Now, each generation has to endure the horror stories of the one that preceded it, and in my case, it has been the stories of playgrounds that were really just bomb sites.
And these I regaled my sons with on moments when Dad reflected on the gulf between growing up in the 1950s and that of four decades later.
Of course, I could have plucked plenty of others out of the memory, from listening to the Home Service on the wireless, enduring sweet rationing, to waking to find ice had formed on the inside of the windows during winter.
To these in no particular order, I can add plimsols, soot covered buildings, and those fogs which rolled in unannounced, turned the familiar into an obscure landscape, where sound became muffled and you could be totally lost.
But bombsites were always a favorite, if only to make the comparison with the large numbers of parks and adventure playgrounds that were available to our kids.
At which point I should say that, by the 1950s the sites had been cleared of rubble, but amongst the plants that sprung up there could still be found odd remnants of people’s homes, which lay just below the surface, and became a toy for the day.
Thinking back some of these playgrounds were actually the work of council clearance schemes and developers who vied with each other to tear down the tired Victorian properties and replace them with shiny, bright buildings of glass, steel and concrete.
But they too, offered up opportunities for play, with the edginess that you couldn’t find in the municipal parks.
It was however the legacy of the war that proved most likely to offer an adventure. One such place was the Emergency Water Tank which was directly opposite where we lived in Lausanne Road.
It had been a row of fine terraced houses, which took a direct hit, and what was left was beyond saving.
So, the cellars were cleared, the sides built up and it became a space to hold a large quantity of water which could be pumped out to assist in fighting fires set off by the German bombs.
There was another just a few minutes’ walk away and I guess more, which I now can’t remember.
They were what they said they were, places to store emergency water supplies in the event that the water mains were damaged by an enemy action.
Ours was drained after the water and became a dumping place for all manner of rubbish.
Getting in was tricky, as was getting out, but never underestimate the curiosity and cunning of eight-year old to climb over the low built up brick wall, descend into the pit and later get back out again.
I can’t remember what we played, but I suspect with a powerful dollop of imagination it will have involved, mountaineering, or just plain pretend “dog fights” between German bombers and RAF fighters.
As for the “treasures” which had been discarded in the pit, I do recall there were slim pickings, and the main game was rolling a rusty empty oil drum back and forth.
Which was a little less exciting than the odd excursions into the crypt of St Mary’s Church on Belfort Road, which was all that was left after the building had been hit by a bomb.
I have no idea if the subterranean passages had been used as an air raid shelter, only that for a brief period it was a place for an adventure for the kids of the neighbourhood. We would meet up, share a candle and descend, always expecting to discover the unexpected but finding nothing more than the scanty evidence of a tramp’s stayover.
What marked out all of these games was that they were not solitary affairs, and like so much of what we did, they were played out as a group, which is always how adventures should be.
Location; London and Manchester
Pictures, Piccadillly, A Dawson,1941, m04013, Portland Street, Manchester, 1941, m04871, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and remaining pictures, 1957-2009, from the collection of Andrew Simpson
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| Piccadilly Manchester, 1941 |
Of course, I could have plucked plenty of others out of the memory, from listening to the Home Service on the wireless, enduring sweet rationing, to waking to find ice had formed on the inside of the windows during winter.
To these in no particular order, I can add plimsols, soot covered buildings, and those fogs which rolled in unannounced, turned the familiar into an obscure landscape, where sound became muffled and you could be totally lost.
But bombsites were always a favorite, if only to make the comparison with the large numbers of parks and adventure playgrounds that were available to our kids.
 |
| Portland Street, Manchester, 1941 |
Thinking back some of these playgrounds were actually the work of council clearance schemes and developers who vied with each other to tear down the tired Victorian properties and replace them with shiny, bright buildings of glass, steel and concrete.
But they too, offered up opportunities for play, with the edginess that you couldn’t find in the municipal parks.
 |
| Walter Green House, 2009 on the site of the EWS tank |
So, the cellars were cleared, the sides built up and it became a space to hold a large quantity of water which could be pumped out to assist in fighting fires set off by the German bombs.
There was another just a few minutes’ walk away and I guess more, which I now can’t remember.
They were what they said they were, places to store emergency water supplies in the event that the water mains were damaged by an enemy action.
Ours was drained after the water and became a dumping place for all manner of rubbish.
Getting in was tricky, as was getting out, but never underestimate the curiosity and cunning of eight-year old to climb over the low built up brick wall, descend into the pit and later get back out again.
I can’t remember what we played, but I suspect with a powerful dollop of imagination it will have involved, mountaineering, or just plain pretend “dog fights” between German bombers and RAF fighters.
 |
| Me, in 1957 |
Which was a little less exciting than the odd excursions into the crypt of St Mary’s Church on Belfort Road, which was all that was left after the building had been hit by a bomb.
I have no idea if the subterranean passages had been used as an air raid shelter, only that for a brief period it was a place for an adventure for the kids of the neighbourhood. We would meet up, share a candle and descend, always expecting to discover the unexpected but finding nothing more than the scanty evidence of a tramp’s stayover.
What marked out all of these games was that they were not solitary affairs, and like so much of what we did, they were played out as a group, which is always how adventures should be.
Location; London and Manchester
Pictures, Piccadillly, A Dawson,1941, m04013, Portland Street, Manchester, 1941, m04871, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and remaining pictures, 1957-2009, from the collection of Andrew Simpson
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