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Food Health History Palmers Green Shops Uncategorized

Horse with repetition

The recent controversy about horse meat in various products is nothing new apparently.

In his book, Southgate and Edmonton Past, Graham Dalling tells the story of the outcry in 1941 when it was discovered that meat roll served at local British Restaurants (run by the Council) had been adulterated with horse meat.

Investigations showed that the Council’s catering officer was also in possession of unfeasibly large supplies of custard powder, probably intended for the black market.

Police swarmed the Town Hall at Palmers Green and there were calls for the entire Council to resign. They didnt, but the catering officer was successfully prosecuted.

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Bowes Park Community Planning and open spaces Shops Uncategorized

The road that roared

Our neighbours in Bowes and Bounds Green awoke one day last week to find that it wasnt the birds that were tweeting (though we do not doubt the mellifluousness of B&B’s streets), but its roads.

So here I am, on twitter. But why am I here, after all I am just a road? Well I will tell you…

began Myddleton Road @MyddletonRd_N22  in its first tweet.

I am more than a road. I am the heart, the lung, the brain and the soul of a community. This may sound pretentious, but hear me out.

If you cut me do I not bleed? No, I am a road. But if I am hurt then a community shares my pain. If I am abused then we abuse ourselves.

And I have had enough. No more. I will share my secrets so that the people who live here, love here and rule here can see what is done to me

And maybe something will be done. Or maybe it won’t but at least people will know. Know what? Of the abuse that brings me down.

Subsequent tweets have formed a diary of hopes, indignities, disappointments and calls to action occasionally broken by a rhyme and proud boast about a swanky passing Ferrari. Near the knuckle, risky and often brilliant, its worth checking out.

Now PGJITN is no fool, and suspects, like our partner website Bowes and Bounds Connected, that it is not in fact the road which is tweeting, but a person.

But who are they? And what would Palmers Green’s roads say if they could only tweet? Are some twittering away already? Tell us!

The Myddleton Road tweeter
Categories
Art and Culture Community History Palmers Green Shops Uncategorized

Memories from before the war

Following on from her wonderful account of growing up in the Town Hall, we asked Betty Wright (nee Walton) to tell us more about what Palmers Green was like when she was growing up in the 30s and 40s.

Palmers Green was always known as a ‘high class area’ to live.

We had some lovely shops, one of my favourites being Evans and Davies,  a large store at the beginning of Alderman’s Hill…it was a general store, selling furniture etc as well as a very good toy department.  I remember looking at a china doll in the window for weeks and weeks and wishing I could have it, it cost 8s.11p. (43p) and I was hurt to find my younger sister had been given it for her 6th Birthday, but when I told my mother “I wanted that doll” she said “Oh Betty, you’re far too old for dolls.” (I was 9).  It’s funny how things ‘stick’.

All our shops were good class shops, Sainsbury’s (no help service)…Woolworth…during the hot weather some of the workers in the Town Hall would ask me to go over to Woolworth and buy them ice cream cornets (one and a half pence each). I used to have to buy about six and run back before they melted.  I never told anyone that I used to have a lick from each on the way back (despite being given one!).  My Mother used to shop at the Home and Colonial, for groceries.

Grouts opened in 1914. Here is an image from www.palmersgreenshops.com showing how it looked in around 2004 (site no longer maintained)

Then there was a shop called Grouts (in Green Lanes, opposite Hazelwood Lane)…this shop sold materials, underwear, school uniforms, elastic, ribbons, knitting woods etc. etc.  I loved this shop because when you paid, the money was put in a little pot and then it was carried (I expect by electricity) to the top of the shop, where a lady sat in a little cubicle and she took the money and returned your change and receipt in the little pot.

Palmers Green had two cinemas.  The Palmadium and the Queens.   The Palmadium was the ‘best one’…the Queens never had the good films.  There was also a Dance Hall above one of these cinemas, but I can’t remember which one.

We also had the Intimate Theatre which produced some brilliant plays with well known actors.

