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Toys, Taverns, Timber & More – 1990

Toys, Taverns, Timber & More: More from my walk on Sunday February 25th 1990 which began with Around Finsbury Park – 1990. The previous post was Along Hornsey Road, Holloway 1990.

*Works, Nugent Road, Spears Rd, Crouch Hill, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-34*

A factory here was established here next to the house in Lambton Road of William Britain (1828-1906). The company grew greatly and the factory expanded after in 1893 his son William Britain Jnr found a way of casting three-dimensional hollow-cast soldiers in 1893 using an alloy of lead, tin and antinomy. Previously toy soldiers had been flat, two-dimensional.

Sales slumped during and after the Great War for Britains Ltd and at Christmas 1921 they introduced Britains Model Home Farm, which became a big seller; later they also made zoo and circus figures.

In 1931 they expaned with a new factory, the North Light Building in Walthamstow. They finally left this Crouch Hill factory and moved completely to Walthamstow in 1968. That closed in 1991 with production being moved to Nottingham.

*Shops, 471, Hornsey Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-35*

This building on the corner of Hornsey Road and Fairbridge Road offering timber, building materials and electrical supplies to the trade and for DIY use clearly had had a rather different past with this rather grand entrance. I had photographed the building the previous year and commented on it but had not found out much about its history.

According to Edith’s Streets it was orginally a coffee tavern, the Jubilee Hall, and from 1905 until 1937 was the premises of Newton and Wright, electrical and scientific instrument makers. They were the makers of The British Snook Machine, a “1920s gas filled or cold cathode medical X-ray tube with a collimator extension of the anticathodeode“. If like me you are totally mystified you can find out more and see pictures on The Hornsey Road blog.

*E D Elson, Timber, Fairbridge Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-22*

E D Elson had a yard at 169 Fairbridge Road for 43 years from when they were founded by Eddie Elson in 1968, along with branches in north London and Hertfordshire – presumably including Barnet. They relocated to St Albans in 2011 and were quickly replaced by a new block of ground floor shops with flats above.

Geo F Trumper, Perfurmer, Sussex Way, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-23 — *Geo F Trumper, Perfurmer, Fairbridge Road, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-23*

Although the street sign is Sussex Way, the doorway at right is 166 Fairbridge Road and Geo F Trumper‘s perfumery is on Fairbridge Road. This is the head office of the company which was established in 1875 by George Francis William Trumper as a gentlemen’s barber shop in Curzon Street, Mayfair. It sells a range of men’s fragrances and personal grooming products, none of which I have ever tried.

*Works, Boothby Rd, Ethorne Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-11*

This building was the Holloway Mills dating from around the 1870s as a steam saw mills for W Betts, the son of J.T. Betts who had founded the company in Bordeaux in 1804. They made boxes and packaging and later became specialists in metal packaging. The company was taken over in 1960 and other businesses moved in. More recently the building has been in use by a a number of artists organisations.

*Byam Shaw School of Art, Ethorne Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-12*

The Byam Shaw School of Art was opened as an independent school of fine art in Kensington in May 1910 by John Liston Byam Shaw and Rex Vicat Cole, and was at first called the Byam Shaw and Vicat Cole School of Art.

It moved to these larger premises in 1970 and in 2003 was absorbed into the art establishment as a part of Central Saint Martins College of Arts and Design.

According to a Facebook post by Matt Crandall, this 1920s building was the factory for G Leonardi Ltd, Leonardene Co, and Leonardene Art Models, all founded by Giuseppe Leonardi, an ex-pat Italian, in the 1920s. They were “primarily makers of Art Deco pieces in the 1920s and 1930s including figures, lamps, and wall masks. Their quality far surpassed the usual plasterware items produced at the time, highly detailed and beautifully painted. Many Leonardi designs were reproduced by other companies into the 1970s.” They apparently had a Disney licence from “sometime in the 1940s, which ran at least through 1953“

*Archway Tavern, Archway Rd, Archway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-13*

Where I was standing to make this picture is now called Navigator Square , part of a new gyratory road system. The Archway Tavern is still standing and opened again as a pub after being closed in 2014 over licencing issues. There has been a pub on this site since the 1700s. It was rebuilt in 1860, and then this larger building replaced it in 1888.

