The Anonymous Widower

Memories of Wood Green

I walked up to Bruce Castle Museum from Bruce Grove station early this afternoon. It was not a difficult walk and there are some buildings worth looking at on the way.

Luke Howard, Namer of Clouds Lived Here

This rather derelict building being refurbished was the home of Luke Howard. He seems to have been an amazing man with a wide degree of scientific interests, who should be remembered for a lot more than his classification of clouds. He must also have been the only pharmacist praised in a poem by Goethe.

But Howard gives us with his clear mindThe gain of lessons new to all mankind;That which no hand can reach, no hand can claspHe first has gained, first held with mental grasp.

I suspect too, that he might have been the Howard after whom the local telephone exchange in Enfield was named. Enfield Rolling Mills, who were my father’s biggest customer and where I worked for a couple of summers, had a phone number of Howard 1255.  There is a list of all the old London exchange names here.

I enjoyed the museum, as it brought back some happy memories for me. I will be back.

1. C’s godmother and her sister had worked at the Gestetner factory in Tottenham Hale and had a flat which would have been in the middle of the riots, although it looked like no damage was done. They were a lovely pair of sisters, who’d had a hard life, but who always remained cheerful to the end. They both lived into their eighties and still had all their marbles when they died.  But I think, if they’d had the sort of healthcare that we get now, they might have had a few more years. Both seemed to keep falling over and breaking thighs and other bones.
2. One memory the museum brought back was a tale from my grandmother about the Belgian refugees, who were put up in Alexandra Palace after the First World War.
3. I can also remember the Monday evening crowds swarming past my father’s printworks on Station Road to the racecourse.  Someone used to setup a Crown and Anchor board to fleece punters before they even got to the races, outside the works on Station Road.  If the police turned up he allowed them to duck inside, provided they put a couple of notes in the charity box my father had on the counter.
4. I also saw the inside of a pub for the first time at about eight, when my father used to take me for lunch on Saturdays to the Jolly Anglers in Station Road, when we both worked in the works.
5. When we were at school, we often drive to Ally Pally to have a drink, as no-one seemed to bother how old you were in the bar there.  You would then take your drinks out and sit on the grass to admire one of the best views in London.
6. In the museum was a display, which had some stationery from Ward’s Stores at Seven Sisters.  In the early 1960s, I used to work in a paper shop, who delivered them to Mr. Ward.  Rumours had it, that he was dying of something and was getting a bottle of Scotch a day on the NHS.

Next time I visit, I’ll have a serious look at the archives.

August 21, 2011 - Posted by AnonW | World | Enfield, Museum, Tottenham, Weather, Wood Green