Banner Flying Over Croydon.

A Memory of Croydon.

I remember so vividly the Croydon Airport building which, fortunately, is still there and protected for all to enjoy. I recall one particular day looking up into the sky from Scarbrook Road (where I was born at number 33 in September 1951) and seeing a small bi-plane towing a long flowing banner ‘Shop at Eastern Carpets’ which was a store in the high street! Oddly that was the only time I remember seeing such an event! Anyone else out there recall similar happenings??? The airport ceased operations in late 1959 I think and the majority of the land is now taken up by the Roundshaw housing estate. Opposite the aerodrome was one of my favourite summer haunts, Purley Way outdoor swimming pools. What a wonderful lido that was and what a sad day when it closed😞. (It became a garden centre for a while which is now gone.) The sun always seemed to shine in the summers back then, but of course it didn’t!
I now live in a converted country Manor House where once Lady Mary Bailey lived. She was a record holding aviatrix and landed at Croydon Airport having completed the first solo flight by a woman from London to Cape Town and back to London. All this in an open cockpit with no heater or radio (!!!) I’m sure everyone will also remember Neville Chamberlain waving his piece of white paper with Hitler’s signature promising ‘Peace in our time’. If only he had honoured that piece of paper. A year or two later and the aerodrome he arrived at was a fighter station!