In Search of the Camberwell Beauty
The Camberwell Beauty butterfly is so-called because it was first found in Coldharbour Lane in Camberwell in 1748.
As I have said many times here, my father was a printer and he used to print at times, using gummed paper from Samuel Jones and Company. Their trademark was Butterfly Brand and they used to give out lots of stick-on Camberwell Beauties to show their products at their best. I had thousands of these butterflies.
So today, I’m going to Camberwell to see what I can find of the history of a company, that occupies a part of my memory.
Paper Isn’t What It Used To Be
I do find reading a newspaper these days to be an absolute trial, as turning the pages in order seems almost impossible.
I did think it was the stroke, but it now appears to me to be the quality of paper that is now used by papers like The Times and The Evening Standard.
Increasingly, I am using the on-line versions of both papers. And others that I don’t buy or pick up.
An Excursion At Wood Green
I went to Turnpike Lane, as I was going to Cockfosters to be picked up by a friend from school. It is an ideal station to be picked up on the northern part of the M25.
I was ahead of time, so I got off at Wood Green, where my father had his printing works and had a walk round. The station itself is virtually unchanged from 1967 or so, which was the last time I used it. Although, the escalators have been modernised and passenger barriers have been installed. But this view is almost identical.
Wood Green Station
Except for a few details and the Ocado van.
I walked down Station Road took this picture of the works.
H Miller & Sons, Wood Green
Note that until perhaps twenty years or so ago, there was a sign saying, H Miller and Sons, above the widest of the arches, which then had a pair of double doors. My father was one of the sons.
My father’s office in the building was at the top left, where new brickwork can be seen. I spent many an hour on a desk there as a young child sitting on a pile of leather bound ledgers watching the trains go to and from the now closed Palace Gates station.
In the photograph, you can also see the parapet, where my grandmother’s ginger cat went about its business in this tale.
Here is a photo of the Jolly Anglers, which hasn’t changed that much since my father used to illegally take me in for lunch in the 1950s.
The Jolly Anglers, Station Road, Wood Green
I also took a photo of where the Rex Cinema used to be.
Where the Rex Cinema in Wood Green Was
Many a day, I would go there, whilst my parents worked. It wasn’t that bad a cinema and was magnitudes better than the Essoldo in East Barnet, which had a collander for a roof.
How Real Printers Catch Rats
My father was a real letterpress printer and his works was a rather decrepit building with a rodent problem.
Over the years he told me various stories about how they dealt with them
In the 1930s, he’d lived with his widowed mother above the shop, so to speak, and they’d employed a traditional solution; a cat.
According to my father, who was not unknown to embellish a good tale, the cat was an enormous ginger specimen. And as was typical of those days, he was a proper Tom.
Whether he was any good in the ratting department never entered the story But above the shop next door lived a posh lady with a pedigree Siamese female.
One morning my father was confronted by the lady, saying that his mother’s cat had fathered a litter of kittens, that her Siamese had just produced. On inspecting them, there did seem to be a large number with a ginger hue.
The lady said that her cat never went out and he knew that his family cat was always shut in to deal with the rodent infestation.
So how did the two cats do it?
One hot night, my father was returning from the Jolly Anglers opposite. All the top windows were open and he saw the ginger cat balance along the parapet on the wall and hop in next door to see his lady friend.
His other method of catching rats, relied on those things that were always around in a print works. He would take a quad box and prop it up at an angle over the rat hole with a pica reglet. They’d then all wait in the dark for action. When the rodent disturbed the reglet, the box fell and trapped the poor animal underneath It was then a matter of switching the lights on and moving the box gently to the middle of the room, keeping the rodent trapped Everybody, then grabbed something suitable, like a small coal shovel before the box was removed
It was a quick end. And as my father told it, a fun tale
Where is the Printing at the Science Museum?
They used to have a Wharfedale and an Original Heidelberg plattern. But there’s nothing now!
Considering that letterpress printing was the greatest information revolution of all time, it is very sad.
But then I’m biased as my father was a printer.
The UK needs a comprehensive printing museum.
Bruce Castle Park and Tottenham Cemetery
At this point in my walk, I met a very helpful Harringey Council official checking how many litter bins they’d lost and after asking the way I walked under the railway to Bruce Castle Park.
Sadly, the museum doesn’t open until one and I was too early. As Sir Rowland Hill once owned the house, the museum also features a history of the Royal Mail.
I will return to see if there is anything my father printed. It does have the archive of Wood Green Empire and my father certainly did their posters and programs in his works in Station Road, Wood Green.
It was a very surprising area, especially as you consider it was only a coiuple of hundred metres from the riots in the High Street.
And Now Recycled Cardboard is a Health Danger!
According to this report on the BBC, the ink in recycled cardboard used in food packaging is a health risk. I have a feeling too, that Nick Higham’s report was actually filmed not far from me. It was certainly somewhere in Hackney.
Apparently, the problem is the mineral oils in the ink.
I know it was years ago, but my father had terrible dermatitis because according to the doctor of all the solvents in printing ink.
Whilst on the subject of paper, I find difficulty reading a newspaper, as I find turning the pages difficult. I thought it was because of the stroke and lack of feeling in my hands, but others, who are young and fit also have the problem. I’ve been told it’s down to the amount of recycled paper used these days.
The Tale of Boughton’s Nail
In the late 1950s or early 1960s my father embarked on a major reconstruction of his printing works in Station Road, Wood Green. We ripped out large quantities of rubbish and covered the walls in corrugated asbestos sheets to hide the damp. It worked very well, but what would modern Health and Safety have said. At one point in our destruction we came across a cm. thick plank of wood, which someone had attempted to fix to a six by four beam with a six inch nail. As he didn’t have the strength to drive the nail home, this bodger had attempted to bend it flat. He’d failed. It was and probably still is, the worst bit of carpentry I’ve ever seen. I can remember that my fsther said it was probably done by a man called Boughton, who.d worked for the family firm some years previously. So to me whenever I see some really awful handiwork, I think of the unfortunate Boughton. Incidentally, I’ve never met anyone with that surname and I don’t know how I’ll react.
But perhaps one of his descendants did this?
A Very Bad Door Stop
The doorstop is too small and whoever put it in cracked the tiles and did a lot of damage. It’s even more stupid as just round the corner in the Balls Pond Road is one of the best shops for door furniture in London.
I do have a thing about door stops, as I was mugged by one in Belarus.
I shall be visiting the hardware store!
Book Burning
It is being reported that a fifteen-year-old girl has been arrested for burning a copy of the Koran.
My father was a printer and bookbinder and to me, all books are to be treasured and not defaced or burnt in any way. Perhaps, when a book has been fully read, it should be passed on, but only in the last resort, should it be burned and then to do something positive like generate heat.
So the girl was wrong in what she did and arresting her for what was probably a childish act, will only encourage others to do similar things.
We need a lot more tolerance and common-sense.
Especially in these days, where we have had the Sunningdale and Milton Keynes murders and the Derby sex attacks to keep the Police busy, with more much serious problems that could be considered to a racial dimension.
My Public Catalogue for Suffolk Came Today
My catalogue of publicly-held oil, acrylic and tempera paintings in Suffolk from the Public Catalogue Foundation arrived in the post today. And what a beautiful example of the printer’s art it is too! It was £15 well spent and over the next few weeks I’ll explore some of the galleries.
As most counties now have a catalogue, they make would good presents for those who have everything!
The Anonymous Widower 