Growing Up In Englefield Green

A Memory of Egham.

I moved to Alexandra Road with my family when I was about 2 years old and then went on to attend St Jude's infants school, actually in my road when I was 5. Friends at the time were Sarah Miller and Yoland Cawley. I loved school and would get 3d from my nan to go to Jarmans the sweet shop on St Jude's Road. The butchers was on the corner of Alexandra Road and St Jude's Road, gone now I think. At the top of my road adjoining Harvest Road was a big horse kept in a small field which has since been built on and I used to visit the horse daily to stroke it. Halfway down my road was a little lane leading to the blacksmith's and sometimes me and my brother would go and watch him work. The rag and bone man used to come up our road regularly as did the coalman. My brother helped the milkman on his float, and I got bottles of orange from him. I was May Queen some years later when we transferred up to the new junior school down St Jude's Road and the junior school in Alexandra Road was closed. We used to go to the church for services from school very regularly. Myself and my older brother used to do paper rounds all around the green on our bikes and when it was really cold my mum knitted us both wooly hats and I made the pom poms to go on top. I remember threading the wool through a cut out cardboard ring with a hole in the middle then cutting the wool round the edge and pulling tight to gather the middle, then sewing it on our hats. What amazing fun we had. We were allowed all round the green on our weekends and school holidays on our bikes, never a fear or worry. I would play out in my road and sometimes go over to Charmian's house opposite to go on her rocking horse. We were one of the first houses to get colour TV and my friends from school would come round to mine to watch 'Top of the Pops'. My house used to be a pub in the old days owned by my grandad, called The Jolly Sandboy, before it was transformed into a large house with a big garden. I loved living there. So many memories, I could go on forever and I remember everything with such fondness and love. Oh, to do it all again...

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