Frogs Newts & Ice

A Memory of Thornton Heath.

I used to visit my aunt & uncle who lived in this - as it was known to me - the posh area of Thornton Heath: it was even pronounced differently - where I lived we invariably but a "mate" on the end of everything. Anyway - this was a favourite place for me - for frog and newt hunting - and in the winter - ice skating: I even fell through the ice one year. It was - as I remember a terminus for one of the London Tram routs and there was a tram depot nearby. As a family of children we were sent to the Granada cinema for Saturday morning films and an ice cream - one of those dreadful Walls bricks made from - as we were to understand - pig fat. We were not the best behaved kids - flying paper aeroplanes over the balcony. Saturday morning club recognised birthdays as well - when it was our birthday we were invited onto the stage and given a small present. The films were the standard fare of the time - Roy Rogers - bat man - Tarzan Charlie Chaplin - Abbot & Costello and a good helping of cartoons - we cheered and booed as appropriate and generally created a lot of noise. We had to walk there and back and at the same time - change our library books as we passed the library. I saw my first film on my own at the Granada including Rock Around The Clock: Our seats were not torn out or damaged in any way during the showing of this film. I thought it a shame to see The Pond reduced gradually from the full size as shown in this photo - to a postage stamp size and eventually taken away altogether.