The Pond And The Common And The Lido

A Memory of Tooting Bec Common.

Although we lived in Balham, many hours were spent on the common and the pond en-route to the open air swimming pool. I can remember with fondness, especially during the summer holiday, as money was in short supply we would either walk or get our bikes out and mess around the pond area for hours on end and by the afternoon we would go to the lido and as you quite rightly say,we all smelt like perch or roach but that soon improved once we had our "bath". Interesting to note in them days the sun shone all day, and every day, and all summer, unlike nowaday's "who knows".