past and present
Memories
Northfield Lane
I was born in 1956 and lived at 16 Northfield Lane until I married in 1974, my parents lived there until 1990.
With reference to your story about Pear Tree Cottage. The shoe mender was Mr Chapman and his shop always smelled of leather and he used to have shoes all over the back tied together, I can remember being sent there with shoes by my mother. Chapman's, originally Williams fish and chip shop, is just showing on the picture below, to the left of Foer's farm.
I remember all the cottages and Pear Tree being last. At Foers farm the front of the farmhouse was used as a Bank, opposite the crossroads, where I can remember going with my grandmother.
Does anyone remember Wopo, he used to always be at Foer's farm and sat on the wall. He used to break in horses at the back of Foer's farm.
The crossing in front of the farm on the way to school had a crossing lady, Mrs Green, who lived at no. 12 Northfield Lane and was well known because she was crippled on one foot (from being dropped as a baby)and she was my great aunt. She had four children, two of the boys Stephen and John went to Cambridge and Oxford.
I remember also, No 8 Northfield Lane which was Westwood's who had a wood yard and shop which was ironmongery/household/sweet shop.
I can still see in my mind the view from my bedroom window when I was three before the houses were built on the Cherry Tree estate, I could see Foer's farm fields swaying like a sea of waves with various crops and at night/early morning you could hear the pit siren.
Where Northfield Lane school is today, Pashley's kept their cows(that's the farm house on the right looking towards Foer's farm)and the cows used to get out and sometimes come onto our front garden and mother was get very mad and we would either tell Philip Pashley or chase them back down Northfield Lane to their field opposite the cricket ground.
I had a wonderful childhood and you had to know Wickersley as it was then. There was no houses after no. 22 Northfield Lane only fields and only fields as far as Silverwood Colliery - can that be imaged today.
Told by D. Wood, March 2008
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