Growing Up In Burnham
A Memory of Burnham.
In this year I was 5 years old, and just starting school in the church hall in Gore Road, which is the road in which I also grew up.
I remember Burnham as a small, close-knit community, we went to church every Sunday, it was friendly and safe. My Mother's family were one of the first to inhabit Burnham, and are recorded in the doomsday book, the family name was Brookling. I have many happy memories of playing in the meadows, before the sprawling estates were built in Minniecroft and Lent Green Lane. We all knew Cleares, Hearns the butcher, the local Doctors, in the High Street, Dr Summers, Dr Daily and Dr Mitchell-Fox. Clonmel had not been built either, and it seemed all of us kids knew each other in the village. How it has changed! Now you can walk down the village and not see a soul you know, sad, but that is progress, the pace of life, and community has been lost in the many years since the 50s, and probably before that for the people who lived there in the 1900s and before. It used to be such a lovely village, but alas no more.
Add your comment
You must be signed-in to your Frith account to post a comment.
Add to Album
You must be signed in to save to an album
Sign inSparked a Memory for you?
If this has sparked a memory, why not share it here?
Comments & Feedback
I also remember the butchers shops plus Lawleys the stationers, Darvill the grocer, Sands garage and Collets which I think was haberdashery. The firefighters were all part-time and summoned for duty by the old air raid siren - the fire station also housed the lending library.
We also went to church every Sunday in the Congregational Church in Gore Road. There was a church hall there where we went to Girls Life Brigade. Every month or so there would be a Sunday parade from Sands garage to the church when we would march behind the Boys Brigade band.
I remember starting school in the old Infant School accessed through St Peter’s churchyard. It was a hut which also doubled as the ‘dinner hut” for both the Infant and Junior schools. The food used to arrive from a satellite kitchen in large aluminium containers.
We moved away in 1963 before, I imagine, the village became too impersonal but I have many happy memories of growing up there.