The Estate

The Estate

From 1966 to 1978 my parents and I lived in an old terraced house that had been converted in to two flats. We had the upstairs which consisted of 2 bedrooms a living room and a kitchen.

There was no bathroom and only an outside toilet. As a young boy I can remember having to knock on downstairs door to get them to put the light on in the toilet as the switch was in their kitchen.

It used to frighten the life out of me going into the dark garden at night especially after being chased by a huge mad rat one night!

My dad tried everything to get us on the housing list for a flat even accusing the council of looking after “foreigners” before Hackney born people!

This didn’t go down well with them and he was quickly tarnished as being a racist, he wasn’t really he was just disillusioned and felt let down.

Finally in 1978 when I was 12 the landlord decided to sell the house we lived in. As the people downstairs were there first they had the choice, however they did not want sitting tenants. So with luck on our side we were finally able to be rehoused.

At the end of our road was a large green full of football pitches called Mabley Green, which formed part of the famous Hackney marshes, on the other side of this green was Trowbridge estate Hackney wick.

 

Trowbridge estate was made up of 6 twenty floor tower blocks as well as houses and maisonettes. It was a sprawling estate with its own library, shopping area, pub and residents club.

We moved into 77 Northaird point right on the top floor! When we moved in it was like luxury indoor toilet and built in bath, I couldn’t believe it!

My parents both worked and they made the flat really nice new carpets decorated throughout new furniture they were proud to have a place they felt was their own.

With so many flats and houses on the estate came loads of kids, it didn’t take long for me to get to know everybody and to make friends. Most of us went to the same school or travelled on the same buses to the local schools. The main hangout was the local chip shop. The owner hated it loads of kids stood outside every day, he felt it intimidated people and stopped them going in! It probably did especially as we got older and bigger and become punks and skinheads!

Friday night was a good night out Hackney Speedway was just behind our flats and if you knew the right place and were fit enough to climb you were in for nothing!

It was great there was a burger man there and sweet shop. My mum and dad used to give me my entry money so I used that for my treats. The noise was incredible and if you sat on the bank as the bikes went around you would be showered with the grit from the track!

Just next to the speedway there was a brewery and they had stock all stacked up in the yard. It was behind a big high fence, but stupidly the fence was the chain link type. So you could see where everything was. We used to rob that place on a regular basis after the speedway crowd had gone! One of the days of a couple of Jamaican lads used to let us use his flat as a party flat on a Friday night, all we had to do was give him a bottle of  Rum and he was in his element. It was on these Fridays that I had my first taste of cannabis from a Bong! To be honest it wasn’t my thing it made me feel really ill so I kept away from it after that sticking to the bottles of pale ale instead.

Most days we would go to an adventure playground in Victoria Park. Sounds naff but in those days before health and safety went mad the swings mad were proper mental! The area was generally run by hippie types keen to please the inner city kids so we took right liberties getting them to make the rides higher and more dangerous!

It was a great hangout to be fair there was a paddling pool next to it and a café. During the summer (which we seemed to have back then) the paddling pool area would be really busy with families, but we used to just push unsuspecting people in as we rode past on our bikes!

Running through the estate was a road that went all the way through to Stratford, along this road between Hackney and Stratford there was a series of factories. I remember that on the bus as you travelled through you had different smells as you passed each factory. There was a perfume factory a bubble gum factory paper factory as well as many others.

One year the bubble gum factory caught fire and so they were chucking boxes and boxes of stock out into the street. We thought it was great we took down a pillow case each and filled them up with bubble gums!

Next to Mabley Green was Lesney’s the toy car makers, they used to pick up their workers using old London buses you know the Routemaster ones but all decorated up. Once one of the older lads from the estate stole one and drove it all around the area. He got chased and ended up driving it in to the river!

 

Running parallel with the main road to Hackney wick (the Eastway) there is a duel carriage way and up by Lesney’s was an overpass. Underneath this overpass was a large concrete area, this became a refuge for the traveller community at the time.

This was the days before “my big fat Gypsy wedding” and so there was no understanding or tolerance of “Gypo’s, Pickey’s Tinkers” as they were known. Racist feeling towards them was massive but having lived next to these particular ones at the time it was justified.

These Travellers would go around the local area clearing rubbish and so on bringing back to their camp and just dumping it literally from floor to as high as they could get it. Within days the smell would be unbelievable.

They would shit in a carrier bag in broad daylight and just throw it on the pile!

There was also fear amongst the elderly residents as the Travellers would go door to door selling their crap and asking to use facilities.

                                            

Inevitably the local kids and the local traveller kids would clash. To give them their due Travellers are fucking hard as nails. There was a kid who hung around with us whose parents had fled the war in Cyprus. He was a crazy fucker, he got in so much trouble his parents sent him back to Cyprus in the end. He even threatened to highjack a plane to bring him back, Mad!  Anyway he went to the shop for his mum and on his way back he was stopped by this traveller kid (looking to mug him). “what’s in the bag” the traveller enquired “just some potatoes and my mums £5 change” he replied.

“Give it here then” the traveller demanded however what he did not know was that in the bag was in fact an air pistol and not a fiver. So out it came and without hesitating he shot the traveller straight in the mush! At close range that fucker is gonna sting.

On another occasion there was a disco at the church hall (St Mary of Eton), the Travellers turned up and a fight ensued one of my mates took a full steel can (as they was back then) of Pepsi and smashed one poor kid right on the forehead.  Not side on but end on leaving the kid with a massive circle mark! Did the traveller give a fuck? Nope, all in a day’s scraping for him.

Of course my parents were oblivious to the sort of things I was getting up to back then. They both worked full time running a social club. When I went out to school in the mornings they were in bed, when I came home at night they were off to work the evening shift. We were like ships that crossed in the night.

My perceived innocence however came to a crashing halt one Monday morning just before I left for school when the Police came knocking.

My poor mum was in a state of shock being woken by two burley coppers. She was not impressed when I was carted off with her in tow!

On the Friday evening of the night before myself and a few of the other lads thought it would be a great adventure to break into the paper factory just behind our flats.

Why was this a good idea? Well to tell the truth it wasn’t it was a stupid idea, but as a 14 year old it seemed like a good idea at the time.

We had to climb up a high wall and onto some roof tops, following around we came to some roof windows and that was our way in.

Once inside it became apparent that a paper factory was not in fact awash with valuables!

The vending machines were the only viable money making opportunities. We were probably only in the factory for a matter of minutes but in that time we had set off a silent alarm.

Because we had entered through the roof the attending police were unable to spot us straight away and we were unaware that they were there.

In ignorance we made our way back to the estate. We stopped to talk to another group of friends and as we were leaving them a police car pulled up.

Now common sense would say blag it you’re not caught in the act just be cool. But one of my mates decided to make a run for it.

This was not the smartest move to be fair

a)     it implied guilt

b)     he had a bad leg from being run over and he could not run fast

The police chased us and for some unknown reason we headed towards Mabley Green, I ducked in to the bushes and hid where as my mate ran straight across the open field.

Once he got to the other side a police car was waiting for him! Under questioning he gave us all up and so to Monday mornings knock at the door.

We were all prosecuted for it at Highbury magistrate’s court, definitely not my proudest moment; a £10 fine was administered as well as a right royal rollicking from my dad, and an imprisonment in my room for a number of weeks.

 Eventually I moved more and more towards my football friends and travelling with Spurs, but that’s another blog story!

The tower blocks were knocked down in around 1984 replaced with low level flats and housing. We moved out of London 1984 just before they were demolished.

The whole area was redeveloped because last year London 2012 occurred changing the face of the area completely hopefully bringing much needed regeneration.