Then, of course, we were lucky enough to have Broomfield Park.  I spent most of my childhood in this park.  It was not only a park: it had a boating lake, a really good play area with several swings, slides and roundabouts; a place to be quiet…with a Remembrance Garden (where we children were only allowed to go on a Sunday with our parents); a full size running track and best of all the house, which held a museum as well as a restaurant to buy refreshments on special occasions!

Things changed when war was declared.  Broomfield House was taken over by servicemen who had been wounded or suffering an illness. Air raid shelters were appearing everywhere, especially in Broomfield Park. We would still go to the cinema (we called ‘going to the pictures) but many the time the film would stop and the Manager would appear on stage and say “The Air Raid Warning has just sounded; you may leave the cinema if you wish”.  Some people would leave but then the film would continue.

I remember running home from being out with my friend and the sirens sounded… I wanted to get home, I didn’t want to go into a shelter because I knew my mother would be worrying.  However, the shrapnel from the ack ack guns was falling all around…and someone pulled me into a door way until it was safe to carry on running.  It sounds so exaggerated, but believe me, every word is true.

Another amusing (??)  story: I used to visit my friends Josephine and Mary Hulme (their Dad was a very famous footballer)…they lived in Riverway.  When I left their house in the dark (it was really dark, because of the blackout), I borrowed a carving knife and ran all the way home ‘stabbing at the dark’ in case I met one of these ‘nasty men that my mother was always warning me about). I did this on more than one occasion and when one of my brothers came home on leave he was horrified to hear how I ‘travelled home’, because I could have murdered some poor innocent person. He warned me never to do it again (I was about 13 or 14).

Of course food was rationed, but Mum managed to feed us good meals, lots of steam puddings and she was very clever at making our rations go a long way. It took a long time for me to realise that she often went without to give us children a little more.  I remember saying “Don’t you like eggs Mum?” (when we were lucky enough to get some) and she said “No, I never have liked them”. This, I discovered later, was completely untrue.

We then heard that the greengrocers had some bananas  – this was towards the end of the war – and we had not had a banana for years.  Each family could have four bananas by producing their ration books. We had, at that time, 9 ration books (my grandma was living with us) so Mum said, “Take four ration books to one grocers and get four bananas and then the other 5 books to the other greengrocer and get a further four bananas”.  I thought this was cheating, so said to Mum “No, that’s cheating, each family can only have four bananas”.  For the very first time that I can remember my Mother slapped me around the face, saying “I am doing for the chance to give you all some fruit, not for me but for YOU”.  I could understand her thoughts: “Why should a family of two people get 4 bananas and only four, for a family of 9”.

I often think of this when I buy a bunch of bananas nearly every time I go to a supermarket…

 

Categories
Community Palmers Green Shops

Palmers Green lights up for Christmas

Christmas officially began this afternoon with the formal switching on of the Christmas lights by the Mayoress of Enfield Kate Anolue and MP David Burrowes. We can exclusively reveal that Mr Burrowes is now sporting a 70s style Movember mustache. Unfortunately the photographic evidence came out all fuzzy, so you will just have to take our word for it.

Categories
Bowes Park Comedy Community Food Health History Palmers Green Planning and open spaces Shops Uncategorized Winchmore Hill

That was October in Palmers Green – A round-up of Palmers Green in the last month

Its been a busy October for us Palmers Greeners. A few of the things we learned this month …

Enfield Council, together with the Broomfield House Trust and Friends of Broomfield Park put in a £4 million bid to the Heritage lottery fund to restore Broomfield House. There is a new website to accompany the bid.  We should find out whether it has been successful in February 2013  …  David Burrowes MP could be getting his edges tweaked in the new constituency boundary changes prop0sed by the Boundary Commission. The changes are currently subject to consultation  …  Theresa May announced that Palmers Green hacker Gary McKinnon will not stand trial in the US after a long national campaign. David Burrowes threatened to resign as PPS if McKinnon was extradited … Well over one thousand people in people in Enfield had already signed up to the petition about local control of GP services as part of the campaign being run by 38 Degrees – sign and view the latest total visit http://action.38degrees.org.uk/ccg_postcode.  A meeting was held at the Harvester in Arnos Grove to discuss how to ensure the Clinical Commissioning Group being established for Enfield takes into account the wishes of local people …

Worried about neighbours building a sky scraper in their back garden and overshadowing your dahlias? Enfield Council said no how, no way, were they going to implement the government’s changes to the planning system, while in another part of the forest, delegates at the recent conference of Civic Voice also called on the government to scrap the proposals … The North West London Waste Authority began a charm offensive, with a stall in Morrisons and local leafleting.  There, a massive incinerator on your doorstep at Pinkham Way doesn’t seem nearly as bad now, does it? …..

If you are planning a Sunday trip up town, First Capital Connect provide some advice on how you can get there in only an hour and a half – pretty much no direct trains to Kings Cross until Christmas on a Sunday, unless you get up early. ……. heading the other way up the railway line, a new farmers market opened at Crews Hill. Good reports so far and we wish them well but it is a little bit naughty to say on their website that they are the first and only farmers market in the borough of Enfield. It would be lovely if a few more people could visit our long established farmers market in Palmers Green – Sundays, station car park. There have been a few new stalls recently, and with more footfall it could expand further.

This month we also learned that …

Image reproduced by kind permission of James Birtwistle

in the old days, you could crash your plane into a roof in Palmers Green, and calmly smoke a cigarette before even bothering to climb down …. Myddleton Road was once paved with wood …. Southgate Town Hall is featured in the new Morse prequel Endeavour … The Duke of Chandos may once have lived at Broomfield House, and the Lanscroon murals currently reputed to be languishing in the basement of the Town Hall could have been created to impress a monarch. We also heard about the charms of the long gone Broomfield House Museum… but could it live again?

And finally

David Waumsley of the wonderful Palmers Green based Art Cove cards (sold by Anita at PG station cafe) challenged us to a Smiths lyrics stand off a la Chris Packham, and got bored before we did. I am sure that a common experience among PGJITN’s readers. Without the Smiths bit.

Anyway, enough wittering. If there is a topic you would like to write about, why not get in touch, especially if its about history and people? We would love to hear from you. There is a huge knowledge about Palmers Green out there … lets try and put it all together.

May November bring you great good fortune.

Sue, Palmers Green Jewel in the North

Coming soon

Friday 2 November  Bob Mills at the Electric Mouse Comedy Club at the Fox. Ricky Grover will also be performing in December.

Sunday 4 November Preparing the Garden of Remembrance in Broomfield Park for Remembrance Sunday. If you have some time to come and help park staff, please come to the Garden between 10 and 12

Friday 9 November Big Green Bookshop Bookswap featuring special guest the Rev Richard Coles Great Northern Hotel Hornsey (new bigger venue for this regular event from the fantastic independent Wood Green bookshop)

Sunday 18 November Herbs and their uses at the conservatory Broomfield Park

Saturday 24 November Christmas Bazaar at the Ruth Winston Centre

Saturday 8 December St Nicholas Fair Winchmore Hill Green. Following on from the summer’s fantastic Winchmore Hill Festival: this!

Saturday 8 December North London Symphony Orchestra perform at the United Reformed Church 7.45 pm  – Wagner, Mahler and Franck

Sunday 30 December Floating Lanterns on the Boating Pond, Broomfield Park

Categories
Art and Culture Bowes Park History Music Shops

Bizarre Bowes Park for the “interesting and nice”

Bizarre Bowes Park image Peter Berthoud

Award winning tour guide Peter Berthoud of Discovering London repeats his Bizarre Bowes Park walk at the weekend

Peter promises that the tour will take in “Ovi the dinosaur, an odd collection of eagles, London’s most interesting underpants, and a ramshackle “pop-up” church that has recently been saved and  look at some interesting late Victorian and Edwardian architecture.” It will also include a stop off for a drink in one the area’s most interesting bars, an exploration of Bowes Park’s musical links and a chance to view the most disturbing window display in the entire city.

Peter has  introduced an entertaining pricing system for this walk, and that alone is worth clicking through to make a booking.

The walk is on Sunday 30 September from 11-2 and starts at Bowes Green tube station.