General

A Memory of Wimbledon.

I lived in All Saints Road at the far end as it was a cul de sac where there was some waste ground that had once been a vicarage and we knew it as bells yard. It was a great place to play until it was fenced by the council and after that people threw their rubbish over the wall; us boys scaled the wall but the neighbour would chase us out. I had two paper rounds and worked for a green grocer called Tiddler in Haydens Road. The paper shop in Merton High Street had a train set in the window and the train would go round if you put a penny in the slot outside the window. I went to Pelham Road secondary school until 1965 when I was 15 and finshed in form 4e. My second paper round took me down Haydons Road and past Cowper Road where a bully would thump me if he could catch me and so I re arranged the round to do that area before he got up. At the top of Quicks Road was an electrical shop called Servio where I bought the first transistor I ever saw. And going towards the Broadway was a sweet shop that sold drinks from spherical glass dispensers for one pence. Saturday morning pictures at the ABC was four pence so we got a penny bun all from my sixpence pocket money. My first job was for the Sunlight laundry in York Road as a van boy and I was very happy there. The toy shop in Wimbledon Broadway was Richards and sold an amazing selection of toys, all the glass and chemicals for chemistry sets, interfloral gardens and Dinky toys etc..
We would stand on the foot brige over the railway and peer down the chimney of the steam engines filling up with water or thundering past in clouds of smoke and steam. I left in 1965 when my mother sold the house in All Saints Road to my brother and later I believe it was re-developed because the up to date maps show All Saints Road joins to Wandle Bank.