Recent Memories
Reconnecting with our shared local history.
For many years now, we've been inviting visitors to our web site to add their own memories to share their experiences of life as it was when the photographs in our archive were taken. From brief one-liners explaining a little bit more about the image depicted, to great, in-depth accounts of a childhood when things were rather different than today (and everything inbetween!). We've had many contributors recognising themselves or loved ones in our photographs.
Why not add your memory today and become part of our Memories Community to help others in the future delve back into their past.
Search for Local Memories
Search for your favourite UK places and read memories of the local area in days gone by.
Add a Memory!
It's easy to add your own memories and reconnect with your shared local history. Search for your favourite places and look for the 'Add Your Memory' buttons to begin
Tips & Ideas
Not sure what to write? It's easy - just think of a place that brings back a memory for you and write about:
-
How the location features in your personal history?
-
The memories this place inspires for you?
-
Stories about the community, its history and people?
-
People who were particularly kind or influenced your time in the community.
-
Has it changed over the years?
-
How does it feel, seeing these places again, as they used to look?
This week's Places
Here are some of the places people are talking about in our Share Your Memories community this week:
...and hundreds more!
Enjoy browsing more recent contributions now.
Subscribe
Join the thousands who receive our regular doses of warming nostalgia! Have our latest blog posts and archive news delivered directly to your inbox. Absolutely free. Unsubscribe anytime.
Displaying Memories 36881 - 36932 of 36932 in total
I understand my great grandfather worked in this forge. He was born Charles Holness around 1830 and married Ann Marsh in the 1850s. My father's mother Agnes Annie Holness was one of their children. She had an older sister Alice, brothers Fred and Bert and William Henry who died of smallpox in May 1902. He worked on boats at Fordwich. My father's father was Charles Albert Tucker who was a blacksmith in ...see more
My grandfather bought Smiths Car Showroom after the war when it was the Green Dolphin Cafe. I can remember going to the cafe in the 1950s when I was small. I think it is now a windows showroom.
I was amazed and delighted to see a photograph of my mother and grandmother. Nearest the camera is my grandmother, Mrs Archie Turner (1892-1974) who lived in Whitford Road, Birkenhead. Next to her is her eldest daughter, my mother, Mrs Clifford Bolt (1916-2003) who lived in Arthur Street, Birkenhead. They would both have been tickled pink to see themselves in print and famous!
As a boy of 11 or 12, I left school everyday at 3.30pm. I then drove the cows to Mr Goodings Mill about 30 or 40 yards away from Mr Shepherd's shop. After being milked I drove them back again. In wintertime I'd grind up mangolds. I was paid 1/6 for this. Then I worked at Mr Shepherd's shop running errands and did odd jobs etc. I remember very well he had fowl houses under the Bridge road but the Council ...see more
This view shows the junction line which linked the GWR Victoria station with the Junction station - running from left to right and opened in 1887. It must have been almost new when the photo was taken and the earthworks are still bare.
This photograph shows a Wednesday afternoon, early closing day, hence the low volume of traffic and few shoppers. The year is definitely 1951. On the left is myself and my apprentice electrician seen manhandling the long ladder outside William Timpson's shoe shop. The other people are just members of the public stopping for a chat. I worked for a company who for many years had the job of ...see more
I am certain the steamer is 'Sabrina' built in 1870 and was the steam inspection launch of the Directors and Engineer of the Gloucester and Berkeley Ship Canal, Gloucester. In 1912 'Sabrina' was owned by the Dock Company and did not leave their service until 1942. 'Sabrina' is still in regular use now on the River Thames and still in steam.
The photograph shows my great-aunt's tea room/restaurant. She was Mrs Matilda Howells, known in the family as Aunt Tilly. I can clearly remember visiting the tea room on many occasions as a 9/10 year old child with my mother Adelaide who was Aunt Tilly's sister. Her husband (Uncle Jack) did all his own baking in a huge wood-fired oven at the rear of the premises and meals for the tea room were cooked in an equally large wood-fired range in the kitchen adjoining.
