NOTES ON
1959 - Life around Maidstone
http://comp.uark.edu/~dsears/photos/Eileen59
Scenes in our back garden at 12 Hart Street and Mote Park.
The awnings feature in many of these pictures. They dominated the back garden but no one ever seemed to mind. In fact, I think Mum and Dad liked the privacy they provided. The railway set was a Christmas present and we often played with it. Malcolm and I were given an identical set but to avoid later arguments Mum touched a red paint brush on each piece belonging to me. I still have the train set in a suitcase in the attic.
Aunty Win and her family lived in the Council house that her parents had previously occupied on Shepway Estate. This was near to Mote Park – a huge municipal park close to Maidstone Town center – and we would sometimes meet Aunty Win and go to the park for a picnic. This time we also met up with one of Mum’s other sisters and her family. They also lived on Shepway.
In the fifties we had no color photography, so we bought kits at Woolworth’s that we could use to colour black and white photographs by hand. Artists could do this to good effect, and I have several hand-tinted prints of my parents, but my efforts at age 11 we not successful.