computedshorty

Have you pets that enjoy each others company? Our cat now lies on the Garden swing watching the wild birds.

The modles were due to Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins possibly due to Derby's connections. Hawkins was appointed assistant superintendent of the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London. The following year (1852), he was appointed by the Crystal Palace company to create 33 life-size concrete models of extinct dinosaurs to be placed in the south London park to which the great glass exhibition hall was to be relocated. In this work, which took some three years, he collaborated with Sir Richard Owen and other leading scientific figures of the time Owen estimated the size and overall shape of the animals, leaving Hawkins to sculpt models according to Owen's directions. Although it is often claimed that a dinner was held inside the Iguanodon, in fact the dinner was held inside the mold that was used to make the large sculpture. Nonetheless, the dinner party, hosted by Owen on 31 December 1853, garnered attention in the press. Some of the sculptures are still on display at Sydenham Crystal Palace Park.

Sir Joseph Paxton was an English gardener and architect, born on 3rd August 1803. He was best known for designing The Crystal Palace in London. He was the seventh son of a farming family, born in Milton Bryan, Bedfordshire. He became a garden boy at the age of 15 for Sir Gregory Osborne-Turner at Battlesden Park, near Woburn. He enroled at the Horticultural Society's Chiswick Gardens in 1823, and spent much time in the grounds of nearby Chiswick House, owned by the 6th Duke of Devonshire. The Duke befriended the young Paxton and became impressed with his skills and enthusiasm, later offering the 23 year old the position of Head Gardener at the family's seat, Chatsworth House in Derbyshire. It was here that he met and married his wife, the housekeeper's niece, Sarah Brown. Whilst at Chatsworth Gardens, he built enormous fountains as well as an arboretum, a 300ft conservatory and a model village. Paxton secured a cutting from Kew Gardens of a Victoria Regia Lily from South America and designed a heated pool that enabled him to breed the lily to an enormous size. He was forced to rehouse the lily in its own glasshouse, the Victoria Regis House, the design of which was based on the lily's own structure. This went on to form the design basis for the Crystal Palace. The palace was a cast iron and glass building originally erected in Hyde Park to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. It was 1,848 feet long, 408 feet wide and 108 feet high and required 4,500 tons of iron, 60,000 cubic feet of timber and needed over 293,000 panes of glass. After the exhibition Paxton was employed by the Crystal Palace Company to move it to Sydenham in South London where it stood until it burned down in 1936. Although he remained Head Gardener at Chatsworth, Paxton undertook other projects such as the Crystal Palace, as well as being a director of the Midland Railway. He worked on many grand public parks and various country houses in Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and even in Paris, France. He later became a Liberal MP for Coventry from 1854 until his death in 1865. He published various botanical and horticultural magazines and books and suggested several improvements for the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. He died on 8th June 1865 in Sydenham, London.

Saucy cards

Some of the Pre Historic Monsters, I remember getting into a hole in the under body of the Dragon there was a brazier to be lighted and show smoke coming from its mouth.

Posters about child evacuations

A few more pictures of the fire.

Three to gve you a laugh.

During the war large hoardings mesuring up to thirty feet by twenty feet showed War Posters, these were pasted and positioned as wall paper is done, the only difference being that the hoarding was pasted by using a very long brush on a pole, the lenght of paper then lifted on the paste brush and slid into place and the next peices added. One of the most remembered boards was in a space that was between houses where the Police Station now stands on Lordship Lane. The Squander Bug became a favourit with the kids.

Air Raid Shelters were built in the streets like these brick ones. Those homes localy would take bedding to sleep on and blankets to keep warm no heating and very little lighting inside, in a corner stood a dust bin that served as a toilet, with just a sack hung for privicy, but the smell was over powering, and the sounds could not be stiffled. Underground Shelters were dug under Peckham Rye facing the Kings Arms Pub, later the area was tatmacked over to stop rain penitration into the two shelters below. The Morrison shelter as seen was put in a room and it was just big enough for two, these were not mucch use as a bomb dropping nearby would blow out the window frame and the glass and debris entered the wire sides of the shelter, these were heavy and often the floor gave way.

