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Horsdean Park Recreation Ground, Patcham

Photo:Horsdean Park, Patcham, 1962

Horsdean Park, Patcham, 1962

Photo taken by Les Ashton, 1962

Revisiting my memories
By Les Ashton

This photo was taken in Horsdean Park Recreation Ground, Patcham in 1962.

I had last kicked a soccer ball around it in the summer of 1946; the colours were just as vivid, the grass smelt just the same (and so did the farm on the ridge).

Doesn't often work that way. Perhaps that's because Patcham is my 'Dreamtime Place'.

Sent to the website via the contribution form on 18-01-04
This page was added on 22/03/2006.

Comments:

Lots of people forget how rural Patcham really is, as the picture of the farm on the ridge shows. Now the by-pass runs through here. I remember taking my sledge to school one day in the early 60s so that we could go to Horsdean in our PE lesson and play in the snow!
By Gillian Coles (07/11/2005)
Yes, wasn't it a great place. Imagine now the hill opposite being covered in tarmac and parked cars.
By Brian Richards (04/12/2005)
Spent many happy hours playing here as a child during the Second World War, living adjacent in Vale Avenue for 20 years.
By Maurice Wyatt (12/01/2006)

Has anyone a photo of the old many windowed pavilion and shed once just to the right of the bushes in this picture or of the football pitch adjacent to this cricket field where The 30th BB (Patcham Methodist Church)regularly played Tuesday night cricket here as well as Boys Brigade Saturday league soccer? On the soccer pitch we played too an inter school cup match against Fawcet School (they came from opposite St Peter's Church in those days). We expected to win but I recall we lost 1-0 in about 1952 and our Patcham Senior School goalkeeper (who shall remain nameless!) decided to unnecessarily show off his athletic diving skills and pushed the ball into his own net!

By John Hancock (11/11/2006)

I remember doing a lot of my 'courting' (you called it that in my day) at Horsdean. It backed onto Braeside Avenue where my late husband lived. I had relations at Patcham Farm, next to Horsdean, where I was pushed in a pram (about 2-3 miles) when I was getting over whooping cough when I was a very young child to see the little lambs - 1940s.   I remember the alley from the Old School -'Legs Hill'.  Anybody else remember this as a very short cut? Muddy and overgrown, but fun.

By Christine Martin (25/05/2007)

I remember the park above around 1954. Mr Mann, the PE teacher from Patcham School used to make us all run out there, do a couple or more circuits and then all run back. Not much in the way of lesson planning or worry about children's safety on the roads in those days.

By Roy Grant (01/11/2007)

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