Queen's Court in 1946

 One small part of Fleetville which I sought on the RAF's 1946 flyover photo survey is the area on the north side of Hatfield where today is located Queen's Court, the three-block three storey flats developed for St Albans City Council.  However, Queen's Court did not emerge from the ground until 1952 and formally opened in Coronation Year 1953.

Unfortunately, peering at the image (below) there is little clear detail, and we need to rely on a supplementary details in describing the story in order to make sense of the camera view.  To be honest, the 1946 experience of walking along Hatfield Road was a mess.  It was not a location where photographs appear to have been taken – these were the days of film and the additional costs of processing, and as with most other aspects of life our resources were frugally managed.  If photographs were taken they seem not to have survived or circulated, unless our readers know differently.

An extract from the RAF aerial survey in October 1946. The north-south roads on the right are
Beechwood Avenue and Ashley Road.  A triangular shape in the centre is the focus for our
exploration in this blog.
COURTESY HISTORIC ENGLAND

The triangle is between the Alleyway, a footpath from Beaumont Avenue towards Woodstock
Road South, and Hatfield Road.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

In this account we will focus on the orange boundaries on the following map.  To the east is a group of five villas built at the start of the twentieth century.  These finish where the footpath, or alleyway as it was popularly called at the time, meets Beaumont Avenue.  The western boundary where the Thrifty Cars site is, but in 1946 it was Currell's Garage as it was about to be nationalised under the name British Road Services (BRS).  Also absorbed into the present site was a bungalow to its right.

The five villas between Beaumont Avenue and Queen's Court.

In addition to the five villas mentioned above there were two other detached, both on wide ploys which extended back to the alleyway. Their short lifespan was the result of a development battleground between commercial Fleetville and residential building which would have contrasted with the tightly arranged terraces between The Crown and Arthur Road.  The City Council, which in the 1930s received increased responsibilities under the formative Town & Country Planning Act, came to the conclusion there were already enough shops along Hatfield Road, and that as traffic along the main road was already busy, houses fronting Hatfield Road would be better than short side roads leading to blocks of flats which were becoming fashionable at the time.

A photo taken in the 1930s.  On the far side of Hatfield Road was Currell's Garage and a bungalow
beyond.  This is now Thrifty Cars.
COURTESY STALEY HAINES COLLECTION

Photo from c1910 from the junction with Ashley Road and looking westwards towards
Fleetville.  These are the villas on the north side of Hatfield.  The most distant house was
said to be the first to be demolished in the late 1930s and part of the site occupied by the wartime
National Fire Service, and later by Queen's Court flats.  However the aerial photo shows both
homes to still be standing, though undoubtedly, empty in 1946.
COURTESY HERTFORDSHIRE ARCHIVES & LOCAL STUDIES

It was the adventurous owner of one of the spacious villas who first proposed building flats on a spare plot to the side and behind his home, with shops replacing his frontage.  When the plan was turned down by the Council, the applicant went even further, purchasing the house of his neighbour, began demolishing both and extended his initial plan.  Shops would be built along the main road in front of both villas, with a side road leading to blocks of flats behind – a rather provocative proposal one would have thought?  Or perhaps the reporting was rather confusing.  So determined was he, according to the press, that he pushed ahead shortly before the outbreak of war in 1939.  In fact, the aerial photograph shows the structures apparently still standing in 1946, though empty.  The gardens and a tennis court were left neglected.

 

A new fire tender purchased by St Albans City Fire Service shortly before becoming part of
the expanded fleet of the National Fire Service.
COURTESY THE HERTS ADVERTISER

As local and national bodies were set up for wartime emergencies and a range of defences on the home front, the newly-formed National Fire Service (NFS) seized on the opportunity to grab the site, which included an unsold plot where the branch library would later be built.  The NFS rather strangely numbered what was left of the two villas NFS1 and NFS2. For what purpose is unclear. It also built a training and operational building on the west side of the site.  It is presumed the former gardens were utilised for the parking of its fire tenders and other vehicles.

Soon after the end of the war the vehicles had gone and the windows of the operational building had been shattered by vandalism, entered and probably occupied by tramps and other homeless individuals.  Children made use of the open space as an unofficial adventure playground and broke through the fencing on the alleyway boundary.

