I was about 3 or 4 when the road was hard surfaced – I can remember playing in the excavations made for the drains, and getting hauled out by one of the construction crew when they turned up for work in the morning. In the picture you can see why the road was hard surfaced! It is signed on the back by my mother, with our address, so I assume it was sent to BUDC as proof of why the work was wanted by residents. In the photo you are looking across Kents Hill Road in the direction of Southview Road, so left is ‘downhill’ to Hopes Green and right is up towards the London Road / A13.
Mum once told me that the year I was born, at home, early in 1960, that my father had to walk up Kents Hill Road in the mud, to fetch the anaesthetic gas machine from the clinic on the A13, as his car could not cope with the mud.
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The house with the double roof is no 139, named Glen Mead. I moved there with my parents in 1960, when Kents Hill Road was unmade, and they left in about 1982. Glen Meade was the name of a boy in my class In Benfleet County Primary School, which I always thought very funny Mrs Skeggs lived next door but one and said it had been a farmhouse. She used to play tennis on their court before WW2.
My aunt lived at Son Alegre, Oakfield Road, in 1949, was wondering if you have any information, I have very faint memories of visiting as a child.
This house is listed on our page of house names, which cross references names to house numbers. (Editor)
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