I grew up in Woodberry Grove and the New River was a slightly magical place in my childhood in the 40’s and 50’s. It was heavily fenced and patrolled by watermen on bicycles. It was quite a ‘dare’ to get over or through the fence and walk along the bank – for fear of being chased or worse still, caught.
However, we did now and then quietly sit on the bank and talk, of course always keeping an eye open. We knew it was drinking water for London and it was respected, so nothing was thrown into the river other than the odd pebble.
The river was the northern boundary of Northumberland House – our playground until they demolished it. We found that the Northumberland House iron railings were quite easy to bend and one could get through to the bank.
A friend with a strong magnet on a string found a large pistol, covered in mud and rust, while ‘fishing’ off the Green Lanes bridge. My dad checked that it was not loaded and gave it back to him, how times have changed.
In later years I’ve become very interested in the river how it has evolved and now appreciate the wonderful engineering involved - just so that we could have sweet clean drinking water, which I never take for granted.
Glad you found my comments of interest. I have just one photo (.jpg) of my mother and me sitting on the bank of the river taken about 1952. I'm not sure how I can send it to you.
Welcome to Harringay Online. I hope you'll find it a great way to keep up with what's going on in and around Harringay.
If you didn’t get a chance to read it when you signed up, you can get a basic idea of what we’re all about and how the site works on our welcome page.
If you have any questions, feel free to visit the page of Hugh or Liz and ask anything you like. (We’re not setting ourselves up as oracles here, but we’ll do our best to help with anything about Harringay Online).
We’d love to hear from you so please share your views by commenting on posts that interest you or adding new ones.
Hugh
PS: If you want to see what the press has been saying about us, you can have a peek here.
Roy aka Smiffy
Hi Sarah,
I grew up in Woodberry Grove and the New River was a slightly magical place in my childhood in the 40’s and 50’s. It was heavily fenced and patrolled by watermen on bicycles. It was quite a ‘dare’ to get over or through the fence and walk along the bank – for fear of being chased or worse still, caught.
However, we did now and then quietly sit on the bank and talk, of course always keeping an eye open. We knew it was drinking water for London and it was respected, so nothing was thrown into the river other than the odd pebble.
The river was the northern boundary of Northumberland House – our playground until they demolished it. We found that the Northumberland House iron railings were quite easy to bend and one could get through to the bank.
A friend with a strong magnet on a string found a large pistol, covered in mud and rust, while ‘fishing’ off the Green Lanes bridge. My dad checked that it was not loaded and gave it back to him, how times have changed.
In later years I’ve become very interested in the river how it has evolved and now appreciate the wonderful engineering involved - just so that we could have sweet clean drinking water, which I never take for granted.
Sir Hugh Myddelton our local hero!
Oct 4, 2012
Roy aka Smiffy
Hi Sarah,
Glad you found my comments of interest. I have just one photo (.jpg) of my mother and me sitting on the bank of the river taken about 1952. I'm not sure how I can send it to you.
How I wish we'd taken more photos!
Regards,
Roy
Oct 5, 2012
Hugh
Hi Sarah,
Welcome to Harringay Online. I hope you'll find it a great way to keep up with what's going on in and around Harringay.
If you didn’t get a chance to read it when you signed up, you can get a basic idea of what we’re all about and how the site works on our welcome page.
If you have any questions, feel free to visit the page of Hugh or Liz and ask anything you like. (We’re not setting ourselves up as oracles here, but we’ll do our best to help with anything about Harringay Online).
We’d love to hear from you so please share your views by commenting on posts that interest you or adding new ones.
Hugh
PS: If you want to see what the press has been saying about us, you can have a peek here.
Oct 6, 2012