One of the three blocks forming Queen's Court

In 1950 the City Council acquired the site and, although no shops appeared, it seems to have had a change of mind about flats, with not one, but two, access roads!  The result was Queen's Court, winning an architectural award in the process, which included the grassed square and brick frontage wall, name sign pillars and lines of lavender shrubs.

Closure and demolition of the branch library.

The small block of flats which was built on the site of the former library.

The Council's Library Committee had been searching for a suitable site for a Fleetville branch library.  Criticised for being remote from the heart of Fleetville as it then was, nevertheless it was still a branch library.  The pleas for access to a library had begun even before the Carnegie Library (Victoria Street) was opened in 1911, but at that time districts such as Camp and Fleetville were beyond the City boundary and their residents were denied the use of the central  facilities.  But from 1913 onwards the East Ward councillors, including William Bond and Stephen Simmons frequently campaigned for the young districts to have the benefit of their own branch library.  It took more than forty years to achieve, being opened in 1959, and its life was barely as long as as the period waiting for it to happen.

The new branch library replaced the existing mobile library van.

Taking another look at that section of the aerial photograph you would struggle to identify anything which might tell the story above, but at least today there is a fine estate of flats, and a smaller building of accessible flats where the branch library arrived – and departed.

A Look at the South Side

 During the latter part of 2020 our posts explored the north side of Hatfield Road, and during that time we covered the distance from Clarence Road to Beaumont Avenue.  Now it is time to turn our attention to the south side of the road, beginning from Ashley Road, thus returning to where we began.

Tree-lined Hatfield Road looking westwards towards The Avenue (Beaumont Avenue).  
This is when we were "out in the country" and we were able to launder in the middle of the road.
COURTESY ST ALBANS LIBRARIES (HALS)

The countryside continued, along the tree-line Avenue towards Beaumonts Farm.

While building was taking place for the printing factory and the Fleet Ville, we would have crossed the boundary into Beaumonts Farm.  If we had ventured further east along the road towards Hatfield our way would have taken us through the quiet of the countryside, for in 1898 there was no building after passing the Rats' Castle toll house which was being prepared for an enterprising build called Primrose Cottage.  We would have passed those Beaumonts Farm fields on both sides, probably not in the best of cropping condition as in the following year they would also be prepared for development.  Individual field and hedgerow trees were being sold as standing timber, as evidenced by little adverts in the Herts Advertiser.  Beyond The Avenue a continuous line of boundary trees stretched all the way to Harpsfield with few breaks along the way.  We were well into the rural tranche for which Primrose Cottage became appropriately named.

A board was erected at the end of The Avenue indicated an amount of land for sale.  One block to the west of The Avenue as far as the foot of the hill; another block bounded by the Ashpath track, Camp Lane, the track later known as Sutton Road, and the branch railway; and finally, a narrower rectangular block between the railway and the road to Hatfield.

This last block was purchased by the development business of T R Marriott of North Walsham, Norfolk – who also acquired a large tranche of the Salisbury Avenue block, along with Alfred Nicholson. A number of single plots were sold for building by Marriott's, but small groups of plots were also transferred to Charles Blow, David Massey and William Bastin.

Unfortunately I have not seen any photos of the Ash Path, its junction with Hatfield Road or its approach towards the railway bridge shortly below the bottom edge of this map.  This is the 1924
OS map shortly before a number of houses which will occupy the two square sections of the field
above.
COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

The aerial photo above  shows Hatfield Road across the lower half of the view, with Castle Road
across the top half.  Ashley Road is on the extreme left.  When the Ashley Church later arrived it
was able to tidy the angled corner on the left; it made use of the former Handalone Laundry
which Mrs Symons' business used before she and her family  migrated to 
Australia c1930.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

The private road and farm track which would shortly be known as The Avenue (then Beaumont Avenue) was continued on the south side of the road to Hatfield.  This was effectively a crossroads within a farm.  On all four quadrants was Kinder-owned farm land, and the track on the south side leading to Hill End, which the newly opened Owen brickworks had gradually given a new name from the patches of ash and cinders used to improve its surface – the Ash Path or Cinder Track.  This was a permissive path used to enable public access to Hill End and it was inevitable it would become a future road.

For the first few years of the 20th century nothing much happened; there was no rush to build.  In fact just one property went up immediately, which will be described in more detail in the next post.

