Cutting the grass in Mottingham …. in them olden days

I like this picture for several reasons, not least because it is one I have never seen before.

It comes from a delightful slim volume entitled Eltham Village and was published in 1984.

Happily, the authors have given me permission to use the images with of course a credit to Gus White, Ian Murdock and Paula Richardson who collected the 43 images of Eltham and the surrounding villages.

And so back to number 6, Horse drawn mower, Mottingham Playing Fields, circa 1914.  

The picture carried the caption "Mr. Groves and young helper tending the pitches of the London Playing Fields Ground Court Farm Lane.  The land was presented by the Goldsmith Company to the London Playing Fields Association in 1905 to provide ‘sports facilities for Londoners’”.

If you are of a certain age you will remember those lawn mowers which didn’t rely on electricity or diesel and instead were worked with muscle power, be it a man in shirtsleeves or men in shirt sleeves with horse.

Apparently, they are making a coming back with manual lawn mowers costing  anything from £44 and heading up towards a hundred.

And for those like me who didn't know, "The London Playing Fields Foundation was formed in 1890 by visionary Victorian philanthropists concerned about the loss of green space in London and the need to provide sport and recreation for current and future generations".**

So, there you are.

Location; Mottingham

Picture; Horse drawn mower, Mottingham Playing Fields, 1914, courtesy of Eltham Village

*Eltham Village,  Gus White, Ian Murdock and Paula Richardson in 1984 and published by G & Pi Publications Eltham

****The London Playing Fields Foundation, https://www.lpff.org.uk/about/history/

Walking Woolwich and Eltham in 1948 … no 3

Now I back with my copy of the Official Guide to Woolwich which was published by the council.

It includes Eltham and Plumstead, and was the “Fifth Edition”.

I have no idea when it was issued but looking at the images and some of the listings we must be sometime between 1948 and the early years of the next decade.

And today's offering come from the drive for better and affordable housing for all.

So that is it, and I shall continue till I run out of pictures.

Location; The Metropolitan Borough of Woolwich, circa 1948

Pictures; Woolwich and Mottingham from The Metropolitan Borough of Woolwich, circa 1948

Mottingham Railway Station ….. the place with three names …….

When you lived in Well Hall your chosen railway station was always going to be Well Hall which today might be described as an Interchange, given that along with the trains there were heaps of buses which terminated next door.

But today it is Mottingham which has caught my attention.  It is a destination I have only visited once but can’t remember why.  

But it may have been to visit our Jill who lived and still lives off Middle Park Avenue and it is her pictures that made me reflect on the railway station with three names.

According to my Wikipedia,  “the station was first opened by the South Eastern Railway on 1 September 1866 as Eltham for Mottingham. 

In 1892 it was renamed Eltham & Mottingham. 

In 1927 it became Mottingham”.*

And it’s a station of many parts, having acquired a goods yard around 1900 it lost it in 1968 , along with its station box the following year.

But the upside ticket office has a mixture of structures,  with “the white clapboard dating from the original station of 1866, [a] brown brick construction of 1957 and sliding doors installed in 1988”.

And to follow up on the interchange link there are a series of buses close by one of which will have taken me back to Well Hall.

Doesn’t quite answer why I would have taken the train to Mottingham to see our Jill but I will let that hang in the air, although I am happy to receive suggestions on a used railway ticket, circa 1990.

All of that said I think I will wander across the network and explore some of the other railway stations I will have known.  

Already located on the blog are some stories of Well Hall Railway Station and its neighbour Eltham Park both of which are babies compared to Mottingham which has outlasted them both.

So with Jill’s help and her camera I will soon be back with more railway stations from Eltham.

Location; Mottingham

Pictures; sunny wet days on Mottingham Railway Station, 2026, from the collection of Jill Goldsmith

*Mottingham railway station, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mottingham_railway_station