Behind at right is the Holborn Union Building, another historic landmark, designed by Henry Saxon Snell which opened on Archway Road as the The Holborn and Finsbury Union Workhouse Infirmary with 625 beds on 1879. More recently it was a campus for University College London and Middlesex University. Vacant since 2013, controversion plans for redevelopment including a 23 storey student housing tower were turned down by Islington council but the called in by London Mayor Sadiq Khan whose decision is still awaited.

*The Royal London Friendly Society, Insurance, Junction Rd, Archway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-14*

The Royal London Friendly Society was launched by Henry Ridge and Joseph Degge in 1861 and in 1908 became a mutual, owned by its customers. Now just Royal London, it “is among the top 30 mutuals globally, and is the largest mutual life, pensions and investment company in the UK.”

This fine building for the society at 32 Junction Road dates from 1903, architects Holman & Goodham and was still in used by Royal London Insurance in 1990. Later it became solicitors offices, but since around 2015 has housed a series of cafés, and is currently Dune Brasserie and offices above.

Mecca, Statues, Bakers, Ladders, Timber… 1989

Mecca, Statues, Bakers Ladders, Timber… Continuing my walk on Sunday September 3rd 1989 which had begun in Stratford, from which some images appeared in my web site and self-published book ‘1989’, ISBN: 978-1-909363-01-4, still available. The pictures here are in the order I took them. For those images which were in the book I’ll show the book pages here.

*Mecca, Bingo Hall, 468, Hoe St, Walthamstow, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-11*

Back at the Bakers Arms after a little stroll on Leyton Flats I found this closed Mecca Leisure Bingo Hall on Hoe Street, its ground floor frontage covered with flyposting. Cinema Treasures says it opened as The Scala Cinema in 1913, was renamed the Plaza Cinema in 1931 and then closed, reopening in 1933. After its next name change in 1961 to The Cameo Cinema in 1961 it kept going for two years before becoming a Mecca Bingo Club. Left derelict for 18 years after this closed in 1986, it was taken over by a church in 2004, Grade II listed in 2006 and now looks much better. The listing text calls it the Former Empress Cinema and notes its still existing elaborate interior plasterwork.

Mecca, Statues, Bakers Ladders, Timber — *Child mannequins, shop window, Hoe St, Walthamstow, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-12*

London Master Bakers, Benevolent Institution, Lea Bridge Rd, Leyton, 1989 89-9a-13 1989 89-9a-13 — *London Master Bakers, Benevolent Institution, 551, Lea Bridge Rd, Leyton, 1989 89-9a-13 1989 89-9a-13*

The London Master Bakers’ Pension Society (now the Bakers’ Benevolent Society) was founded in 1832 and in 1854 decided to build almshouses. The foundation stone for the first was laid in 1857 and the first block of 18 were finished by 1861 and the rest by 1866, providing homes for elderly poor bakers and their widows.

In the late 1960s the site was purchased, probably as a part of a GLC road-widening scheme and the Bakers moved out to new villas in Epping. The almshouses were saved from further threats to demolish them by Grade II listing in 1971 and were purchased by Waltham Forest Council for use as 1-bed flats.

This is now Clow Group Ltd, Diamond Ladder Factory, still in this shop on the corner of Shortlands Rd.

*Bakers Arms Tyre & Brake Co, 545, Lea Bridge Rd, Leyton, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9b-62*

Rather to my surprise this corner of Russel Road and Lea Bridge Road still looks remarkably similar although the names have changed and the central buildings have been rebuilt, I think with a slightly wider pavement. But it still sells tyres and cars and there is still a shed on the corner, though no longer named the DUCK INN, and the buildings down Russell Road still look much the same.

*House, 27, Capworth St, Leyton, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9b-66*

This house was demolished to build a modern office for the Capworth Panel & Timber Co Ltd, which was dissolved in 2012. As well as the main house all of the sheds and buidings at right also went.

The house had obviously seen grander days, and I wonder it it had originally had a carriage entrance at left where the brickwork does not quite match and the window and door are clearly much more modern, perhaps having been added at the same time as the first floor windows were given a makeover probably in the 1930s or 50s.

