Post by Les on Oct 6, 2017 18:03:04 GMT
At the top of Brewer Street Wheeler Street runs from Union Street all the way past Holland Road and eventually it meets Park Avenue. From here, we would walk up the hedges, over Heathfield Road, and down to Penenden Heath.
At the two corners of Brewer Street and Wheeler Street the two public houses the Ancient Druids (now a Chinese restaurant) and the Eagle. On the other side of the road were Mrs. Beautridge the greengrocer, I was sent here on many occasions to bring back vegetables, always forgetting by the time I made the top of the street what I had been sent out for. Mrs. Beautridge would say was it beetroot you wanted love. I always replied yes please and go home with completely the wrong thing, I would be sent back with instructions of what mum needed written down, and to return the unwanted beetroot. You would think that I would learn but I never did. Any purchases wrapped up in newspaper.
Mr. Shippey our local newsagent employing countless numbers of newspaper boys to deliver morning and evening papers and magazines. We, my brother and I, not allowed to apply for such jobs, mum thinking it was wrong for children of our tender age to be working.
Mr Clarke had a sweet shop next to the newsagents, not that he seemed to sell much however I remember that he had a large glass globe approximately eighteen inches across that contained water. He would use this to make posh cordial drinks, price 1d.
Gran Wade ran a sweet shop further up Wheeler Street, another entrepreneur selling homemade ice-lollies at 1d. while all the other ice-lolly vendors were charging 3d. per lolly. I remember Gran Wade so clearly quite a short person with a twisted smile I think she may have suffered a stroke at some time.
Mum and Dad took us to visit a dying person in Wheeler Street, they were lying in the front room or parlour on a made up bed. I cannot remember why we were summoned to the deathbed or even who it was doing the dying.
Towards the top of Wheeler Street just before you reach Grecian Street was a firm called Serck Radiators. I imagine that they rebuilt car and lorry radiators, I wonder if they’re still in business.
Just below this was a bombsite dating back to the war years, just wasteland and rubble, the strange thing is that I grew so used to seeing it that I never even questioned when it, or how it, had happened; no fence just the front wall of the houses stood to keep out trespassers. Still thinking back there were many sites like this around Maidstone.
At the two corners of Brewer Street and Wheeler Street the two public houses the Ancient Druids (now a Chinese restaurant) and the Eagle. On the other side of the road were Mrs. Beautridge the greengrocer, I was sent here on many occasions to bring back vegetables, always forgetting by the time I made the top of the street what I had been sent out for. Mrs. Beautridge would say was it beetroot you wanted love. I always replied yes please and go home with completely the wrong thing, I would be sent back with instructions of what mum needed written down, and to return the unwanted beetroot. You would think that I would learn but I never did. Any purchases wrapped up in newspaper.
Mr. Shippey our local newsagent employing countless numbers of newspaper boys to deliver morning and evening papers and magazines. We, my brother and I, not allowed to apply for such jobs, mum thinking it was wrong for children of our tender age to be working.
Mr Clarke had a sweet shop next to the newsagents, not that he seemed to sell much however I remember that he had a large glass globe approximately eighteen inches across that contained water. He would use this to make posh cordial drinks, price 1d.
Gran Wade ran a sweet shop further up Wheeler Street, another entrepreneur selling homemade ice-lollies at 1d. while all the other ice-lolly vendors were charging 3d. per lolly. I remember Gran Wade so clearly quite a short person with a twisted smile I think she may have suffered a stroke at some time.
Mum and Dad took us to visit a dying person in Wheeler Street, they were lying in the front room or parlour on a made up bed. I cannot remember why we were summoned to the deathbed or even who it was doing the dying.
Towards the top of Wheeler Street just before you reach Grecian Street was a firm called Serck Radiators. I imagine that they rebuilt car and lorry radiators, I wonder if they’re still in business.
Just below this was a bombsite dating back to the war years, just wasteland and rubble, the strange thing is that I grew so used to seeing it that I never even questioned when it, or how it, had happened; no fence just the front wall of the houses stood to keep out trespassers. Still thinking back there were many sites like this around Maidstone.