Ten Years

 Although this blog had begun life a couple of years earlier, the current Blogspot format was launched in 2012 with the aspiration of publishing about three posts each month.  There was no intention to reach a ten-year lifespan, or in fact any set target, but here we are, ten years later and SAOEE blog is still going strong.  While the last year in which the target of thirty-six posts in a calendar year was reached was in 2014, I am pleased to have reached this total again in 2021.  Further, this post is number 350 in the current series.  I'll raise a glass to that on New Year's Eve.

I've chosen to look back at the festive period in the 1970s, to re-discover what events were making the news in our East End during that decade.  None of those selected recorded public celebratory events, so there was no reference to Christmas trees or other street decorations – we left that to the city centre – although many of the shops did create their own special display windows with little lights, cotton wool snow and Happy Christmas signs, and exhorted via signs invitations to purchase festive food, do-it-yourself decorations, and small trees and holly stems.

But the following all occurred in December and would have added an extra dimension to the local scene.

1970: A supermarket (a newish term in everyday use) was slated to open at Whitecroft, London Road, right on the edge of our patch. Named Downsway, its warehouse was owned by T W Downs which  had opened on the Butterwick Industrial estate a few years previously.  This small group later bought out another small chain, but later in the 1970s found itself selling to one of the big guys: Fine Fare.

1971: A postbox standing on the corner of Ely and Cambridge roads for many decades, suddenly became a headache because of its position – on private land – and the owner now wanted it moved from the space in front of the corner shop and onto public space. St Albans Council and GPO jointly agreed to it residing on the footpath a few yards away, where it remains today.

1972: Now that there was no land left on which to farm, the barn next to Cunningham Hill Farm homestead was being converted into two houses, one four-bedroomed and the other five-bedroomed (above).  A feature article in the Herts Advertiser stated the barn had been acquired by Michael Hunter from a Watford contracting firm, but had previously belonged to James Baum, of the last farming family at Cunningham. The barn was estimated to be 400 years old.  The existing roof tiles were retained and two-century-old bricks were brought from a Southwark church to fill the framework sections.

1973: In one of those subsidence alerts which occasionally come to light – and the holes sometimes produced – the end of the year brought the worrying news that a house in Sandpit Lane, the last to be finished just before the Second World War, was to be shored up because of unstable ground.  In testing the ground conditions there appeared to be a space between 15 and 80 feet depth.  The Herts Advertiser stated that other nearby homes were also affected.  An "unsettling" time for the house owners affected.  And just before Christmas.

1974: A decision had been made by Hertfordshire County Council that both the Girls' Grammar School and Boy's Grammar School were to be extended, in both buildings and pupil numbers, were to become all ability schools, and would, from the following September, change their names.  The boys' school in Brampton Road would henceforth be renamed Verulam School, while the Girls' School nominally removed the word Grammar, reducing its initials from STAGGS to STAGS.  The Girls' School had occupied today's Fleetville Juniors buildings until 1952.

1975: The extension of residential housing in Hatfield Road had strangely prompted a proposal to increase the road's speed limit from 30 to 40mph between Colney Heath Lane and Ryecroft Court.  After a period of intensive community lobbying, the speed upgrade did not take place, and the existing limits apply to this day.

1976: Hertfordshire County Council applied for planning consent for a new 40-place nursery unit at Fleetville Infants School, a year after the move of the Junior section to larger accommodation at the former Sandfield Road School.  The new unit, including development on the site of the closed police houses, which were also owned by the County Council, allowed for the closure of the temporary and inadequate Day Nursery erected in 1942 on the Recreation Ground. Fifty-five years later this temporary building is still in occupation by Fleetville Community Centre.

1977: From the 1920s until 1977 the St Albans Bypass was a three-lane single carriageway, although sufficient land had been purchased for dual three lane roads. One section had been dualled in the mid-1950s, but in December 1977 it was announced work would begin on converting two further sections to dual two lane carriageways: Noke to Park Street and London Colney to Colney Heath.  This work would greatly ease congestion throughout, but as we have some to experience capacity has been reached once more, especially at the roundabouts, and the benefits which once derived between Hatfield and St Albans are now behind us.

1978: Cllr Ronald Wheeldon was helping Fleetville bid for cash towards making the area a General Improvement Area (GIA), including a traffic management scheme.  Fleetville had been the subject of a scathing report by the Labour Party three years previously.  Castle, Cape, Sutton and Burleigh roads were assessed as being the most needy in the ward.