I still had time to continue my wandering around the area and take a few more pictures and will post a final set from this walk shortly.

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Great Union St, Hedon Rd & Popple Street

Great Union St, Hedon Rd & Popple Street: The River Hull divides the city in two, and although there are around a dozen bridges linking the two sides, they remain very separate. Perhaps the most obvious aspect of this are the two league sides, Hull FC and Hull KR, facing each other in bitter rivalry from West and East. The river may not quite be an iron curtain but at least when I first went to Hull it was a very tangible divide.

I stayed in North Hull, on the west side of the river, and was surprised to find my wife who had grown up there was almost completely ignorant of anything on the other side. Of course some people worked on the other side of the river, and back in the sixties and seventies were often delayed on on their way to work or coming home as the bridges opened for river traffic. Now those openings are infrequent as few vessels make passages upriver.

Mo's Cafe, Great Union St,, Hull, 1989 89-8n-15 — *Mo’s Cafe, Great Union St, Hull, 1989 89-8n-15*

I photographed Mo’s Cafe on two different days in August 1989 and the notice in this picture tells me it had recently closed and “MOVED TO DRYPOOL GARGE 18 HEDON RD 2 MIN’S AWAY”. My second picture a day or two later is from across the road and shows some of the surrounding buildings which were still there on Great Union Street until 2015, but are now demolished.

On the north corner of St Peter Street, those buildings were part of the Rank Hovis Clarence Mill site, and Mo’s Cafe was at the rear of the Waterloo Tavern on Great Union Street at its junction with Clarence Street. The pub closed around 2010 and is now an an antiques salvage yard.

*As You Like It, Hedon Rd, Hull, 1989 89-8n-16*

This doorway presents a mystery I have been unable to solve in its plate fixed on the wall. At the top is a helmet of sorts, perhaps a link to diving though it could be just heraldic fantasy. Below is a shield with its three crowns, the emblem of the City of Kingston upon Hull since the 1400’s and the text ‘AS YOU LIKE IT’, presumably a trademark as underneath in smaller letters it states ‘REGISTERED’.

Finally at the bottom is one of those lettermarks of combined letters, always unreadable unless you know what they are. I can see a ‘J’, ‘F’ and ‘R’ with an ‘L’ that is possibly for Limited as there is a small ‘D’ to the right. Perhaps some local historian will know more and comment.

*Gravestone, Great Union St, Hull, 1989 89-8o-62*

I think the small graveyard area is part of the churchyard of the former St. Peter’s Church, which was destroyed in a wartime bombing raid in 1941. Since the Covid lockdown this area has been cleaned up by a group of local residents and is now a small park now known as ‘Thinkers Corner’ after a sculpture by Kevin Storch was placed in it on the 59th anniversary of the start of the Second World War in 1989.

Unfortunately I could not read the inscription on the stone but I thought he had probably been the captain of the vessel shown.

*Herald, Storage tanks, Hedon Rd, Hull, 1989 89-8o-63*

I don’t know what was in these tanks if anything, but the 1928 OS Map shows some molasses tanks in this area to the south of Hedon Road. The large building with HERALD on it has its frontage on Popple Street, just off Hedon Road, and the name N R Burnett Ltd large on the other side. The company is still listed as a timber merchant in Hull, now in West Carr Lane. HERALD seems to have been painted over their name at a later date. It was also on the side of the building followed by a second line already illegible, but could have read TIMBER [HULL] LTD.

This area is immediately to the north of Hull’s timber dock, Victoria Dock, which opened in 1850 and closed to shipping in 1970 and has been redeveloped for residential use. Hull remains the UK’s leading importer of softwood mainly from Russia and the Baltic states.

*C M Railton & Son, Popple St, Hull, 1989 89-8o-66*

C M Railton & Son were as their sign states Joinery Manufacturers and the property in the centre of the picture is still on Popple Street, backing on to Hedon Road next to Robbies pub (aka Victoria Hotel/Monkey House.) The site is currently a medical supplies company.

C M Railton moved out and are now registered in Beverley as a non-trading company, due to be struck of the register and deemed to be bona vacantia – without owner.

