A Reflection Of 50 Years Ago

A Memory of South Ockendon.

We moved to Cruick Avenue in December 1959 but the scene depicted is very familiar, although I would remember a few more cars in the road by the early '60s. We lived at no. 65 which would be back over the photographer's left shoulder. The wall and fence on the right hand side is that of Mardyke School with the main entrance and gates being the opening just after the first lamp-post on the right. The view on photo S 280349 would be what you would see when going through these. I attended both the infants and junior school there until leaving in 1965. A bit further up on the right was Elwick Road, the view on S280033 being taken from South Road, looking up towards Cruick. It seemed a long road to little legs but you could walk to the end facing and although it was a dead-end for cars, there was an alleyway which led through to Foxglove Crescent, which was all prefabs then. Further along Foxglove was a footbridge which took you over the Fenchurch St. railway line which ran at the bottom of the gardens of the houses on the left of Cruick and Foxglove on its' way up to Ockendon station. You could go over this and down Afton Drive to Derwent Parade (or the "Big Shops" as we called them, mainly, as I recall, to differentiate them from the "Little Shops" which were in Broxburn Drive) seeing the view in S 280090. Otherwise, you could continue along Foxglove until it turned right, back towards South Road when you could carry on past a small grass area and across the small bridge into Orchard Road as seen in S280005. If the photographer turned 180 degrees you would see Cruick heading down the hill towards Stifford Road, which you could cross and go to the delights of the Mardyke Valley, either down Stifford Hill to the road bridge over the river, under which you could wade and fish for tiddlers and sticklebacks or swing over the river on a rope attached to a stout banch of a tree beside the bridge, or go through Cullen Square and down beside the railway viaduct ( the 14 Arches ), risk life and limb crossing the "Spikey Bridge" or play near the sewer outlets - where was H & S then? Otherwise you could go through "the woods" emerging well on your way to Aveley. Although it's not too apparant in the photo, most of the houses were in terraced rows of 10, with alleyways between pairs for rear access except the end houses which had side access. The families which lived in our row of 10, from 61 - 79 were, as I recall: the Mundys, the Petersens (later the Prices), us, the Wilsons, the Hunters, the Scriveners, the Krygers, the Beadles, the Simpsons (??) and the Crosbys. I left Cruick in 1978 but I still have cause to go there regularly. Has it changed? Obviously the school has gone, and the land it stood on and most of what was the school field is now a small estate of houses, and the uniformity of the original council houses has been lost as individuals have bought and altered their properties to their taste, but it's still Cruick Avenue to me, with lots of memories of a happy childhood and of people I shared it with, all looking now as they did in the 60's!