The elderly man on left is my grandfather Mr James Bishop. He had probably popped in to the Post Office to get tobacco for his pipe. He was born in Worcester in 1883, his father was a master builder and from an early age he used to help carry bricks. He then delivered meat on horseback and went on to manage Redditch Meat Company butcher's shop on Church Green. Then he worked at 'Terry Springs' in the warehouse ...see more
The couple on the right pavement are my grandparents George Gray and his wife Elizabeth (nee Phippen) of Thornford. The photo would have been taken on a Thursday because after his retirement they always travelled to Sherborne on the once a week bus and would have been walking back to Digby Road just before midday for the bus home. Date about right as born 1887. He retired 1954/5.
I was the main weekday driver of the launch photographed during the student holiday periods of 1955-1958. When I drove it, the name was 'Silver Stream'. It was the largest of a set of three electric launches which carried paying passengers for trips of about 40 minutes duration from the steps on the downstream, north side of the town bridge. Typically this launch would carry about 40 passengers maximum. Silver ...see more
My mother ran Burraton Post Office from 1950 to about 1990 and sold Frith postcards. The cows are being driven by Mrs Cook, a farmer's wife, whose farm was about 300 yards behind the photographer in Liskeard Road, Burraton. The farm was called 'The Elms'. The farmhouse is still there, but is now an old peoples' home called The Elms. The farmland has been built on.
The boat in the photograph was completed in 1949 by my father George Watson. We lived in Palmers Green, London N13. I am up forward then aged 11. I think the picture was taken in 1949 as I can remember the occasion well.
This building was known to us as Hammett's Farm, properly West Orchard Farm, in the Higher End area of St Athan. Arthur Hammett and his wife ran the farm and I occasionally helped to deliver milk from the farm around the village from a horse and cart. Arthur, who lived to the great age of 92, and continued farming to the last, would bottle his own milk in a tiny parlour. He was a lovely chap and always gave us a ...see more
Ormerod House passed out of the Ormerod family when the male line died out and the three daughters of the last Ormerod married. Their husbands were John Hargreaves, a local coal mine owner, the Rev William Thursby who became vicar of the local church and General Scarlett who led the Charge of the Heavy Brigade to retake the field after the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava. The family ...see more
In the early 1940s the bay window on the first floor over the front door of Rotherham Grammar School was that of my second form classroom. On a rainy day we were 'attacked' by one of the other second forms as a result of which I was pushed through one of the windows. Fortunately the wartime shatterproof gauze in place prevented me and the window from falling to the ground. Several of us received six of the best for that lunchtime episode!
St John's Hospital is home to 35 elderly people. 24 live in the older part. There are 6 houses each holding 4 flats. House six can be seen in the photo, it stands alongside the hospital chapel. The chapel is used twice a week by the residents. Beyond the chapel and graveyard are two more modern buildings, St John's House is about 40 years old and comprises of 2 flats, one of which is occupied by the ...see more
The roof of the Town Hall was set alight by incendiary bombs in the heavy air-raids on Manchester and surrouding areas in late December 1940. I remember seeing it, being a young boy at the time. Sale is about six miles from Manchester centre.
The gentleman with the scythe over his shoulder was my grandfather. His name was Joseph Jackson, born in 1849 at Bootle in Cumberland. He spent most of his life as a tenant farmer, first at Canleton Farm near Egremont also in Cumberland. He then moved to Lane Ends Farm at Haverthwaite in what was then Lancashire owing to subsidence of the land due to iron ore mining from the nearby Florence Mine. He retired from farming in 1919 to Penny Bridge where he spent the rest of his life.
I built the boat shown on the right hand side of the photograph.
Bailey Bridge pontoon MKVI N0.19053 was manufactured by Gee Walker & Slater Ltd, Uttoxeter Road, Derby and sent to Engineers Stores, US Army Depot, Newbury, Berkshire on 29/9/1944. At post-war WD surplus sales, a considerable number of these Bailey Bridge pontoons were bought by Levesley's International and stored at ...see more
I was born and lived the early years of my life in South Molton. My father had his own building firm there. In 1958 we moved to Croyde Bay my father having bought this large house on the cliffs above the bay for £1800. This photo shows it before it became a motel. He put a new roof on the property in tiles rather than the slates which were normally used at that time. He then converted the top floor into our ...see more
The children in the boat are Leslie (boy), Harry (his brother), Noel (his sister) Wren. His other sister Millie Wren is sitting on the riverbank. The other child is a neighbour. For many years Millie Wren was a teacher at Lightburn School, Ulverston.
