Time Changes Everything

A Memory of Mitcham.

As I read and reread the memories that are posted on this site, Mitcham and my childhood there become more and more vivid. I can almost smell the grass on the cricket green, just after it was cut. When I was young, Mitcham was a place that people from the surrounding areas would come to. Now it's a place you have pass through going somewhere else. I sat and thought for a while, what was it they came for? Poppy Day, at the War Memorial next to the Mitcham Fire Station. All the bands were there, the Sea Scouts, the Boys Brigade, the Boy Scouts and of course the band I played in, the St John's Ambulance. The Last Post was played and the Mayor placed a large wreath at the foot of the cross. It was somewhat of a sad day, remembering the fallen, in both world wars, and yet I suppose a magnificent specacle for the onlookers. The May Queen was another good reason to stop a while in Mitcham. The Mitcham Fairs at both ends of the Mitcham Common, the Croydon end and the Three Kings Pond end. The circus that visited us, I believe twice a year. I can also remember that Firework Night was held at the Three Kings Pond, until after one year when gangs attacked the firemen that were sent there to control the fire, the event  became illegal. Even the Queen Mother came to visit at the Townhall. I was shocked at just how small she was.  And the heart of Mitcham, not the fair green as most people would have you believe, it was in fact that wonderful area that encompassed the Mitcham cricket green. How many ex-Mitchamites have spent a lazy summer's day, watching their favourite club play, and still be in walking distance of three public houses, the White Hart, the Cricketers and the Burn Bullock. Not to forget, if you had other leanings, an icecream could be purchased at the now famous LEO'S, or maybe a knickerbocker glory, or for that matter a banana split, or maybe just a cup of frothy coffee.  After all that you had now consumed there on the corner stood the public toilets, to relieve you of any burden you may be carrying. Why wouldn't you want to visit Mitcham.
Casting my memory further back, changes in Mitcham sometimes occured right under my nose. Such as when we first moved to Church Path. From my bedroom window I could see row upon row of Nissan huts. So many of these quick and easy homes had been errected, all over London and I don't doubt in many other cities too. I don't remember exactly how old I was, when my play friends and their homes, the Nissan huts, simply disappeared. The next to vanish was a huge area of apple trees, pear trees and wild fruits of every kind. In the middle stood the remains of a very old wall, probably part of a house, long since fallen into disrepair. I had spent hours on this land, scrumping all I could lay my hands on. And now it was no more than a mud hole, and was to remain in that state for some time. The open space reached from Head's cycle shop all the way up, to almost reaching the Labour Hall, right opposite Mitcham station and The Crown. If anyone remembers the Crown, my sister worked there in the evenings as a bar maid. If she had worked there now, she would probably have been known as a bar person. Her name was then Patricia Gibbs, but most people knew her as Pat. She lived a little further up the road, just opposite the Hovis sports ground. Close to where she lived was a soap factory, and even closer still was the River Wandle.
Work now begun on the waste ground and as if by magic, three large blocks of flats started to appear, slowly at first, but as each month passed momentum gathered, and we could clearly see, just what this part of Mitcham was to look like from this time forward. We had seen nothing like it before. Smaller buildings were being constucted very close to our street. Speculations as to what they were ran rife, until we were told by the builders that they were none other than garages, garages! No one had a car, only a few of us had bicycles. How the poor can feel even poorer. Cars - whatever next? I believe there was a ceremony when the three blocks recieved their names, but I am not absolutly sure. Baron Court, Gedge Court and Fenning Court, strange how they call blocks of flats Courts. Many of my schoolfriends-to-be now lived there, and as soon as the dust laid, I also forgot that there had ever been anything else on that particular piece of ground. I don't know if anyone remembers, but if you walked passed the three courts toward the Labour Hall, just before you reached the bridge, and laying back from the road, was a dance school, the Romamy Club De Dance, run by Peggy Spencer. Now that does bring back memories. Saturday night was dance night, only trouble was, no alcohol in the club, which of course meant that when the music stopped, we would run across the road to the Crown to savour the ale, and then back again before the music started. Some nights, the running, the dancing and the ale just did not mix. Boy! Did we suffer for our art. But you have to remember we were the children of the sixties. Although the running, the dancing, and the ale have long since stopped, the memories live on.