1979: In the ongoing tussle between the Council and St Albans Cooperative Society, another building design was submitted for the Society's proposed supermarket (on today's Morrison's site).  A number of Fleetville traders were concerned about their future livelihoods and a number of residents looked forward to improved shopping experiences, though many were greatly supportive of existing grocers and greengrocers.

So, in those years there was much to look forward to, as well as hopes for battles in progress.  As always, changes affect people in different ways; commercial takeovers may risk employment, especially worrying at the end of a year.  And many residents would continue to wait a long time for improvements to their living conditions.

A Better Entrance

This week we pause to consider a few of the issues which come about when a site is purchased and a note on a planning map: "future school", or in the case of Hatfield Road "future schools".

Whether primary or secondary there was a huge difference between what was provided in an educational building. In today's terms the facilities to be found in the pre 1902 Board schools or the later elementary establishments can be considered very basic , where even effective winter heating might be absent.  The County Council, on its formation, became responsible for building and maintaining schools where they were needed.  In the early years after formation in 1889 the Council engaged an architect for each individual school, but in the 20th century it set up an increasingly sophisticated architect department to develop standards common to groups of schools; and these standards developed and improved with time.

The Rural School Board were responsible for creating a school for the widely-spread child
population in surrounding hamlets.

So, using just a few select examples, what did we discover from actual experience?

You would have thought a mains water supply was a basic requirement, but Camp Elementary School was opened without a water supply extended this far from the nearest supply; and in Sandridge senior boys were detailed to carry water buckets from the village pump when required.

In 1908 (Fleetville Elementary School) lavatories were strictly outside at the far end of the playground; and the playground surface was gritted.

When the land was purchased for senior education in Fleetville the space was deemed sufficient for one boys' and one girls' school.  Ten years later when the girls Central School was built only one school could be accommodated.

The County Architect Department developed a building style with interchangeable components
This style of building is widely distributed across the county.  Staff at Beaumont Boys' School
in 1959.

By 1938 when the two senior schools were required even more urgently, Beaumont got its pupils in one building, girls upstairs and boys on the ground floor, with the absolute minimum of sharing!  Playing field space, according to the government, was required to be even greater.  The site reserved for a girls' grammar school in Brampton Road was instead used for a boys' school, while new housing hemmed the school in on all sides.  The regulations required more playing field acreage for boys than for girls; which is why the pupils of the Boys' Grammar School (now Verulam) have, since 1938, walked to their remote site in Sandpit Lane, and continue to do so.

A hall was multi-purpose in the early days, with a requirement to divide into two classrooms, even in the 1920s (London Colney).  It must also double up as a gymnasium in 1930 (Central).  Even Beaumont (1938) was in build when the next advance came, and a separate gymnasium with changing rooms became a new requirement.  This facility was also added to Central later.

When Beaumonts Girls' and Boys' Schools were designed a gymnasium what not required 
separate from the hall.  This new requirement was added as the schools were nearing completion.
Changing rooms were included.  When more modern sports hall facilities were later built the 
gymnasium was converted into a library centre.

From 1930 a platform suitable for drama was added to the hall at Central, and at Townsend an adjacent room was included for teaching and changing purposes, and by 1938 (Beaumont) two small classrooms were added for changing rooms.  Similar improvements were made for staff facilities and administration.  And considering many school still closed at lunchtimes down to the 1920s, catering facilities weren't added until post-war with many schools being supplied from central kitchens elsewhere in the city.

A detached house was included when required for the caretaker and his/her family.  This is at the Fleetville Juniors site, formerly Central, Girls' Grammar, Beaumont Girls, Sandfield; all names
applied to schools occupying the Hatfield Road school site since 1931.  The house no longer
serves its original function.

When schools might be built further away from the urban area and where caretakers need to be close at hand, the authority either acquired a nearby house or had one built in a part of the site.  This added provision was in place by the mid 1930s (Central – detached house), Marshalswick  (bungalow in 1959) and St Albans College (flat in 1959).

The main entrances to schools were also given a more prominent statement where possible.  Central was added in 1937 when the caretaker's house was built.  The need for parking, visitors, staff and other vehicular pressures often limited the possibilities, and Beaumont was only significantly improved within the last two or three years.

Camp and Fleetville schools have had to squeeze more onto their fixed plots even, in Camp's case the removal of a former head teacher's house, and in both cases removal of part of the schools' infrastructure onto new sites (Fleetville Juniors across the road onto Central,  overcrowding of Camp to form Windermere, and overcrowding of Fleetville to form Fleetville Extension School, renamed Oakwood).