Not very happy times even if there was no Air Raid, those bombs that had not landed and exploded could go off at any timer.

Remember going to the Oval or the Elephant & Castle to sleep on the Underground rails? and platform, not realy a good place to go as it was nearer to central London. Boarding schools made the children sleep in the crypt under the church. And now I think my matress is hard.

These girls were cheeky, are the now?

There was and still is a second Crystal Palace Station Called crystal Palace High Level, strange name because it is actually lower than Crystal Palace Low level and in fact passes underneath the Crystal Palace and the other station. The station is just to the right of third picture down the hill, the other station is shown.

We had to get onto buses and trams where the glass windows were covered in Glued net curtain to save a passenger getting cut by flying glass, there was a small section left clear but this soon got browned by the tobaco smoke on the top deck. Imagine being inside most of the light bulbs had been removed to comply with the Black out, so you had to feel your way to a seat, once there unless you were in the seat near the window you could not see where the tram had reached, also outside it was pitch black. The bottom part of trees and lamp posts were painted white in stripes and the vehicles had shaded headlights and the front and back had to be painted white on the bumpers and side running boards, this did alow a slow moving bus to see a little bit, but trams if some thing suddenly showed if front the driver standing at the controls could not avoid it as it was guided by its rails.The tram that got blasted in Lordship Lane near Shawbury Road had all its Glass blown out.

A scaffold was put up to erect the pal;ace but it collasped, so they built it again. then the hall was filled with exhibits

Just a fewc more

Many of us got evacuated alone, your mother was left at the curb as the bus took you to the railway station, with a lable tied to your coat with your name and address on it. No body knew where we would be going, when we reached our destination we were hearded into a church hall, and mothers came to choose a child to take home to look after, there were three of us and nobdy wanted or could take three, eventually the baby twins were taken away to a village called Blunderstone, I got no offers so as every one else had gone the WVS lady took me home, and I stayed with her on a farm but in another village so I could not go to see my brother & sister, who I had been sent to look after. There was a son of the farmers who I shared a room with, we got on fine but I worried how our twinns were getting on. Mother came to see us and because the twinns were sitting on the well top wall she feared they would fall in, so we got brought home after six weeks

Did you have to wear a gas maskin class it misted up and you wanted to take it off. Our teacher put your name on the board if you took it off, and said, shall I tell your mum? I had to wear the one in first picture it had a mickey mouse nose. The second picture shows the baby gas mask the baby had to tied inside withb bjust the legs hanging out, we had two for the twins, mum and myself had to use the pump all the time the were inside, I dont know what would have happened if I was at school. The children were quite under control of the teacher.

A few Pictures of those in your older family who would have endured these times. The dreaded Anderson Shelter out in the back garden no lighting or heating, just cramped with those of the faamily who could get in.

This is the Very large Railway Station Facing Crystal Palace The passagewa from the station under the road into Crystal Palace

The Postman's been

A rare view of these cards

Indeed no one after sixty-five years precisely knows why and how the Crystal Palace was set on fire. On November 30, 1936 at six in the evening, the manager of the Palace, Henry Buckland, noticed a red glow ablaze in a staff lavatory. He called firemen and workmen to extinguish the blaze and went on with his duties. Within five minutes, the fire had swept across the Palace, which eventually then was evacuated. Over half of London???s entire fire brigade eventually arrived with 381 firemen and 89 engines, but the blaze was too fierce. Stories of arson abounded because of the large amounts of flammable material the gigantic structure contained, but the true cause may have been a terrible accident (British Path??). The Last picture was of the Crystal Palace that was showing it in Hyde Park London. Notice the absence of towers.

Three old pictures