Memories of Harringay in the 1920's-1930's - Part Seven

Green Lanes Part Two

Each Saturday evening, until quite late at night, both sides of Green Lanes were also occupied by stalls and wheeled barrows selling fruit, vegetables, crockery and many other items. The stalls and barrows stood in the gutters of Green Lanes, in front of the shops, and each one had a large flaring acetylene lamp which hissed and spluttered and threw out a harsh yellow light.

The stalls were very unpopular with the shop owners, because they sold goods cheaply and in direct competition with them. But stalls and barrows along Green Lanes on a Saturday were a local tradition, and they could do nothing about it.

Every stall or barrow holder would be shouting out, at the tops of their voices, the excellence of their goods, and the cheapness of their prices, trying to make themselves heard about the rattle and clanging of the passing trams. The din was terrific!

Some stall holders were great characters and would gather a crowd around them as they strove to sell their wares. Some did it by flattery, and some by actually cheeking, or even insulting, their prospective customers.

As the evening wore on, they became more and more desperate to sell their goods before it was time to pack up, and there was one man who ran a sweet stall who did it by 'reverse auction'.

He would hold up a large paper bag in one hand and with the other would start throwing different sorts of sweets into it. For example, he would shout:

"'ere's yer whipped cream walnuts, 'ere's yer chocklit toffees, 'ere's yer coconut ice, and 'ere's yer barley sugars…….there you are, you greedy pigs, a tanner for the lot". [A tanner was six (old) pence, or 2 1/2 p today].

Someone might shout out: "I'll give yer tuppence for 'em governor".

"Make it fourpence and their yours" he would reply.

"Nah, threepence" would come back.

"Done" the stallholder would shout "but you've ruined me, and me wife and kids will starve tonight"!

Another favourite of mine was the stall which sold crockery. The stall holder stood on a set of wooden steps, so that he was well above the crowd, and had two assistants one of whom handed up the 'stock' while the other moved about among the customers.

This stall sold everything and anything made from china, and most of it was thick and decorated in garish colours. You could buy a single cup and saucer, or a milk jug, a vase, or a complete dinner or tea set, "enough for a full-blown banquet" as the stall holder explained.

He also insisted it was of the finest quality "Just like what 'is Majesty the King 'as at Buckinum Pallis", and of course it was being sold at prices which would ruin him (the stall-holder, that is!).

To start the ball rolling, the stall holder would shout down to his assistant "'and me up that gold dinner service like what the Duke of Westminster uses".

Reaching beneath the stall the assistant would fetch out a large dinner plate and hold it up for all to see. The stall holder would then describe in glowing terms how beautiful it was, how many pieces there were in the complete set and, of course, how little he was asking for it.

Usually he would start with something like this: "I'm not askin' a quid, I'm not askin' 15 shillings, I'm not even askin' ten bob .... you can 'ave the lot for five bob!" (25p).

The real bargaining would then begin, with the assistant in the crowd running around encouraging the buyers.

If a sale was made (and the stall holder might finally settle for as little as 'arf a crown, (which was 2/6d, or 12 pence in today's money), then the other assistant would reach under the stall and fetch out a big cardboard box in which the dinner set was pre-packed.

Looking back, I wonder now whether the buyer actually got what he paid for! Sometimes, if the stall holder failed to make a sale, he would deliberately smash a dinner plate with a big hammer, shouting that the customers did not deserve to have it anyway because they were all ungrateful pigs and did not appreciate his bargains.

Deliberately smashing a plate with a hammer brought 'Ooohs and Aaahs' from the crowd, and always livened up the proceedings again.

As the evening wore on the proper shop keepers in Green Lanes would become desperate. Especially butchers and fish mongers. There were no refrigerators in those days and all meat and fish had to be sold by Saturday night because they were unlikely to keep until the following Monday morning. (No shops, save newsagents, opened on a Sunday).

Butchers and fishmongers had shops with very large sash windows in front, which were sometimes raised to show the goods laid out on slabs. Hygiene was not seen as important in those days, and the uncovered meat and fish were of course open to dust and flies.

As eight or nine o'clock on a Saturday evening drew near the butchers and fishmongers would become more and more anxious, and would stand on the pavement outside their shops, banging on their windows, or ringing hand bells, and shouting out their prices.

The later it got, the cheaper the prices, and many was the bargain my mother got for a piece of meat or fish bought that way. Once again, the din was tremendous.

I have another vivid memory of Green Lanes in the 1920's. At the comer of Green Lanes and Fairfax Road (where my cousins lived at No 88), there was an undertakers, or a funeral directors as it would be known today.

Above the shop there was a large gas lantern with deep purple glass panels on four sides, which shed a rather gloomy and ominous light. Purple was thought to be the correct colour for the lamp outside an undertaker’s business.

Late one evening I was out with my mother shopping and outside the undertakers we saw a man with a dancing bear, begging for money. This poor creature, a brown bear about 6 ft tall (or so it seemed to me), had been taught to stand on its hind legs and to 'dance' when shouted at by its owner. In fact, it merely lifted its feet alternately two or three times, and then stopped until it was shouted at again.

The man held a long wooden rod one end of which was attached to a large brass ring through the bear's nose, so that he could hold the wretched creature at arm's length.

Every now and then he would pull or push the rod so that the bear would shuffle a few steps along the pavement, as an alternative to 'dancing'. On the pavement, in front of the bear, was the man's cap, into which he hoped people would throw a penny or two.

I stood very close to my mother, and watched the bear with awe and fear, and did not sleep very well for the next few nights. Can you imagine such a spectacle being allowed today, especially in a public street?