Ryegate, 282, the first house to be erected c1906, although the OS map appears to show the
house as a semi-detached pair.

The second property, a house given the name Ryegate (today's 282), was first occupied by Arthur Nightingale in 1906.  A further two years passed before a further house near the Ashpath corner quickly became Mrs Symons Handalone Laundry.  

The field remained quiet again until c1912 when a group of houses next to Mr Nightingale was put up, and gradually the rest of the spare plots were occupied between the end of World War One and 1926.  We should also bear in mind that the gardens behind these homes met gardens which fronted onto Castle Road.

We discover from the 1911 census and 1939 registration something of the occupations of the people living in the homes between 268 and 314 Hatfield Road.  Many were employees of railway companies or local printing works; and inevitably, given buildings were springing up widely, there were occupations related to the building sector.

For the most part this row of varied houses has remained unremarkable during the past century, not because they have not deserved to be otherwise, but because until we reach nearer the Rats' Castle PH, there has been less variety in the land use; and the Editor has to admit he knew no-one who lived in any of those houses during the period in which he was growing up!

In the next post we will pass bread, tyres, flowers and a drink or two.

St John's and Lane End

 A message received this week stated "In my endeavours to discover the history of St John's Court I most happily came across your site ..."  The editor very much appreciates that you did, Rebecca, as the north end of Beaumont Avenue is often recalled; the former Beaumonts farm workers' cottages on one side, and two large houses on the other.

A substantial acreage of Beaumonts farm was disposed of for development in 1899, the remainder in 1929.  In this context it included land between the west of Beaumont Avenue and the former stream course at the foot of the hill (where Salisbury Avenue meets Eaton Road).  The first house to be erected after the 1899 sale was St John's Lodge, first occupied by 1905 and possibly a little earlier.  The first name applied to this address was Avenue House.

There is a connection between the former owning family of the farm and the owner of Avenue House (later St John's Lodge).  The Kinder family had been farmers and brewers since at least 1737, and in addition to Beaumonts Farm Kinder either owned or rented fields to grow oats and barley for the brewing trade.  He also had interests in the highly successful brewery, the business of Stephen Adey and Samuel White in Chequer Street (where The Maltings shops are today and in the first half of the 20th century had been the Chequers Cinema and the Central Car Park).

The houses Bramhall, Lane End and St John's Lodge consumed an estimated
five acres at the north end of Beaumont Avenue. Ordnance Survey 1939.
COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

Harold Adey had been living in a villa in Verulam Road, but was the first to acquire a strategically positioned plot in the newly laid out development land of The Avenue and Salisbury Avenue.  Was it just coincidence that Harold Adey purchased his new house here?  After all in 1900 Thomas Kinder had been dead for nearly two decades.  But there might have been a provision in Kinder's will.  His trust was empowered to sell assets over a period of time to ensure his wife and daughters had solid futures.  Nevertheless it had previously been  Kinder's former brewery,  and here was current owner Harold Adey building his own house on part of the Kinder estate!

Only four other homes were built in the Avenue during the next fifteen years.  And next door at the very end of the avenue the variously named The Grange, Stoodley and Lane End appeared for a Miss Hough. Meanwhile Avenue House changed its name to St John's Lodge.  Both properties had a footprint of around two acres each.

In the 1920s the Misses Blackwood began a small private school from their St John's Lodge home, which by the mid 1930s had moved as a "prep school" to the eastern end of Jennings Road.

St Albans Councillor William Bird made St Johns Lodge his home from c1937, before moving on to The Park in the 1950s.

This pair of neighbouring houses were the location of Conservative Association fund-raising garden parties during the fifties.  Mr Williams at Lane End was an extensive rose grower, and it is said that he had over 1,500 rose bushes in his garden.  On garden party  days, visitors were able to use a gate between the two homes and, maybe, for a small surcharge could walk around the Lane End gardens to enjoy the flowers.

The three houses were in the area marked in green above.  Today nearly seventy homes
occupy the same space.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

They may have continued to provide homes for future owners, but there was also interest by developers searching for house building land.  By 1960 the end had come for both homes.  They were demolished, together with the Sandpit Lane-facing Bramhall and by 1966 permission had been given for a new development of 69 homes, collectively taking the name St John's Court.  A new future for the northern end of Beaumont Avenue lay in wait.

It would be great to find photographs of either or both of these houses to illustrate just how impressive they were in their day. Meanwhile, there are probably many readers who have other recollections of these houses.

Meanwhile, the following memory has been received, and it seems appropriate to add it to the above post.

"I spent lovely afternoons playing [at Lane End].  A friend and I were invited by Mrs Williams to tea.  We were sent in our best frocks, but Mrs Williams told us to come in clothes suitable for play the next times we visited. It was a wonderful garden, huge, with a little bridge and big trees to climb.  Roses galore, and we played croquet too.  The house was beautiful, and attics to explore and a green marble bathroom.  Mrs Williams was a kind lady.  I'm not sure if she had children, but we had such happy times there.  I was dismayed when Lane End was sold and that such a lovely house was demolished.  My father was most unimpressed with the new development."

Changing Our Name

In the previous post we heard of a primary school from Camden, Princess Road, which spent the entire period from 1939 to 1945, nesting in Fleetville while their homes near Regents Park were at risk of bombing.

Another school, Haverstock Hill Senior Schools, also spent time with us, but having a rather different outcome.  The school was formed from earlier establishments in new purpose-designed buildings at the foot of Haverstock Hill in 1911.  In 1939 the girls' section was led by Mrs Pearce, while the Head of the boys' school was Mr H J Blackwell.  At the beginning of September 1939 the schools, en-masse, boarded a train from nearby St Pancras and arrived at St Albans "for the duration," as the rather vague expression was often phrased.

The 1911 building of Haverstock Hill School, Chalk Farm, since replaced
by a more modern and extensive estate.

Their school home would be Beaumont which had barely been completed and its own pupils and staff moved in under their head teachers Miss Ellis and Mr T H McGuffie.  As with Haverstock Hill, the girls' school and boys' school shared the building but were administered completely separately – interesting when there was only one telephone!

The initial arrangement, common everywhere, was for Beaumont pupils to occupy the school in the mornings and Haverstock Hill in the afternoons.  It is possible that the Beaumont school roll was below capacity enabling some flexibility in the occupation of classrooms and halls.  As the Haverstock pupils were older than their primary peers some of the older ones may have returned home to look after family members or undertake work even though they may have been below leaving age.

At a presentation event in 1942: L-R Mrs Pearce (Head of HH Girls' School); Joan Parry (Head Girl Beaumont Girls' School); Colin Taylor (Senior Prefect Beaumont Boys' School); Mr T H McGuffie (Head of Beaumont Boys' School); Elsie Bridges (Haverstock Hill School); Mr H J Blackwell (Head Haverstock Hill Boys' School); Miss Ellis (Head Beaumont Girls' School).
HERTS ADVERTISER

However, between friendships made at school and friendships formed with their billet families it seems that many of the evacuees saw Fleetville as a second home.  In 1942 the Heads of Haverstock Hill at Beaumont had a decision to make.  We are not in a position to understand the trigger but it is possible that a number of pupils were still being enrolled at the Camden premises, and as the oldest pupils at Beaumont left at the end of their schooling, to have four separate heads in charge of a set of buildings probably seemed unnecessary.  Mrs Pearce and Mr Blackwell therefore closed their  two sections at Fleetville, but they gave the parents of their pupils the choice of remaining at Beaumont, transferring to the Beaumont roll.  Of course, this would also have relied on the co-operation of the billet families with whom they had stayed so far.  It is also likely that fewer top-up children arrived in 1941 and 1942 to replace those who had left.

We know that this offer was taken up by a number of Haverstock pupils, but there seems to be no record of how many or how long they remained with their host school and family.  Could a small number of leavers have remained in St Albans, taking up essential war-time jobs, remaining with their billet families?

At the close of the summer term in 1942 a collection was taken among the pupils of Haverstock Boys' and presented to Mr McGuffie so that a sports cup could be purchased.  This request was honoured as the author recalled the Haverstock Cup being fought for among the house teams in the 1950s.  But no-one seemed to think it important that the pupils might benefit from understanding why the trophy was so-named.

Sports cup winners at Beaumont Boys' School in 1959.  One of these trophies
may well have been the Haverstock Cup.

Mr Blackwell, in a letter to the Herts Advertiser, commented: "Will you permit me to express to the citizens of St Albans the heartfelt thanks of the children and staff who, during these three years and more, have enjoyed the hospitality of the city.  We owe more to the kindness, helpfulness and forbearance of its citizens than we shall ever be able to repay.  Each of us, I know, will have a warm corner in his heart for them."

Since this post was first published the Fleetville Diaries' Beaumont Avenue project has identified that Head Teacher Mr Herbert Blackwell, his wife Elizabeth, and their young son Michael, had obtained accommodation in a house called Elmwood, now number 43 Beaumont Avenue.  Also residing there were John and Lilian Rowe, and George Twigg.

All are described as being "in charge of children of government evacuation scheme."  Although not stated, it is likely that the other adults were also Haverstock Hill teachers at Beaumont.

We have focused on the billeting of evacuated children with local families; their teachers also needed accommodation and this is the first reference to the adults given the awesome educational and caring responsibility for the young people and where they lived – although Hertfordshire County Council accepted overall legal responsibility, and there are extensive reports on how it carried out its role.

Source: 1939 England & Wales Register.
Fleetville Diaries Right Up Our Street: Beaumont Avenue.

Mixed Up 1940

Previously selected items of news from the decade years was featured, and 1940's choice was weather related, how people continued to survive everyday life through the bitterly cold weather. But there were other events.

Life in St Albans was, of course, a very different community than usual. A depleted young male population as they moved into the Services, large number of adults out of place, that is, having arrived in the city from elsewhere on wartime contracts, many of them boarding in homes with spare rooms.  It was this coming together of strangers which gave rise to the hugely successful Garden Club. Then of course there were schools and families who had evacuated, initially from London, and just a year later from the south coast.  Not far away were also island groups from the Channel Islands now  living more safely in Harpenden.

With the safety of the nation's children in mind, the government set up convoys of chartered ships to take families and unaccompanied children to Canada for the duration.  Although escorted, the passage of ships across the Atlantic was a huge risk and a convoy in mid-September was attacked by U-Boats.  

One vessel early in the convoy, thought to be SS Volendam, was torpedoed.  On board were "several hundred children" according to the Herts Advertiser and later recorded as 320, so we assume it to be a large vessel.  One of the supervisors on board was a teacher, Margaret Walker from 23 Hatfield Road.   

Later ships, SS City of Benares, SS Marina and SS Hurricane were also hit and the resulting loss of life was considerable.  This included death from extended exposure over several days in lifeboats.  Evacuation to Canada was immediately halted as the risk was clearly significantly greater than if the families and unaccompanied minors had remained at home.

Although Margaret Walker came from St Albans – or at least she was living here immediately before being deployed on the evacuation mission – we are uncertain whether any local families or children were also part of that convoy.  But there are other examples of people moving towards perceived safety and who nevertheless lost their lives.  Many Fleetville residents will be aware of the Strowbridge family who moved out from north London and took up residence into a newly completed house in Beaumont Avenue and on the night of the Coventry bombing in November suffered the loss of four of its members in a direct hit.

St Albans had other connections with child refugees both during World War 2 and in the decades following.  Details of some of these connections will be related by the author at a Fleetville Diaries event at Fleetville Community Centre on Wednesday 29th January at 7.30pm.

St Albans provided relief funds to the survivors of the
Duisberg bombing many of whom had become refugees
in their city's basements.

What About Those 50 Houses?

At the top of the website's front page is this banner:
1919: Council proposed 50 houses on the corner Hatfield Road/Beaumont Avenue.  Did it happen?

It would have been so easy to provide a single word answer; job done; but so much more satisfactory to explore the question a little further.

An early drawing for one of the four-home blocks at Townsend, Waverley Road area. HERTS ADVERTISER

Townsend HFH in Margaret Avenue GOOGLE STREETVIEW

St Albans Council in 1919, shortly after the end of the First World War, didn't fully respond quickly to the call for local authorities to build huge numbers of new homes under the banner Homes for Heroes.  By April, however, it had agreed to explore three sites. First, 65 homes in Camp Lane opposite Sander's nursery (presumably where Vanda Crescent is now); this did not go ahead but was later replaced by the Springfield site at the top of Cell Barnes Lane.  Second, 50 homes at Townsend, which was the first development to go ahead; the scheme was formally announced in 1920.

Newly completed Springfield home in 1928. HERTS ADVERTISER

The third location was, perhaps a surprise: 50 homes on the corner of Hatfield Road and Beaumont Avenue.  This was fairly quickly crossed off the list as the city's drainage network did not extend that far at the time.  However, was the choice of location just a curiosity or was there some logic at work?

We have to forget what was actually built, but later, and focus on the farmscape in 1919.  Beaumonts Farm had been acquired by Oaklands in 1899 and the land on the west of Beaumont Avenue had been sold for development.  That left the east side of the Avenue and the fields lining Hatfield Road to be managed as a mixed farm.  Today, Beechwood Avenue and Elm Drive sets the scene.  We even know how this field had been used during the war. Checks had been made to ensure farmers were making effective use of their land for cropping and one field in particular caused concern as it gave the appearance of not being cropped at all.  Mr Moores, the farm manager, implied that he had more-or-less given up with that field as the local residents – meaning Fleetville at the time – regularly used it for recreational purposes, there being a gate near the junction.

Beechwood Avenue from the old pre-development field gate entrance, Hatfield Road.

So, in 1919 there was a field alongside Hatfield Road which gave the impression of being neglected and would probably prove easy to acquire by the Council.  We should also remember that the Council boundaries had been extended from The Crown to Oaklands (Winches) only six years previously.  This field would have been eminently suitable for a Homes for Heroes development, and if the authority had been able to muster sufficient funds there would have been space for considerably more than fifty new homes.

The field remained until sold, along with others, in 1929 and the Beaumont estate came about.  The short answer is therefore no!

Contrasting tracks

Most of our streets came about during the period of expansion and utilisation of former fields into residential or mixed development.  Before Kingshill Avenue there was a field sloping downwards towards the former Marshalswick Farm.  Royston Road and its neighbouring streets were carved out of a large field where cattle had grazed; and Cavendish Road, though there may have been a footpath of sorts, was created from an orchard or a tree nursery or a small crop field, depending on time. 

Although there are minor roads which were formerly footpaths crossing the countryside, and roads linking towns which have existed for several centuries, it is rare to come across a road with a life stretching back into antiquity, probably part of an ancient network of trackways which traversed the region.

Pre-development Beaumont Avenue at the Hatfield Road end.
COURTESY ANDY LAWRENCE

Part of one such route is now Beaumont Avenue and forms an attractive residential road linking Sandpit Lane and Hatfield Road.  Along this road was a minor spur leading to Beaumonts Farm.  The spur today is part private (Farm Road) and part adopted, absorbed by the residential estate as Central Drive.

Remove the homes which line each side of the Avenue, all but three of which arrived since 1899, and you are left with the remains of a double stand of fine trees.  

The track which wandered through the former manor estate had extended through wooded land of uncertain age north of Sandpit Lane.  Today we know this as The Wick.  Also part of Beaumonts Farm was a continuation of the track towards Hill End.  Now Ashey Road, it is a mix of early 1930s semi-detached homes, a post-war industrial estate and the green acres which are now Highfield Park, formerly Hill End Hospital.  How this section of the track contrasted with the Avenue: it had been dug for the clay and was home to a brickworks as a result; and with the exception of isolated groups of trees did not appear to have been treelined.

One further difference: the southern section, though a track snaking through the farm, was a permissive route for traffic other than that which was farm business.  The Avenue, on the other hand, had always been considered private (whether legally so is another matter) and gates were installed at both the Sandpit Lane and Hatfield Road ends.

The former BT building next to the railway, now Alban Away,  Today
part of an industrial estate and earlier a brick works and rubbish tip.

Today's Alban Way still intersects Ashley Road and demonstrates a further difference between the two sections.  But before feeling too satisfied that the avenue escaped the smoke and steam of railway tracks, it was a close call.  The Midland Railway's early iteration proposed a route which would have clipped the northern end of Beaumont Avenue and crossed in front of the former Marshalswick House.  Although Thomas Kinder, owner of Beaumonts, had not been found to have objected to the compulsory purchase of a small portion of his land, the Marten family certainly did, and as a result Beaumont Avenue retained its rural and ancient landscape.  No railway crossing the Avenue.  Same track, but quite a contrast.