Click here for memories from Addressograph Multigraph
Click here for photos from the 1971 Carnival by Alan Bailey
Click here for memories and photos of early Warners End from Gail Clark
From: Margaret Baran (nee Simpson)
I have great memories of the Pavilion! My friends and I went to concerts there as young teenagers to see some of our favourite pop groups including Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Titch, The Isley Brothers and other current Top Ten Groups. At that time (the late 60's) the Pavilion was a major venue for pop groups and we would join the queue very early in the morning on the day that they went on sale to ensure that we got our tickets!
From: Lee-Anne Visagie
Hemel Hempstead
My father tells me that Bert Ablett won an award of merit for the design of the Water Gardens. Originally there were a lot more statues but unfortunately they were made of fibre glass and vandalised so had to be removed . One memorable statue was of a woman crouching and feeding the ducks. Does anyone have photographs of these statues?
Re Multi storey car park with mural opposite the Market In 1958, the design of the multi storey car park, opposite the market was the first assignment for Rex Stubbings when he joined Fuller Hall and Foulsham, architects and town planners (later based in 53 the Marlowes). The car park was the first free standing multi-storey car park in Great Britain. Previously there had only been car parks within buildings in London for car firms.
At that time the market had brightly coloured canopies and the first design was to echo the market colours by having the cars screened by vibrant coloured panels. Designed of reinforced concrete with a staircase onto the pavement so that people could walk up from the town street directly to their cars.
The original design had a canopy over the pavement. The distinctive mural was originally designed to reflect a scene of car headlights and tail lights at night time.
However, Chief Architect, Bert Ablett decided that he wanted more of a civic fascade so the car park frontage was redesigned to the current moulded concrete blocks and perimeter railings.
The artist Emmett was commissioned for the final mural design which makes the carpark a distinctive landmark. It shows Dacorum's history in cartoon like format with Henry the Eighth taking precedent in the centre.
A paper was written about the car park for the Institute of Civil Engineers as the design was the first of the scissor type multi storey. The architects gave lectures on the design in other towns such as Croydon and Sheffield At the time the cost of construction was c £120 per car and the cost of building was subsidised by incorporating seven shops underneath.
Today the cost of an average car park is nearer c £2,500 per car if not more! It is also interesting to note that car design was generally smaller in 1958 and the parking bay lines have been re drawn over the years.
From BOB GIBBONS in South Africa
HI FROM S.A!! GOING INTO YOUR WEB SITE AND SEEING YOU ARE CELEBRATING 60 YEARS OF NEW TOWN what i would like to see is the Market that my wife and i use to vist every Saturday in Marlows ,that was 33yrs ago and also at the back of Marlows was the Canal which was the home to many swans where we spent many an hour watching and feeding them.
AAAAHHHH THE GOOD OLD DAYS.I just hope Hemel is as good as it was 30 plus years ago regards BOB GIBBONS P.S I USED TO LIVE IN BENNETTS END
FROM HEMEL TODAY: Pelow are a couple of pictures for you taken in March 2007 (One thing, it wasn't the canal but the Water Gardens and the River Gade)
The market today with permanent covered stalls |
The Water Gardens. People still feed the ducks etc |
From: Gail Clark
Address: Wales
In 1955 we lived in Tooting S.W.London.Mum,Dad,my brother and I shared 2 rooms in my grandparents house.My parents were desperate to find their own home and everytime they applied for a flat or house in London and were unsuccessful my dad bought my mum a piece of secondhand Torquay Mottoware! We have boxes full of it!
Then one Sunday he said 'let's go and have a look at one of those new towns they're building'So- complete with packed lunch and primus stove we piled into our Austin 7 and dad took us to Hemel.
My grandmother was convinced she'd never see us again and said 'you be careful of those swedebashers'!!!
Well, after stopping to have a cup of tea (brewed on the trusty primus)and our picnic we arrived in Hemel.I can remember seeing horses in fields and being fascinated by them as the only horses I'd ever seen were in front of the milkmans wagon!
Dad drove to the Industrial Area and saw a sign on one of the factory gates that said 'Men Wanted-House With Job'. Dad rattled the gate and the watchman came out of his hut. He told us where to find the council housing office, it was open on Sundays!
Mum was close to tears when she was told not only could we have a brand new house but that she could choose the area and the plot! She then started to get a bit fussy and eventually chose a big corner plot that was to become 12,Myrtle Green,Warners End.
We drove down over the next few weeks and watched our house being built.
Mum would use the builders trestles and put a tablecloth over them and we would sit in the windowless livingroom for our lunch.
We moved in in the summer of 1956, I was 5 and my brother was 9.We spent a lot of time running up and down stairs 'pulling the chain' in our TWO lavatories, both of them indoors!
In London we lived backing onto Tooting Bec Asylum and due to regular 'escapes'always had to take my nan with us to use the outdoor lavatory at night!
My nan bought me liberty bodices with rubber buttons and some woolly combs complete with flap as she was sure I'd catch cold living 'in the sticks'.
The pathways still hadn't been finished when we arrived and the area was solid clay that stuck like glue to the soles of your shoes.I can remember getting stuck and not being able to walk as the clay had such a tight hold on my wellies, mum had to lift me out of them and then go back to fetch them.
None of our neighbours had moved in and my brother and I had great fun exploring the empty houses none of which were locked,he left me behind once and a workman found me crying my eyes out and took me home.He and my father were friends for many years.
There was also a plague of earwigs,they were everywhere and we had to shake our clothes every morning before we put them on.We were told that the new building had disturbed their nests,I don't know how true this was but that was the Councils' story! We went to Pixies' Hill School in the old army huts in Chaulden.
My mum was school secretary and when we moved up to Micklem School mum was secretary to the head Mr.Milne Postlethwaite there as well.
It was so cold at Pixies' Hill and the little bottles of milk used to freeze and had to be stood round the coal stoves in the middle of each hut to thaw.It tasted disgusting. I now live in Wales,my mum lives 4 miles from us and is now 86.
My dad died in 1981.My brother and his wife are retiring to Spain this year,their eldest son and his family are in Oz and their other son is moving away later this year.
For the first time in 50 years there won't be any Clarks in Hemel.Very sad. You may publish my name if this rambling is of any interest but not my address please.
From: Ruth Gosden, Hemel Hempstead
Does anybody remember the fact that we had 2 cinemas back in the 60's I remember one was the Luxor but unsure of the other. I remember saturday mornings at the flicks as kids and all we had to pay was 6d to get in, great fun. I also remember Woolworths having an old wooden floor where sales ladies served you from behind the counter, as they did in most of the shops back then. My mum use to walk us from Bennetts End to town every Saturday as it was wuicker than waiting for a bus.
From Hemeltoday:If you click here you'll find out more about those cinemas
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