Swaffham Bulbeck, Cambridgeshire

Elephants in Waterbeach

I am assured that my memory is not playing tricks on me when I recall elephants living in the large garden close to Dr Pritchard's old surgery. The nuns at the convent off the A 10 road used to terrify my sister and I. They were all partially visible behind a decorative gridded screen to the side of their chapel, black-clad and mumbling.
The parcel people would pass through Waterbeach regularly. A woman who turned naked cartwheels through The Fen was a popular sight.

Playing in the corn fields

I lived in the cottage next to the Chapel, and played with Wendy, we used to cycle to Upware and Wicken fen. At one point we would sit on the haystacks after the farmers had finished them. I would go horse riding in the corn cut fields, wonderful thing to do.

One good memory was when it snowed, Mrs Dowdswell used to pour water on the playground so we could all slide on it. Not allowed to do that sort of thing for the children today, Health & safety and all that!  The village used to have a few shops, which sold more or less anything you wanted, and two pubs. We had lots of places to play, cadnam, down the fen, up heath road. It was a happy time. Children now adays do not know how to play with each other.

My first experience of England

When my family arrived in England from the US we went straight to our home which was located in Burwell. While my parents went to buy groceries for the kids we were able to start meeting our new playmates in the area. This was my first expereince with the difference in our english language. To this day I still get a laugh remembering when a young girl was leaving she said "Cheerio" and I thought to my self why is she talking about a cereal.

THE VILLAGE FOOTBALL TEAM OF THE 1950s

I remember in the 1950s when Cherry Hinton had the best village football team in Cambridgeshire, and around the 1950s when Cherry Hinton was a village, sadly no more. Farms up the High Street. Smiths bakers in Fulbourn Road. A piano playing all the old songs on a Saturday night in the Robin Hood.
I remember the sheep being brought from Fulbourn Road down the High Street to Chalks Farm. Old Ken Baker riding side-saddle on the big Shire horse, chewing a bit of straw, delivering muck for the allotments behind Fulbourn Road. Those were the days. Walking to school from Fulbourn Road down what was classed as Long Walker (a path which ran from Fulbourn Road to Fishers Lane) before the council estate was built. And the other footpath which ran from between Fulbourn Road and the old Dutch barn over the hill to the beech woods. No longer there (but could be if the locals had it opened up). I remember Mr Olie Chapman, 56 Fulbourn Road. He used to cut my hair for sixpence on a Sunday morning, if I did not keep still he would clip my ear. Oh those memories. Catching rats and rabbits when they done the harvest, the foreman from Chalks Farm, Mr Dawson, could not catch us. I remember Bill Chapman who I owe so much  for what he did for me, and was one of the players along with Peter Dean, Brian Stevens who would be today's £50,000,000 football players who played with pride. I could go on and on. Always dreaming but the times have gone, two other men I must mention are Douglas Kitson, who was like a brother to me, sadly no longer with us, and Bill Taylor from the High Street who also I owe so much to. I was born in Fulbourn Road, no 34. Nickname NOBBY. CHERRY HINTON, THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES.