Post by Les on Nov 28, 2017 4:17:04 GMT
Maidstone I remember it well: Cor - loads of memories on this site. I was born in Oak Tree Avenue in Mangravet, in March 1954. My Dad (Owen Foreman) was born in Yalding and my Mum (Joyce Cox) in Sutton Valence. I went to Mangravet infants school for a while then we moved to Bell Meadow opposite the (then) Blue Door pub. I was in the very first class at the newly built Bell Wood School. My earliest friends were Robert Frith and Steven and Roger Rawlings. We played in the woods at the back of Park Wood - what is now Bicknor Road and the Industrial estate and south of Willington Street which is now Senacre Wood. I rode my first motorbike there - a BSA Bantam 125cc. before any of the houses were built.
Many weekends were spent with my Aunt and Uncle in Wheeler Street - in one of the few original Wheeler Street houses that are still standing today - just over the road from The Rose pub. I recall my Aunt buying knitting wool in Mankelows shop in Holland Road. On the corner of Wheeler Street and James Street was another little shop called 'Prudence'. I'd buy penny Bangers for bonfire night and sweets from the shop window - you had to open a wire cage door to get to them. Highlight of Saturday evening was roasting Chestnuts on the coal shovel on the fire and watching The Billy Cotton Bandshow on the little black & white telly. Sunday dinner time I'd walk with my Uncle, through the cut at the end of Bluett Street to The Dog and Gun in Boxley Road and have a lemonade in the corridor while my Uncle had a pint or three in the bar.
When I started at The Boys Grammar in (I think 1964) I'd catch the trolley bus from Wallis Avenue. The bus went down Stone Street which was then a two way street. I'd get off at Knightrider Street and walk back up the hill to school with my friends. The Art College on The Tonbridge Road was a popular night out at weekends. I saw lots of great bands there - The Groundhogs, Stray, Edgar Broughton Band, Status Quo, Gentle Giant, Fairport Convention, Matthews Southern Comfort and even Skid Row with sixteen year-old Gary Moore.
When I reached sixteen I formed a rock band called 'HYDE'. Dickie Judd was the Drummer, Micky Holness, the Bass player and Ryan Beeching a brilliant lead singer. The last two worked at Charles Arkcoll. David Bowie, The Sweet, T Rex, Status Quo, Fleetwood Mac, Rolling Stones were all popular at the time. We played all over Kent but in Maidstone it was at The Mitre, The Albion, The London Tavern, The One and Only and at Youth Clubs in Parkwood and the one in the basement of The Congregational Church in King Street.
I remember 'Elvis' dancing with a pint on his head in The Mitre and there was another feller always there. He always wore a floppy leather hat and danced on his own. He once got picked on and beaten up for no reason at all in The Mitre by an infamous local Scumbag who, I'm told, is still around.
My first motorbike was an AJS 250 then a Tiger 90 then a NORBSA 650cc cafe racer - the first bike I ever built. We'd all meet at either the Fiesta (under the Granada cinema or over the road at Conti's coffee bar - later Hubble and Freeman. The bikes were parked on the corner opposite and there was always one or two of them in pieces on the pavement.
Dickie Judd and I later formed a band called 'JET' with Terry Brown and Dave Rosewell originally from 'TALES'. Terry and Dave were replaced by Pete Giles on Bass and Micky Hewitt on Keyboards. We always seemed to be playing at The Star Ballroom, Tudor House, Great Danes or Greenways. Sooo many memories, I could go on forever.