I was a pageboy!! I used to walk through the graveyard every day on my way to work in the Post Office in Church Street or the sorting office in Southbury Road in the 1970s.
When I Was A Lad
I was at Suffolks School during the Second World War and after, from about 1939 until 1947, when we endured the worst that Hitler could throw at us. We had many, many air raids that interrupted our schooling and much of our time was spent in the air raid shelter. I recall the rocket that fell on the infant school and destroyed most of the school, the Head Mistress asked some of us to help salvage the merchandise, I was one of them. Oh, so many happy times.
Growing up in Enfield
I remember the pool very well, I attended Suffolks Secondary Modern School in Brick Lane, just off the Great Cambridge Road, we walked to the pool for swimming lessons but if you could not swim the teachers did not bother to try teach you. One day my friend Doreen Banks told our parents we were going swimming but in reality we went to see a Mario Lanza film at the Savoy. The boys we went with wet our swimming costumes under the tap for us on the way home! I wrote a critique of the film for an English lesson, this was displayed on the wall for parents' day, luckily my stepmother did not come. I also remember playing in Hilly Fields, also going to the 'Bughutch'. I lived near Enfield Wash, not in the town, Hoe Lane was where I lived, right next to the railway line. I was mad about dancing, went 3 times a week, first learned to dance at 'Dinah's dance class, she lived in Crest... Read more
Brrrr - it Was Cold!
There used to be a big sign outside the pool which displayed the temperature of the water that day. When it was our day for swimming, one of us was sent down from George Spicers school to see what the day's torture would be. The threshhold was 58 degrees F - if above, we all trooped down there. I remember a number of times the runner came back with the news it was 57! Funny that.
Re Hilly Fields, Enfield c1950
I also have good memories of "dag jumping" and catching tadpoles in the brook at Hilly Fields and Fourteen Arches. The wonderful smell of of the grass as we played "roly poly" down the hills and over the bumps. Games of pretend on the band stand and ice cream from Gaylors next to the Rose and Crown. Collecting conkers and colourful leaves for school. (Chase Side Elementary and later Chace Girls) We crossed the road into White Webbs Park and on to the duck pond.
Also many memories of riding on our horse and cart with my dad to the nurseries in Cattlegate Road to buy local lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers etc for our shop long before the present day Garden Centres existed. As greengrocers we walked miles every week alongside our horse and cart delivering to the cottages and houses in the Clay Hill, White Webbs Lane area.
Yes, Roger and Derek such good memories. We were lucky to have lived in that era when... Read more
More of Enfield
Swimming at the open air pool was so compulsory at George Spicer and then Kingsmead schools but then we grew a little and in the holidays worked at Pearsons and danced at the Court above Burtons in the market square. Those days it was safe to walk home at night and everyone seemed to know everyone, the town seemed so small and people were actually nice to each other. We started off in Graeme Road and moved to Faversham Avenue, Off Village Rd, Bush Hill Park and attended St Stephens every Sunday to watch the girls dressed in blue cassocks in the choir!! We loved our teenage years in Enfield. Now far away in the US with my Masters degree tucked under my arm, I miss that time, the people and the town.
Family Picnics
White Webbs was a place that all my family including aunts, uncles and cousins went to for picnics and a game of cricket. The women would play against the men and all us children would hope they would let us have a go at batting as we didn't like fielding. One of the things that all us children would do is catch tiddlers in the brook. We had a handkerchief and two of us would hold two corners each and drag it under the water to catch the tiddler, it then went into a jar, but was dead before we got home. The embankment got quiet wet from us going up and down with wet feet, then we would slip down and our clothes would be wet and muddy. We loved it, but our parents didn't. If there was time we would go blackberrying. My mum gave us an empty powdered milk can (which she got from the clinic for my baby sister), my dad put a hole each side... Read more
With Mum And Dad in Church Street, Enfield, Middlesex.
I believe this is a photograph of me, James Ernest Thomas Massey, being pushed in my pram by my father Ernest James Massey, and mother Rosina Massey, towards our home above Dolcis shoe shoe at 5 Burleigh Way, Enfield Middlesex, sometime in the first year of my life. God Rest their souls.
