NW11 Golders Green, Hampstead Garden Suburb
Mr Van, the Dutch Twins and other local characters |
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My parents moved from North Square to Middleton Road in Golders Green in 1945 when I was less than a year old. They lived there for over 50 years. It was always a very quiet road as it did not lead anywhere, merely linking Finchley Rd with Rotherwick Road which itself opened into Finchley Road. Despite its quietness a surprising number of people knew of its existence because of Van’s School of Dancing. Mr Van taught ballroom dancing for many years in a studio in the basement of his house. He was assisted by his twin sisters who were small and dumpy and whom we nicknamed the Dutch Dolls. I always assumed that Mr Van was Dutch but whether that is true or not, I don’t know, nor did we ever know him well enough to find out what had brought him to Golders Green. We knew them all quite well by sight as they would walk past our house with their airedale dog several times a day. Many people learned their ballroom dancing there in the 1950s and 60s and possibly earlier. To augment the classes he ran a practice dance each Saturday evening which was a very proper affair. We would practice our waltzes, quicksteps and foxtrots as well as a very sedate cha cha cha, tango and samba. At half time we were refreshed with orange squash and a biscuit. |
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Almost opposite Mr Van’s, on the corner of Finchley Road was a small private school, I never knew any children who went there, but my recollection from occasionally seeing them in the playground is that they were small and had a green uniform. For a brief spell I was friends with the caretaker’s daughter and would go into the school when the pupils weren’t there. It was a completely different world from the Primary school in Hampstead Garden Suburb where I went. The classrooms were small and I dimly remember benches rather than desks. I also remember the headmistress who was an upright and stern looking spinster cycling to and from school with her corgi in the front basket. |
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Apart from Mr Van, the Dutch Dolls and their dog and the headmistress of the school, the only other people to go up and down the road regularly were the milkman (I wish I could remember when the horse drawn milk floats became electric vans, the Express dairy had stables in Hoop Lane), a very occasional rag and bone man also in a horse drawn cart and various other delivery men. I can still remember our Co-op laundry and dividend numbers as both our milk and laundry services were provided by the co-op. |
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We played out in the street totally unsupervised from quite a young age. I would gallop round the block being a composite Champion on his Wonder horse without, as far as I can remember, ever asking permission or telling anyone where I was going. It didn’t take long to go round once and I don’t ever remember being missed. I do sometimes wonder whether that period in the early 50s was the only time when children did play out in Middleton Road, I don’t think that there were ever as many children all of about the same age in the road again, Would children of middle class families living in Golders Green in the 1920s and 30s have been allowed to play out in the street? |
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Not only did we play out unsupervised in the street but we also travelled to and from school on our own from an early age. By the time I was seven (and I can’t remember when it first began) I would be taken across Finchley Road and put on a bus. I would get off in Temple Fortune and a policeman would see us across the road to school. Coming home there were no roads to cross and I along with many other children would make the return journey home on my own. With the 2 and the 13 buses and the 660 and 665 trolley buses there was never more than a few minutes to wait. |
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The shops in Golders Green in the 1950s provided almost everything. Two branches of Sainsbury's, where I remember we queued separately for cheese, meat, bacon etc, butchers, a Macfisheries, two branches of Boots, a Co-op selling general groceries, two hardware shops (one called Hardiments), a milliners, a haberdashers and a Scotch Wool shop, numerous shoe shops, and several estate agents. There was also a branch of Peter Robinson, several jewellers a china shop and several hairdressers (including one where the customers still sat in individual cubicles, it was dark and there was lots of ornately decorated gold painted woodwork). There was a glorious delicatessen called Appenrodt’s. The whole road was infused with the aroma of freshly roast and ground coffee from the coffee shop which was about half way down. A tall man in a grey overall would turn and shake the containers of coffee beans which he roasted over an array of gas burners. Weiss’s and Frank’s both had the most extravagant lingerie. At the far end of the shops in Golders Green Road was the public library and a branch of Woolworths. |
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