Good Old Days

A Memory of Rubery.

I remember Elite fish and chip shop. Went to Colmers Farm 1957-1967
Fine Fare was opened by the Dagenham Girl Pipers. Avery’s was the shoe shop.
Hadley’s we went for bags. Delaney’s toy shop. Dowlings for veg and straw for the chickens.
And the little corner shop on Eachgreen Lane run by two dear little sisters, had a Barbers Tea motif paired high up on the wall. The cliffs we climbed down when our mom sent us to the shops. That wonderful library with the dungeon like front door. Even the cherry blossom trees before they were replaced by the by pass.
My mother left her pushchair at a cottage at the bottom of cockhill Lane for 2d as it couldn’t go on the bus, caught at the terminal by Rubery Hill Hospital.
As kids we were entertained by a male patient, an old man, bald head, long black overcoat.
He used to stand outside Dowlings and produce a tomato from one coat pocket, salt and pepper pots fir the other pocket, sprinkle the tomato and swallow it as he had no teeth.
Those were the days, no X boxes or technology for amusement.