Enfield Open Air Pool - 1960's
My dad met my mum at the Open Air Pool in the 1930s - so they had a lot to answer for in my family! During the late 1960s I went to Kingsmead School (next door to the pool) and during spring/summer games lessons we were "forced" to go swimming! I also remember the sign on the outside of the building telling what temperature the water was - I personally think they lied through their teeth as it also seemed bl**dy freezing! I also remember watching the staff tipping large bags of chlorine powder in the (middle) deep section - God help you if you dived in just after! Then I spent most of the summer holidays there with my mates - cut-down Levi's were the fashion order of the day! I believe that they turned this into a skateboard park in the late 1970s. Enfield Town FC's stadium was also just behind the pool - many happy hours were spent there on a Friday night (if my memory serves!)... Read more
Construction of Civic Centre
I worked as a carpenter on the construction of the Civic Centre for Allen Fairhead &Sons whose H.Q. was in Enfield Town just down the road from Lyons Corner House opposite the gas company. I got married during this period and was working seven days a week as I needed the cash, I cleared seventeen pound a week!
The layout for the flower box on the right side of the building (not shown in photo)was a screw-up, instead of being om the same line as the main building it goes off at an angle, funny the things you remember after 50 years.
The King And Tinker. Whitewebbs Lane
The Ballad of King James 1st and the Tinkler.
And now to be brief, let's pass over the rest,
Who seldom or never were given to jest,
And come to King Jamie, the first of our throne,
A pleasanter monarch sure never was known.
As he was a hunting the swift fallow deer,
He dropped all his nobles, and when he got clear,
In hope of some pastime, away he did ride,
Till he came to an ale-house hard by a wood-side,
And there with a Tinkler he happened to meet,
And him in kind sort he so freely did greet,
Now pray thee, good fellow, what hast in thy jug,
Which under thy arm thou dost lovingly hug?
In truth, said the Tinkler, 'tis nappy brown ale,
And to drink to thy good health, faith, I will not fail,
For although thy jacket looks gallant and fine,
I hope that my two-pence is as good as thine.
Nay, by my sole, man, the truth... Read more
What's The Temperature Today?
Growing up in Enfield, this pool was quite a fave spot, especially during my teens - the 1960s. They always displayed the current temperature, so we could know how hot it was and how much we needed a swim, and the security was way ahead of its time - like Fort Knox, I seem to remember.
Chase Side Memories
The original Chase Side Secondary School shared premises with the Chase Side Primary, although we had separate play grounds. Next to the school was the Birkbeck Hygenic Laundry with a huge chimney and a steam siren that sounded the lunch break. The old Workhouse that eventually became a home for elderly women and later became abandoned. The War Memorial Hospital, where I had my tonsils out in 1952, which was later demolished to make way for town houses. The cenotaph at the town end of Chase Side where every November a huge bonfire would be built for Guy Fawkes day. Gentlemans Row and Lambs Walk, named after Charles Lamb who resided there. The sound of steam trains passing between Enfield Chase Station and Gordon Hill. Yes a lovely era fondly remembered.
CANADA BOUND
While working in the Lake District as an hotel assistant manager I reached such a point of frustration that I up and quit my job and applied to emigrate to Canada. Five minutes later, after hearing of my decision, the head accountant gave his notice (we were good golf buddies). He had a wife who ran a sub post office/ newsagents/sweetshop in Edmonton, north London so we both, along with the gorgeous ex-model wife (who we both adored) of our sister hotel's manager, all took off south. When we arrived in London a whole lot of nasty realities hit home when I realized that this scoundrel was bringing his lover home to his wife! I had not thought through the question of why was he working in the north of England and she in London. The subsequent tension was awful and he quickly realised that I was out of my depth in so many ways and I was summarily shipped off to a rented bedsitter.
So there I was...no... Read more
Premier
I can remember going to the Premier, you would buy your ticket at the kiosk then a young lady would tear your ticket in half and all the halves she collected were put in a bag. After the first film she would take the bag on stage, then someone would pick a ticket out of the bag, and the person with the other ticket half would win a prize.
Rose And Crown
The area where the Rose and Crown public house is situated was initially known as the "Bridge Street" hamlet. It is one of the very old inns of Enfield situated at the hollow between Whitewebbs Park and Hilly Fields. The road running at the rear of the inn towards Whitewebbs House is or was called "Bullbeggars Hollow".