Behind at right is a sawmill, one of a number on the Hedon Road. You can read an extensive article by Paul Gibson, The timber industry in Hull, on his Hull and Eat Yorkshire History site.

*National Dock Labour Board, Popple St, Hull, 1989 89-8o-51*

The National Dock Labour Board was set up by the Labour government following the 1945 Dock Strike in 1947 to adminster the Dock Workers’ (Regulation of Employment) Scheme. It combined the trade unions and employers and controlled wages, hiring of labour and discipline of workers and was financed by a levy on employers.

It gave dock workers security, guaranteeing them with work on the docks, finding employment for them if they were laid off by an employer – or if no work was available a £25,000 payoff. The scheme was abolished by Thatcher in 1989 as being an anachronism that prevented the industry exploiting its workers. Dockers went out on strike in July 1989 but most voted to go back to work in August.

This building remains on Popple Street though rather difficult to recognise except by the distinctive brickwork. It was used for some time by St John Ambulance but is now a charity providing activities and education for vulnerable adults.

More from East Hull in later posts. As always you can click on the pictures to see a larger version on Flickr.

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More From Bow Creek, April 1989

The second part of a short walk by Bow Creek on Friday 7th April 1989. The first part is at Bow Creek, East India Dock Way, April 1989.

*London Sawmills, Bow Creek, East India Dock Rd, Canning Town, Newham, 1989 89-4b-15*

I walked back a few yards to the west along the East India Dock Road and made this picture looking south down Bow Creek, again showing the stacked timber on the wharf. The closer of the two bridges visible was I think just a pipe bridge, probably to carry gas from the nearby gasworks from Poplar to Canning Town, and has since been removed.

The second bridge is a Dock Road Foot Bridge, more commonly called the Blue Bridge (a name it shares with several others in London), though it also carries pipes and is still in place. I think it was intended to provide a route for people living in South Bromley to Canning Town station, and it leads to a bridge taking the footpath over the DLR, but unfortunately this has been almost permanently locked. It has been at least partly rebuilt since I made this picture

Hidden by this bridge a few yards further downstream and fenced off is another bridge, Canning Town Old Railway Bridge, long disused which was built to carry a single rail track over the river.

*Pipe Bridge, Bow Creek, Tower Hamlets, Newham, 1989 89-4c-61*

I walked on across Bow Creek and took this picture of the pipe bridge. As you can see it was well fenced off and although there were steps up and a footway across I could not access this.

All this brickwork on the Middlesex side of the river has gone, I think when the road bridge here was widened and a link road provided to the Limehouse Link tunnel but the brick abutment remains on the Essex side. The bridge was built to give sufficient clearance for navigation.

*Pipe Bridge, Bow Creek, Tower Hamlets, Newham, 1989 89-4c-63*

At the centre of the river I had crossed from Newham into Tower Hamlets. My street atlas names this area as South Bromley, but I don’t think anyone now knows where that is, as there is no station of that name, the DLR having decided on East India instead.

A few yards on along waste ground I made another picture showing the pipe bridge and the river, before turning back to the East India Dock Road. I made two exposures and I wonder if I may have chosen the wrong one to digitise as it is just slightly unsharp.

London Sawmills, Bow Creek, East India Dock Rd, Canning Town, Newham, 1989 89-4c-65 — *London Sawmills, Bow Creek, East India Dock Rd, Canning Town, Tower Hamlets, 1989 89-4c-65*

Across the water you can see much of the planks produced by the sawmill on the wharf, as well as stacks on a further wharf downriver between the building around 50 yards away on land but half a mile downstream round what is now the Bow Creek Ecology Park. Behind the cut timber you can see part of the Pura Foods edible oils factory on the opposite bank of the invisible river, and above that the top of the flood barrier across the river on the other side of the factory.

Timber was for many years a major industry on Bow Creek and along the Lea Navigation, as the Surrey Docks just across the Thames was mainly a timber dock, with large timber ponds. Boats and barges would have brought huge trunks to sawmills such as this, and the cut timber was also mainly transported further on by barge.

*Pura Foods, Bow Creek, Tower Hamlets, 1989 89-4c-52*

I walked further east and used a short telephoto lens to make this image of Pura Foods. Their factory processing vegetable oils here at Orchard Place had grown considerably over the years, as had the smells from it, and many locals were pleased when the factory moved out in 2006.