The gentleman laying on the ground in the front is my great grandfather John 'Teapot' West. He was a fisherman and lifeboatman but also well known for being a 'Fisherman Evangelist'. Together with William Craske and William Long he was a Methodist Preacher for over 50 years. They travelled throughout the county preaching and after visitors heard them they appeared at rallies in such places as London, ...see more
The unique and distinctive property of the Promenade is that its roadway is twice as wide at the top end (Queens Hotel) as it is at the bottom end (High Street), while the buildings double in height from the four stories of the Municipal Offices to the two story insurance office at the top. The reduction in height is by a careful and sophisticated series of architectural gradations involving different ...see more
The furniture van to the left will have been carried to Barnstaple by rail. There were special low 'road vehicle trucks' onto which these vans could be loaded and moved long distances around the country. and it is standing next to the end loading docks at this end of the station.
The building on the left is a carriage shed, used for holding spare passenger vehicles under cover. It is from the North Devon Railway in the 1850s and still appears to have broad gauge track (7ft gauge - not removed until 1877) laid into it. Access was by means of a small turntable just off the picture to the left. The Ilfracombe Railway is being built - the low embankment can just be seen with what appears to be ...see more
Date of this photograph is c1874/75 as the railway viaduct is complete.
This is a photograph of me as a young man operating my passenger carrying narrow boat 'Bellatrix', trading as Midland Navigation Packet Boat Service. 'Bellatrix' is a traditional narrow boat built in 1935 at Yarwoods of Northwich.
I was born in Hythe and spent all my childhood there. My brother, sister and I used to walk home from school along the canal bank. In the holidays we would take jam jars and catch tadpoles. In the winter, we would slide on the frozen water.
My father and grandfather both served with Henry Blogg on the 'Louisa Hartwell' and my dad was one of the pallbearers when Henry Blogg died.
The property on the left of the photograph marked 'Printing Office' is where I grew up and lived until my student days. My parents operated a bakers and confectionery business from the premises. In 1890, when a printing works, it was owned by the Brookes family as can be seen from the sign over the door. Their ownership continued until about 1918, at which time two sisters opened a cafe (Fells Cafe) ...see more
The photograph was probably taken from the top of the Odeon cinema which was demolished in about 1983. On the skyline can be seen the Lyceum Theatre, the Corn Exchange (now demolished), the Market Hall clock tower, the Town Hall and the Mechanics Institute with Library and Ballroom below (now demolished). Traffic is still running in both directions along Market Street, which became 'one way' in 1963 in the week I took ...see more
The lady on the left by the railings of King's College is my older sister then aged 22. We lived in Cambridge until 1922 and I was a pupil at Cambridge High School during the First World War. I am now 93.
The wooden boats in the picture belong to the riverside restaurant, out of shot to the right. As a teenager, in 1974, it was my job on a Sunday afternoon to hire these out. We did have a few people fall out of the boats, but no one complained. A warm brew and some towels was all it took to make things right.
Have seen this view many times in my younger days, back in the late 1920s and early 30s, just after crossing the footbridge over the river, when on my way to see my dear old gran at Harnham. I can still remember the smell of the old mill.
The cottage used to be called Whitlands Cottages. In 1881 my great grandparents Mr & Mrs French lived at no 3, next door to Mrs Gapper.
I was born in Axmouth and most Sundays we would have to walk out to Landslip Cottage. We all knew it as Anne's Cottage because the lady who lived there was called Annie Gapper. She would give my late Mum and Dad a cup of tea. I was one of nine in the family.
