Torpedo Tom Blower

In a continuing thread on Area 4 connections with fame and the famous Rachel from Radford Road sent in a great potted history of Torpedo Tom Blower, the Hyson Green lad who broke the world record in 1937 for the fastest time in which the English Channel was swum. His record breaking time was 13 hours and 29 minutes.

Tom was born in 1914 in Hyson Green. Aster attending Berridge Road School he worked as a factory hand for Players. Whilst at school he earned the nickname “Carthorse” for being such a slow swim sprinter. Tom’s training for his long distance swimming was the stretch of the Trent River by the Meadows area of the city.

Ten years after his Channel record Tom becomes the first man to swim the northern Irish Sea in a time of 15 hours, 26 minutes.  1948 and a year later, Tom becomes a member of that select club of swimmers who have sum the English Cannel in both directions.

As part of his preparation for this endurance swims Tom undertook a marathon 30 hour session at Victoria Baths in Sneinton where he swam 2,664 lengths.

In the 1930’s and 1940’s Torpedo Tom Blower was a well recognised sportsperson, as famous as Torvill and Dean. There are even articles about him in the American Time magazine. Today however he seems to be a forgotten Nottingham figure, there is a plaque at the John Carroll Leisure Centre in Radford but it’s in need of some renovation.

All of this exercise can’t have been good for Tom, he died as a result of a heart attack in 1955 aged just 41.

References:
Time Magazine Article
BBC Online Article
Spectator Article

Tagging from 1929

As part of an ongoing occasional series on area 4 tagging through the ages we present this fine example.

Boldly carved into a brick on the front of 47 Gregory Boulevard. This tag from 1929 reads

W. McC. 21
B. Gee. 16
1929

I am guessing that this pair of taggers may have been the builders who built the extension to the original Victorian building. Of course this is only a guess. A wag who saw this photo has already suggested that B. Gee is obviously one of the Gibb brothers pre-fame!

Alan

Hyson Green Library

I was chatting to George the other day about Hyson Green Library and how it was extended considerably some time back. Neither of us could see the join. This morning it looks like George has solved the conundrum. The photo below show the library from behind and above. The roof tiles clearly show a difference. If the new tiles are the extension then the work must have constituted a considerable expansion.

Photo credit : George the Quizmaster

Action of the Police and Special Courts with regard to the street disturbances in Nottingham during July 10th – 17th 1981

Below is an excerpt from a contemprary report on the 1981 Riots.

The National Council for Civil Liberties
Nottingham Branch

REPORT

Action of the Police and Special Courts with regard to the street disturbances in Nottingham during July 10th – 17th 1981

A CAUSE FOR CONCERN

The Context of the ‘Riots’

The Nottingham “Riots” as they were constantly referred to by the local Nottingham Evening Post, took place over the weekend of Friday 10th July to Sunday 12th July 1981.

The major battle between the Police and the ‘rioters’ took place in and around the Hyson Green Flats complex between 11-30pm on the Friday and 3-30pm on the Saturday. However, preliminary gathering of youths in the Clifton area occurred, apparently reacting to the rumour that youths from the Meadows area were coming into the Clifton area that evening. When they did not arrive the Clifton youths moved into the Hyson Green area together with youths from many areas of the city which resulted in them all joining together against the Police. Petrol-bombs and bricks were thrown and a large number of arrests were made. The following night (Saturday) there were further outbreaks along Alfreton Road and in the city centre and a gang of 20-30 youths ran through the Beeston Town Centre Shopping Precinct.

As a result of these outbreaks the Police arrested just over 100 people – youths, mainly between 16 to 25 years of age – 90 of whom came before the “Special Courts” between Monday 13th to Friday 17th July.

It is difficult to assess the degree to which these outbreaks were ‘organised’. A Chief Superintendent from Nottingham speaking at his Association Annual Meeting was said by the Nottingham Evening Post of the 25th September, to have spelt out in general terms the tactics of the Police employed. The Post also claimed that the cost of policing the riots came to £379,000. Apparently police kept an eye on troublemakers by deploying men equipped with powerful night binoculars on the roof of high-rise flats and monitored Citizens Band Radio wavelengths – “thought by the police to be the main medium of communication between some of those involved in the disorder”. (Evening Post 25.9.81). What is clear is that there was a good deal of tension evident during the weekend and the initial public reaction according to the Evening Post was one of outrage and disgust against the activities of the ‘rioters’ with a good deal of sympathy for the Police.

In this unusual and tense situation the Chief Clerk to the Magistrates responded to Police information that “a large number of extra cases would be presented” (Letter from the Clerk to the NCCL( National Council for Civil Liberties), 25th September 1981) by arranging for “additional courts”. A request from NCCL to the Clerk to the Justices asking for information about the way in which the ‘Special Courts’ were set up and dealt with defendants produced a statement from him claiming that they were only ‘Special’ in the sense that they were additional courts arranged by his staff because of the large number of extra cases. In view of the fact that all normal procedures were altered in these courts during the week, they were, by definition “Special” and not simply additional.