Almost all of my pictures at this time were taken with a 35mm lens, giving a moderate wide angle view. The Olympus Zuiko lens I used was unusual in being a shift lens, allow me to move the optical elements relative to the film to give additional control over the perspective. It made it possible for example to photograph taller buildings without tilting the camera which would have resulted in verticals that converged.

Lens design has improved considerably since, and so have our expectations of lenses. Many of my pictures made then have a lack of critical sharpness at the corners which we would now find unacceptable. Digital imaging in particular means we now routinely look at images on a much larger scale on screen than the prints we used to make.

*West Ham Power Station, Bow Creek, East India Dock Rd, Newham, 1989 89-4c-55*

I crossed to the other side of the busy East India Dock Road, going along Wharfside Road under it, and made this view looking north up Bow Creek. As you can see the West Ham Power Station was then being demolished. This was the last in a number of power stations on the site since 1904, when West Ham Council built one here to power its trams. This was West Ham B, built in 1951 and it used coal brought up Bow Creek as well as coke from the neighbouring Bromley Gas Works.

Power production at the station dropped off from the late 1960s and it closed in 1983. By 1989 its two 300ft cooling towers had already been demolished and the rest of the station was following.

*West Ham Power Station, Bow Creek, East India Dock Rd, Newham, 1989 89-4c-56*

A second view shows more of the Newham (or Essex) bank south of the main power station building and the closer parts are again full of stacked timber.

Newham Council together with Tower Hamlets has plans for a number of new bridges in the area providing links across Bow Creek, at Lochnagar St, Poplar Reach near to Cody Dock and Mayer Parry connecting the Leven Road former gasworks site to roughly where the old power station was, now the SEGRO industrial park.

It had been a short and interesting walk and I made my way to Canning Town station for the slow journey home. Canning Town is much easier to get to since the Jubilee Line opened at the end of 1999.

Laundry, Timber and Glengall Road

The previous post on this walk I made on Sunday 29th January 1989 was Housing and the Grand Surrey Canal – 1989 .

*Elite Laundry, Willowbrook Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-65*

The Elite Laundry at 48a Willowbrook Road was on the edge of the canal walk and had obviously been closed for some time when I made this picture. It has since been demolished but the property in the left half of the picture, behind the roadside structure made mainly of corrugated iron sheeting has been renovated and is now on the Surrey Linear Canal Park. For some time it was the Willowbrook centre, a community planning and education centre of Southwark Council but they decided to sell it in 2017. It is Grade II listed as Willowbrook Urban Studies Centre.

The canal bridge a little further down Willowbrook Road is almost identical to that on Commercial Way, and both were built for the St Giles Camberwell vestry around 1870. This was then named Hill Street Bridge, though the 2015 map still refers to it by the older name of Taylor’s Bridge. The map also names the wharf here as Langdale Wharf. It was the site of timber merchants William Sharvatt & Son Limited.

*Timber Yard, Colegrove Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-66*

Timber from the Surrey Docks was the main cargo of the barges which came down the Grand Surrey Canal, and this yard will once have been a wharf on the canal. I’m unsure exactly where on Colegrove Road it was as this side of the street is now a large run of modern flats and I think all the buildings shown, both those on the wharf and the more distant flats have been demolished.

*Factory, Glengall Rd, Latona Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-51*

Glengall Road and Latona Road were still full of the industrial units that grew up around the Grand Surrey Canal, twith the large building on the corner and the adjoining property on Glengall Road in 1989 being occupied by Hays Chemicals Ltd. These buildings still remain, now occupied by Gadmon Industries, a German company specialising in steel tubing and pipelines, but those further down Glengall Road at the left were demolished in 2022.

*Factory, Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-52*

Some of the older factories and warehouses in the area had been replaced by more modern buildings, which I have now also been demolished. I think this particular warehouse was built on the actual filled in canal where it went under Glengall Bridge, no trace of which remains. I’m unsure what these stacks are, but I think they were probably made from wood. The peeling paint at left looked to me like a map of some unknown part of the world.

Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-53

The house at left is 41 Glengall Rd, which has since been extended. The factory buildings have been replaced by a modern equivalent built with a slight echo of the previous structures and is not the Glengall Business Park. The canal ran just to the south of here. I think this was the Glengall Works, where Chubbs moved their Patented Safe Manufactory in 1868, producing fire and burglary resistant safes and strong-room doors. They closed the factory in 1908 moving all production to their Wolverhampton works.

*Travellers Camp, Surrey Linear Canal Park, Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-54*

Caravans were parked on a part of the canal park. The building at left is still there but the block of flats was demolished as a part of the North Peckham regeneration scheme.

Houses, Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-55

Houses on Glengall Road were built on open fields to the south of the Old Kent Road between1843-and 1834 in what was then called Glengall Grove to emphasize its rural nature – though a short walk would have taken the new middle-class occupants to some noxous industries beside the canal. The street was planted with lime trees, some of which survive.

*Houses, Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-42*

These houses are thought to have been designed by the well-known architect Amon Henry Wilds who also designed other houses in the area including some still remaining on the Old Kent Road. But I don’t think there is any sign of his trademark decoration and perhaps he was not personally involved in their construction though providing the look of the houses.

*Houses, Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-43*

Nos 1-35 (odd) & 24-38 (even) Glengall Road are all Grade II listed, as well as similar houses in Glengall Terrace.

*Houses, Glengall Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-1i-46*

The listings date from 1972, but in 1989 some of the properties were still in a poor state of repair. This picture shows houses which are part of a terrace at 36-50, a later development probably from the 1860s. Having spent some time photographing the houses at the top of Glengall Road I was walking back down the street when I made this picture.

My walk will continue in a later post.

The first post on this walk I made on Sunday 29th January 1989 was Windows, A Doorway, Horse Trough and Winnie Mandela

Old Ford, Middlesex Filter Beds & Hertford Union

After my stay in Paris in August 1988 I was back in London and managed to fit in one more walk before the end of the month, starting from where I had finished one of my previous walks in Bethnal Green.

Old Ford Rd, Old Ford, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-66-Edit_2400 — *Old Ford Rd, Old Ford, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-66*

Old Ford Road runs parallel to Roman Road but a couple of hundred yards to the north, and almost certainly follows the real Roman route to the east out of London, fording the River Lea somewhere close to where the Northern Outfall Sewer (The Greenway) now crosses. The river here is a part of the Lea Navigation and now very much more constrained between banks than it once was, though then it will still have been tidal here.

There was a route here even before the Romans, leading along the way of modern Oxford St and Old Street to Bethnal Green and Old Ford and then continuing through what were then marshes to Wanstead Slip north of Stratford and on the Colchester.

There are long stretches of Victorian houses as well as modern flats along Old Ford Road, but the house at the left of this picture is No 218, and is a terrace beginning with 196 and ending at 224 a little to the west of the bridge over the Regent’s Canal and immediately north of the Cranbrook estate.

Roman Rd, Bethnal Green, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-52-Edit_2400 — *Roman Rd, Bethnal Green, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-52*

I wasn’t sure what to make of this establishment on Roman Road, which seemed to be both a Patisserie and Bar, offering Light Lunches & Coffee, as well as catering for all functions, with rather curious window decoration and an odd bit of statuary in its entrance.

Middlesex FIlter Beds, Lea Bridge, Waltham Forest, 1988 88-8am-42-Edit_2400 — *Middlesex Filter Beds, Lea Bridge, Waltham Forest, 1988 88-8am-42*

I did a lot more walking without taking many photographs, going south down Usher Road and then going east to cross the East Cross Route on Wick Lane before joining the towpath on the opposite bank of the Lea Navigation to get to the Middlesex Filter Beds at the north corner of the Hackney Marshes – something over 2 miles before I took the next black and white pictures in what had been turned into a nature reserve.

The filter beds were built in the early nineteenth century to combat cholera in London by providing clean drinking water which was still killing thousands but were unable to cope with the increasing population and were finally closed in 1969, left to become a nature reserve. I think they may have recently been made open to the public when I made this short visit. Going back more recently they seem to have been made a little less overgrown than they had become over the 19 years since they were abandoned. This image seems to me the more interesting of the five frames that I took – film was still expensive.

