Home thoughts from abroad nu 4 ................ catching a train and borrowing a book

An occasional series on what I miss about the place where I grew up.*

Now when you leave the place you grew up and pretty much only go back for the odd short visit it becomes frozen in time.

Not so of course for my sisters and their families which of course is just how it should be.

All of which has made me come back to these two pictures of Eltham from the collection of Steve Bardrick.

They were taken by his grandfather sometime in the 1950s or 60s, and are just as I remember home and both in their way are special.

And the station is the first I would single out for having moved to Well Hall in 1964 I still made the train journey every week day back to New Cross and Samuel Pepys Secondary Modern School.

I can’t say I ever felt that happy about the school and so the walk up along the station approach was a mixed one and was something I did like the visit to the dentist.  You did it because you had to but it was never going to be something you chose to do.

Added to which as the trip was done during the rush hour the chances of getting a seat were never high.

That said the journey back was always something to look forward to and even now I can remember the train taking the curve past the signal box and pulling in to the station with that view of the woods above where we lived.

I never tired of it then and I still have fond memories of the scene  which signalled I was home.

The new station might be more shinny and look the part but the old one with its wooden booking hall giving out onto the platform and that cast iron footbridge are part of my Eltham.

And in much the same way so is the picture of the High Street offering as it does Woollies, the library and the electricity showrooms.

If you are of a certain age the old Woolworths will have powerful memories.
It starts with that special smell, continues with the wooden floorboards and those mahogany island counters and culminates with the sound of Apache or Telstar blaring out and those small round ice creams.

The library was to become one of my favourite’s haunts, a place you went when you needed to do some homework and better still the place to borrow an LP.

Even the electricity showroom was not without its charm with those odd shaped windows.

And by 1966 the library won out over the station, because in that September I had swapped schools and was going to Crown Woods, a place which will always be special.**

It was there I met friends that have stayed the course over the last sixty years and it was there that I discovered the magic of books, and history and a way of looking at the world which I have never lost.

All of which meant that it was looking down at the High Street from the top of the bus twice a day which pretty much took over from the walk up the station approach.

And then one day in the 1980s I returned to find that the station had moved, and later still Wilcox’s and Woollies were no more and even later still the Greyhound had been transformed

Of course there is that simple response that I should get back more often and there is much in that idea.

But even so I rather think I would still miss the old station and if I am pushed hard it will be that slow final pull into Well Hall with the view of the woods which were best seen from the old site.

And before I forget that look down on the Pleasaunce which in the summer would always be a place to stop and sit for a few minutes beside the old moat and equally old garden wall.

Location Eltham, London




Pictures; Eltham Well Hall Railway Station & the High Street circa 1960s from the collection of Steve Bardrick

*Home thoughts from abroad, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Home%20thoughts%20from%20abroad

**Crown Woods School Eltham, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Crown%20Woods%20School%20Eltham

Home thoughts from abroad nu 1 ................. Well Hall Road on a warm spring day in 1965

An occasional series on what I miss about the place where I grew up.

Now I don’t do nostalgia.  It’s over rated and too often offers up a view of the past which at best is deceptive and at worse downright wrong.

But having been away from Eltham for over forty years I have bit by bit been drawn back.

It’s partly those bouts of reflection that come from someone in his seventies but also because it was one of the places I was happiest.

That said for most of that last forty years it is somewhere I only came back to on flying visits.

In the early 70s Well Hall was home between term time, and then a place to catch up with family and friends and later still where we brought the children for short holidays.

During those early visits I have to confess to a mix of feelings.  It was always nice to be back amongst familiar places but when you are 19 it is easy to be over judgemental.  After all I was living in the heart of Manchester which was vibrant and new, offering up a wealth of experiences and Eltham seemed small beer.

But I never entirely lost the pull of Eltham and in the last few years have begun digging deep into its history and remembering so much from my childhood.

So this is the first of those memories and it is nothing more than that walk I took from our house up to the High street.

We lived just beyond the roundabout and so on a warmish spring day it was no hardship to stroll down past the Odeon and the parade of shops taking a detour into the Pleasaunce before going under the railway bridge up past Spencer Gardens and that second parade of shops before reaching Willcox’s and the parish church.

More often than not there was no real purpose behind the trip which meant you could take your time, be delayed by looking in the window of the electrical shop near Wells the Chemist, gaze at one of the guitars in Norman’s before  deciding on a book from Willcox’s.

And then with the whole High Street ahead of you an hour or two could pass just looking at the shops and visiting the library.

Like others I have very fond memories of the library which offered up plenty to do, from digging out those obscure old volumes from the reference section to choosing an LP and a couple of books.

Of course Well Hall Road offered up more than just a route to the library and on other days when the sun shone it was the way up to the woods and on to Woolwich.

Now I know others will have their own favourite road and I have to concede that Court Yard and Colepits Lane had their attractions but sitting here just 4 miles from the centre of Manchester I will go for Well Hall Road.

Location; Well Hall Road, Eltham

Pictures; Well Hall Road, & Eltham Library, 2014 from the collection of Chrissy Rose

Home thoughts from abroad nu 2 ................. walking home from Woolwich on a summer’s night in 1966

Woolwich Common, 1970

Some memories stay with you and are as vivid now as they were then.

I was sixteen, it was the summer of 1966 and I was walking home from Woolwich to Well Hall.
It was a journey I must have made countless times and it was one I always enjoyed, especially once you had cleared the town and made it up to the common.

It was that mix of peace, the lingering heat of a hot summer’s day and the smells from the grass, the bushes and the trees.

The bonus was always those nights that brought on a thunderstorm.

And almost the same spot in 1906

If I was lucky I got home before the rain but either way there were those magic moments when the woods above our house were lit up by the jagged streaks of lightening followed by the roll of thunder.

The best place to see it was just past the police station as the road fell down towards the roundabout.

And usually I was alone which made the event all that more awesome.

After all back in 1966 few people were daft enough to walk out of Woolwich at nearly midnight and so the only company were the occasional passing car or the odd 161 with all its lights off heading I knew not where.

And now a full half century later I still think of those nights.

Location; Eltham, London

Picture; Woolwich Common, 1970, from the collection of Jean Gammons and the Royal Military Academy, from the series Woolwich, 1906 and the Royal Military Academy from the series Woolwich Town and City 1905 issued by Tuck & Sons, courtesy of TuckDB http://tuckdb.org/history

Home thoughts from abroad nu 5 ................. "Thursday evening stroll"

One of the joys of being a member of the "Well Hall in Eltham, its stories and its history" site on facebook, is the way I get to see where I grew up.

Over the years I have enjoyed and learnt so much about Eltham's history from the research and photographs of Tricia Leslie and Matt K Finch, the comments by Lesley Ross,Phil Wilson and others, as well as the Pictures from an Eltham Bus series by Larissa Hamment.

To these I must add the stunning sets of pictures from Alison Benson of the Pleasaunce.

And here is one from  Ryan taken during an evening walk through gardens at the Pleasuance.

Location; Well Hall

Picture; "Thursday evening stroll", from the collection of Ryan Ginn