We feel that the matter of concern dealt with this report (both affecting Police behaviour and the workings of the court) can be particularly explained in terms of the strong sense that both the Police and Courts seemed to have had about the importance of, being seen to be ‘tough’ on rioters in order to give an example to others. This is illustrated in the comments made by an Inspector of Police at the beginning of proceedings in the first of the riot courts where he stated that”no one would control the streets of Nottingham except the Police” and that “the weekend was one of the blackest in the history of the City”. (Law Society report, page 2, para 8).

Given that only one person was charged with “incitement to riot” the reaction of the Authorities would seem to have been exaggerated. The consequences, – severe doubts about the fairness of the Magistrates Courts, and the concerns about both Police and the Courts expressed by the parents of those accused who were interviewed – must be seen as grave and damaging for the relationships between the community and the Police and the Courts.

Graham Greene Nottingham culture shock

I have to take serious issue with Alan Carter-Davies’ comment on Greene that “Greene did not have a happy time of it in Nottingham. ” Certainly he appears to have been relieved when his short stay in the City was over. However there are numerous mentions of Nottingham in his works, viz. Brighton Rock, A Gun for Sale, A Sort of Life, and I came across yet another in The Power and the Glory the other day. It is know that he planned a further “Nottingham” novel in the 1960’s and visited the city again.

In general he seems to have looked back at his time here as a culture shock – but a memorable and formative experience nonetheless; and we should not forget a very major event in his life took place in Nottingham – his conversion to Roman Catholicism at the hands of Father Trollope at the RC Cathedral on Derby Road!

I plan to set up a Nottingham Graham Greene Society with the objective of erecting a plaque at the top of Goodwin Street. Anyone interested in supporting us please contact me. Andrew Schlich

Link to the original item

Good point Andrew, I had not taken into account the cathartic period that Greene was going through.
If it any help I would certainly support the errection of a plaque at the top of Goodwin Street. Kind regards, Alan

A place to call our own

Many thanks to Antony T and Richard Shenton from The Media Archive for Central England for this link.

Link to short ATV News Clip about the demolition of Hyson Green flats

For a few weeks now I have been trying to work out what was on the ASDA site before the supermarket weaved their bulldozer magic. Part of me was running a romantic internal dialogue along the lines of multinational destroys community. The 1987 film that this link leads to blows away any such romantic notions.

How can anyone have thought that housing like this could have been in any way a good thing?

I am now on a mission to hear what it was like to live in the Hyson Green flats. I have heard rumbles about some pretty solid Blues Parties but as yet no one has popped pen to paper….

Enjoy the clip –

Link to short ATV News Clip about the demolition of Hyson Green flats

Alan

Skipping Rhymes

Many thanks to Moby of Laurie Avenue for sending this to us. She sourced it from an Evening Post Article dated 30th December 1996 by David McVay about children’s pavement rhymes. He was interviewing Reuben Carlisle and Dave Baldry, who worked with the Basford Bystander, a local History Magazine. Among the children’s rhymes:

Sheila Manners remembers a rhyme with a Radford or Basford bias:

Harry Ploppitt sells fish
Three halfpence a dish;
Don’t buy it, don’t buy it,
It stinks when you try it.

But the best one was submitted by T.W. Glover,Sandown Road, Toton:

My father is a sailor, he navigates the Leen
He has a wife in Radford – and two in Hyson Green
He takes exotic cargos to lots of foreign lands
And had an awful shipwreck
Upon the Lenton Sands.

 

DIY Archaeology

“My house, at the top of Forest Fields near Birkins Lace factory, has two pencil inscriptions ‘papered by C. Love July 31st/ and August 1st 1884’ written in copperplate writing in different rooms. I wonder if anyone else has uncovered evidence of the same Victorian graffiti artist cum painter and decorator, or whether he might have been an early Area 4 DIYer?”

Mike of Albany Road

I see that tagging is nothing new then, Mike!
Alan

Stop the Press!

This just in from Ralph of Sandon Street.
“HP sauce was invented at 49 Sandon Street, just over the border in New Basford (off Nottingham Road by the Royal Oak pub). My Sandon Street neighbour knew Mr Garton’s son, so  the location is identifiable in living memory. The house (and workshop) is for sale (April 2008 ) if anyone fancies a historic place in which to live – it definitely deserves a blue plaque!”

This is a personal connection to the birth of Wilson’s gravy. Many thanks Ralph for helping us out. – The other information below about the amounts paid and to whom are all correct as far as I know, it was sourced (pun intended) from HP’s website and Wikipedia with supporting evidence from the FT. – Alan

Happy 18th Birthday ASDA

Hyson Green’s ASDA Superstore was opened at 9am on 23rd April 1990 by the Lord Mayor, Councillor John Riley. The Mayor was presented with a cheque for £500 for his “pet charity”, the NSPCC.

(Source – Nottingham Evening Post 24th April 1990)

Does this mean that April 23rd (within Hyson Green) should stand for England, St. George and shopping? This could be quite apt really.
Alan