The gentleman fishing in the foreground is the late Mr Eric Sewell. He was a very keen fisherman and lived with his sister in a mansion flat in Twickenham Road overlooking Tough's boatyard. He was a very nice quiet man who always, when he was out of doors, wore a trilby hat and a light fawn coat whatever he was doing. I knew him for a long time and in the later years of his life he lost most of his ...see more
By this time Seeboard have taken over the Uptons building but Caffyns still have their garage premises which finally became a furniture salesroom in about 1982. the one way system has still not been created (see H252069), the restaurant is still 'Haywards' and the bank is the National Provincial.
This neat little Standard 8 Tourer (DNJ 785 - an East Sussex registration from 1947) could then get down nearly to the pavilion.
This is taken from outside the Star and shows (as does H252583) the system that prevailed before the Star became not just a pub but a roundabout eg things could turn right down the Broadway and Muster Green North was still a through road. The 36 bus is going to East Grinstead (although the 30 only went to Chelwood Common to connect with another bus).
This is the Broadway as I knew it. Both the Middlesex registered Driving School Morris 1000 and the East Sussex registered Morris 1000 truck MPN556 date this to after 1958. On the right beyond Eastman's the cleaners were WF Measor (haberdashers), JD Neal (who took over the business of F Butcher, jewellers), James Langridge (the Sussex Cricketer) who ran a toy shop, and beyond that was Ballards the ...see more
It could be an AEC double decker that is running into the bus station in this picture. I think it could be a little later than 1950 because of the 'embryo' roundabout, but not much because of the single decker leyland on the station forecourt. 'The Burrell Arms' (centre left), revamped in the 1930s, was once run by the father of cricketer Maurice Tate.
I cannot recall this single-decker Leyland bus on the 29 Route from Lewes. It is worth noting that up to the 1950s most of the local bus routes were serviced by single and double decker laylands (with even a few pre-war 'Gilfords') but the Haywards Heath circular route (no 84) was always serviced by 'utility' GUY double deckers.
'The Hayward' sign was outside 'Haywards Cafe & Restaurant' which flourished until the 1960s when it successively became 'Delmontes', 'Pieros', 'La Ferola' and now 'The Blue India'. Going down the right hand side of the Broadway facing north, one had immediately The National Provincial Bank (with flats over; Mr Bill Lowings was the last manager to live 'over the shop' in the 1950s), then Evans (electrical) and ...see more
The men on the wall are (looking from left to right): Charles Matthews, William Matthews and Sydney Matthews (Charles's son who died quite young). The little girl in the background was a Miss Jones who lived at No 1 West End.
Before George Hilton and Sons took over the buildings on the right as a furniture store (now Robert Dyas) it was Dinnages Toy Shop (a subsidiary of the garage company) where I bought my "Dinky" toys in the 1940's. The shop on this side was J Norton - bespoke outfitters.
It is possible that amongst the spectators of cricket on the lower tier maybe boys from "Sharrow School" in Heath Road, which I attended from 1945-50 because we played cricket there (see also H252587). If so, it is also possible that the lady standing in the foreground could be Miss Irwin (later Mrs Singer) a mistress at the school.
As can be seen (also in 252002 & 252006), the 1930's "Psuedo Tudor" block on the corner then contained "Dewhursts" the multiple butchers, 2 (later 3) frontages for "Edward Hodges" an independent tailor and outfitter, then "Sussex Stationers" (manager Bruce Gillett?), The "Copper Kettle Cafe" (owned and run by Mr and Mrs Hyslop) and "Scilla" (hairdresser). The offices of "Vincent Penfold" estate agent, ...see more
I suspect this is a little earlier than 1960 (but after 1956) the first building on the right was the offices of "Waugh Brummell and Barron" later Waugh & Co Solicitors and still going strong. The original Waughs were prominent in the C19 not only as solicitors but clerks to the Local Board, Magistrates and the newly formed Council. Further down on the right, up to the 1960's were "Jacksons Ironmongers", "Hoadley and ...see more
I was a fairly regular customer at "The Serg" from about 1955 to 1967. Mr Turner was the first landlord I knew and he was succeeded by Stan and Betty Allen who came from "The Charter" at Epsom.
The "Park" - known to us as "The Rec". I walked across this daily to and from my prep school 1945-50 and our scout troup did it's woodcraft here!