The Rose and Crown has an interesting history as it was once owned by a Mr. Nott, who was Dick Turpin's grandfather. Dick Turpin being one of England's most notorious Highwaymen. On the wall of the Rose and Crown, between the second window from the bridge and the original doorway there is an iron ring where it is possible that Dick Turpin tied up his horse "Black Bess".
The right hand side of the Rose and Crown was added sometime in the late 19th century as a painting that I am in possession of painted in the early 19th century does not show the addition. In the pre and post war... Read more
Oxo And A Slice of Bread
This photo brought back memories of 'swimming' of which mostly was done under water. I had a bit of trouble co-ordinating arms and legs. The height of adventure was to use the slide (shown in the photo). Splash into the water and then a desperate sideways crawl back to the side of the pool. Blue lips and a shivering body was revived by a cup of Oxo and a slice of bread in the cafeteria.
Suits And Films
Burtons the Tailors. I remember going there to buy a suit but found nothing I liked. I then went to a tailors nearby and had my first made-to-measure suit made, barrelbacked and knuckle length in a sober grey Glen Check with a red line in it.
Besides Burtons is the Rialto which was one of the many cinemas I went to at this time and later in both in Enfield and Waltham Cross. The Savoy for choice, the Rialto if I'd already seen the film at the Savoy and maybe the Florida. As a change I went to the Embassy or the Regent in Waltham Cross. About this time I also went with my mates to the Bughutch aka the Premier in Enfield Wash.
It was different going to a cinema in those days. You bought a ticket and went in whenever you liked, no need to wait for the film to finish and everbody went out.
You could go in in middle of one film, stay till... Read more
Enfield Town Station
A nice shot of Enfield Town Station, at the side of the station was the engine shed. I started work at for British Railways Enfield Town as an engine cleaner in 1953 and later became a fireman. We worked the steam trains from Enfield to Liverpool Street using type N7 0-6-2 Tank engines. Your photograph shows the station just the same as it was in 1953 and looking at it brings back memories.
Enfield, 1901 Census, Durants Road.
The 1901 census shows my grandad was living at 49 Durants Road Enfield with his wife and two children. His occupation is shown as Clerk at Electric Lamp Works.
Does anyone know the likely name and location of the Electric Lamp Works?
Market
I used to help cleen up the market on Saterday Nights when I was a small boy, the church bells used to toll and one night sounded for hours. One stall holder was very small and when he drove his truck he had wooden blocks fitted to the peddles and could only see through the stearing wheel.
Forty Hill Rose Fayre
I am contacting you on behalf of the Association of Parents and Friends of Forty Hill School. We are currently organising the annual Rose Fayre which is taking place on the 16th June 2012. We are producing brochure for the day. In this, we would like to give the History of the Rose Fayre itself, which we understand has been part of the community for over a 100 years. I am wondering if anyone has any memories of past Fayres, that they wish to share? If so I would be grateful if you could contact me. Thanking you in advance.
Brigadier Hill
Can anyone help with memories of Brigadier Hill.
There was Farrants the grocers, a Tudor Cafe, that sold orange ice lolles, which were mostly ice, a bakers, a church hall, a large stable yard, with straw and horses.
St Michaels School, with a coal fire, near the teachers desk.
A horse trough at the bottom of the hill, opposite the Rose & Crown.
My dad had a cycle shop about 1930 on the corner opposite the cafe, times were hard, and he seldom got paid, for repairs, and knowing the bike was needed for work, finally went broke.
Prefabs in Glenville Road, and a huge bomb crater on the corner, and bombed houses, we as children played in, different times.
Hilly Fields 1955
My former surname was Lovelock, I attended Chace Girls' School in Rosemary Avenue and I used to go through Hilly Fields on my way home from school to Crews Hill where I lived. Yes, I too remember the talent competiton held in the bandstand especially as I had a friend who was in the choir with me at St. John's Church, Clay Hill. She always walked off with the prize after a beautiful rendition of The Holy City. Her name was Ailsa Morrison and we sang alto together.
My most abiding memories of Hilly Fields are, being picked to run a cross country course there with the then famous runner Diane Leather, I was at an advantage knowing all the quirks of the course as Diane had not run it before. All too soon though, her experience won the day but I was proud to have represented my school.Other memories are of taking Girl Guide tests under the fourteen arches, tracking and sausage cooking on a camp fire, never mind... Read more