Lea Navigation, Eastway, Hackney Wick, Hackney, 1988 88-8am-45-Edit_2400 — *Lea Navigation, Eastway, Hackney Wick, Hackney, 1988 88-8am-45*

Walking back south along the towpath I made three exposures of this derelict building with its broken windows and the reflection in the canal by the Eastway Bridge. I probably took few pictures on this part of the walk as I had photographed fairly extensively along the Lea a few years earlier – some pictures you can see in the book ‘Before the Olympics‘ which has images from the source to the Thames.

Hertford Union, canal, Old Ford, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-46-Edit_2400 — *Hertford Union, canal, Old Ford, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-26*

At Hackney Wick I crossed the bridge and took the towpath beside the Herrtford Union Canal, a short section joining the Lea Navigation to the Regent’s Canal. Then there were still a number of canal wharves, mainly for timber, though it was a few years since commercial traffic here had ended.

Hertford Union, canal, Old Ford, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-32-Edit_2400 — *Hertford Union, canal, Old Ford, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-32*

Another view of the same wharf, and one of the lorries which now served them rather than canal boats. The Challenge, owned by the Docklands Canal Boat Trust, a registered charity formed in 1985 that provides boating holidays and day trips for people with disabilities, is a specially built boat for the purpose – and it was a challenge to get the money to build it. Still in operation it is now based on the Lea at Clapton.

Hertford Union, canal, Hackney Wick, Tower Hamlets, 1988 88-8am-31

There was still plenty of timber along this stretch of the canal.

More from the end of this walk in a later post. You can see a larger version of any of these pictures by clicking on them which will take you to my album 1988 London Photos.

Timber – Lea Navigation

Timber made up a very large proportion of the commercial traffic on the Lea Navigation, certainly in the twentieth century. In its earlier years barge traffic on the River Lea and its canalised sections was largely of agricultural products – malt, meal and grain – being carried down to London, with barges being returned empty or carrying coal upstream. Trade was substantial even before the construction of the navigation began following plans by John Smeaton and the 1767 Act of Parliament, and the river carried an estimated 30,000 tons a year coming mainly from around Ware and Stanstead Abbotts.

The flash locks then in use, with gates that were removed to allow barges to pass wasted large quantities of water and tolls were high, and they also meant that loads going upstream were restricted to a third or a quarter of the 35-40 tons of a downstream load. There were many later improvements to the navigation, though most of the current system comes from an 1866 Act of Parliament.

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34m-52_2400

In the twentieth century barges carried loads of 100 tons on the waterway and the main traffic was timber, carried upstream from the Surrey docks to a number of timber wharves, one of the larger of which was the Edmonton Wharf at the Lea Valley Trading Estate, which I think was operated by Hahn & Co Ltd, though I can find no further details.

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34l-16_2400

I made several visits to this large site and took pictures, and returned in later years when it had become a bus depot. Back in 1983 there was another timber yard on the opposite bank of the navigation, which I think was called Dornford Wharf, though the old street plan I used labels this area of the east bank with this name.

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34l-15_2400

In the Flickr album River Lea – Lea Navigation 1981-1992 I’ve captioned these images as being in Dornford Wharf, Towpath Rd, and I’ve also included a few more images which are simply slight variations on those show here – as well as many other images taken along the river.

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34m-61_2400

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34m-63_2400

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34m-66_2400

If these huge trunks had been brought here by the navigation they will have been here some time as commercial traffic ended a couple of years earlier in 1981. There didn’t appear to be any work being carried on in the timber yard when I took these pictures, but they were possibly made on a Sunday.

Timber yard, Towpath Road, Dorford Wharf, Edmonton, 1983 34m-51_2400

At the side of the yard close to the towpath I came across an area that had clearly been used fairly recently to cut up some wood on a rather smaller scale but which had produced a prolific amount of sawdust.

Although the Flickr album River Lea – Lea Navigation 1981-1992 only currently contains black and white pictures, I did also make some colour transparencies when I was photographing the Lea Valley. Three of them, including the image above, were my contribution to the show Roof Unit Foundations at [ space ] in Hackney in 2007.

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.