This Constance postcard view of the steps to Hazel Grove and the beach dates from pre 1950s, today the bank sides are considerably overgrown; in some cases more brambles than grass. I remember the council workmen cutting them, but alas times change.
Image courtesy of Iris Place and many thanks to Alan Collins for the update on possible dating of this image.
I think this photo is much earlier that the 1960’s. I moved from Victoria Road to Emerald St in 1954 and those posts in the middle were not there then. The “bottom end” kids used to build an annual bonfire just to the left of this picture, and there was a sort of war game, with the “top end” kids (or posh kids from where I used to live!) when we tried to burn each other’s bonfire, before 5th November, just for fun! This photo was taken from The White Elephant, where we also played a game at night where one stood there with a torch, and tried to call your name out before you crept up and touched them. If not, one captive was set free again, to continue the hide and seek game. We learnt the game at the Cubs and Scouts; which had a hut at the top of Hazelgrove. We used to do sledge races in winter from that hut, down the other narrow path where over-taking was very daring and great fun! At the bottom there was a stage theatre, where our lodger used to do magic tricks in summer, around the corner at the bottom of these steps. There was a Saturday cinema matinee for children at the old cinema at the top, opposite the Scout Hut next to Pearl St. before t.v. spoilt everyone’s social life in favour of commercialisation! Anyway this photo is older than the 60’s. There was a public toilet at the bottom of these steps, behind a shop on the prom where a choc ice was only 5p (old money). I have photos of my brother on the sands at the bottom of these steps where there were beach huts in the 1940’s, and of my brother sister and myself with our cousins standing against another dug out seating area, next to The White Elephant. We used to pull bogey carts with sea-coal on them, up this path – which was a job and a half, I can tell you! We filled cornets from newspaper to burn it because we had fallen from rich to poor, in those days… Then when my mother opened a shop in Pearl St during the Coronation celebrations and street party there, and later on she worked for the woman who owned the Cat Nab cafe – who lived behind that place and had two daughters. There was once a boating lake beside Cat Nab, next to the Valley Gardens minature railway. To prove it, I have a photo of ourselves in a boat taken in 1950. Maybe I should learn how to put these pictures up here?! We used to hide under a bridge or among some broad leaved weeds in the Valley Gardens, and wait until the small train went past, then put loads of big weeds on the lines to have a laugh at the train driver been forced to stop and remove them – while he could hear us but not see us! Those were the days of innocent fun making by children, which adults also enjoyed. Times long gone, unfortunately!
Can anyone tell me what school in Loftus my aunt Bessle
(GARBUTT) was a teacher in.
Recently visited her family home at Street House Farm to see it has all been
split up into units some as holiday rentals others for sale.