1944 1972

A Memory of Heston.

Born 1944 I grew up in a house on the Great West Road, between Springwell Lane and the Broadwalk. My first great adventure: a tricycle with which I nearly broke the legs of several pedestrians. Springwell infants' school on what had been Blackberry Farm and became a building site for much needed housing. Headmistress Miss Parnell (or was it Burnell? I never did know) - who gave us such a good start with her modern approach to education. Sand trays for learning letters and numbers, plasticine fruit and veg for going "shopping". Play reading and the beginnings of essay writing; the "times tables" (oh so impossible to remember); egg and spoon races on the square of grass in the quadrangle. And rolls of plaster and bandages for all those scraped knees! All Saints Mission Hall for Sunday school, country dancing taught by - was it Miss Meg and Miss Mary? - Christmas Bazaars and a show put on, we children singing Inch worm, inch worm - and what was the song for which we wore alternate pink and green aprons? A very good curate who made the Bible stories come to life; and a prized album of attendance stamps (which I think I still have). Brownies and Girl Guides, Sunday morning parade to St. Leonard's. Boy Scouts and Bob-a-job. Roller skates with metal wheels which the neighbours hated. A bicycle to zoom down Sprinwell hill with feet on the handlebars ... On summer evenings walking beside the Policeman and his dog, a beautiful Alsation. Berkeley junior under Miss Brown, followed by Miss Salter. Miss Andrews who came in her car with such an unfortunate number plate (BUM) until her chariot resigned and she peddled determinedly back and forth in all weathers. Exercise and gymnastiques with hoola hoola hoops. Miss Wallace and her fight to get us through the 11+ - a role previously taken by Miss Roots until she married. A school visit to the Express Dairy to learn how the churns arrived by train and the milk was processed for bottles to arrive on our doorsteps, thanks to the milkman and his horse. A Heston baker pulled his cart all round the area, dispensing good bread and, my own interest, delicious currant buns. Sadly sliced bread took away most of his custom. I went to see him amongst his unsold loaves, and he said all he had to do was eat them himself. I tried to organise a campaign amongst my school fellows to get the parents to once more buy his bread ... Brown's and Hawk's for sweets, the cafe, a hardware shop where I watched as paint was stirred; the bakers with the first post-war cream horns; Peak Freans for a Saturday and holiday jobs (remember full employment, Saturday boys and girls?). My paternal grandmother lived on Vicarage Farm Road and the house was later sold to the Drs Wright. The airport grew rapidly and we watched the first Brabazon fly over our back garden. On 2 May 1953, BOAC Flight 783, a de Havilland Comet, broke up in the air shortly after leaving Calcutta airport. BOAC brought the pilot's family to live in Heston. I went to Twickenham County school so didn't see much of Heston after that, between homework and the Saturday job!!! I became a professional dancer on the international variety circuit, and was more and more horrified each time I returned home at the increase of noise and pollution. The parents moved to a retirement bungalow in spring 1972 and I haven't seen Heston since. I now live in the clean air and real silence of central, rural, France - a far cry from the Great West Road!!!
VERY IMPORTANT - PLEASE READ: if anyone remembers the disappearnce of a little boy in Heston, some time between 1950 and 1954, please contact me. There was a report in the Middlesex Chronicle of two men misbehaving themselves; one was caught, the other not. The little boy's photo was in the paper: head and shoulders - hair not dark, a light-coloured sweater. If you remember anything about it, please let me know. The relevant newspapers are in copyright still and will therefore not be scanned and online for several years. I am myself unable to travel to London and search them. Thank you for reading this.
Christine Tilbury in Chambon sur Voueize.
tilburycm@aim.com