Social Media…Does It Come With Benefits?
People often crack on about social media and how it's destroying the art of conversation, mutterings of dire warnings about its use for any manner of nefarious reasons. Well, I for one love it, not least because you can have interaction with literally hundreds of people that you might never come across in 'real life.' Such was the case this week. Enjoying A general online natter with someone on one of our Facebook pages and up popped an old photo of the Radipole gardens playing fields! (Many thanks to Alan Appleby who gave me permission to post it on here.) To say that I've been searching for something like...
The Creation; Four Men and a Floating Tin Shack
Four Men and a Floating Tin Shack Now you might well wonder what on earth the grainy old photo of four men and a floating tin shack has to do with our beautiful park and gardens. Let me explain....
The Ground Beneath your Very Feet…
As a continuation of the history of Radipole park and gardens, here's a couple more photos from the 1930's showing their construction. Pictured below is the partly infilled, swampy land, and the original, very much shorter, Alexander Bridge, with Hanover Road running off into the distance and Lyndhurst Terrace facing the the tracks. Most of the garden's were formed with the dredging of Weymouth's estuary floor, redeposited via pump to infill the ground. Only problem was, it wasn’t filling it quite quick enough. The solution? It also became the town’s tip. Unfortunately, those frequent dumpings of debris brought with them a certain noxious aroma! Definitely not one that local residents...
Radipole Park under Construction…1920’s-1930’s.
Radipole park and gardens is probably one of the 'newer' recreational areas in Weymouth. It was constructed between the two World Wars, at a time when when the country was suffering from economic depression and the accompanying high unemployment. The government of the day had set out loans to those councils that wanted to avail themselves of them to complete public works at very favourable rates. Weymouth grasped this opportunity with both hands and set to expanding it's land. A problem that had thwarted the town for centuries, because Weymouth, or Melcombe Regis of old, was basically built out on a sand spit. Surrounded by the sea on one...
Childhood memories of Radipole playpark
To many people of a certain age this insignificant low wall will bring back many happy and fun-filled memories. For those NOT of a certain age you may wonder what the dickens I'm on about. Let me explain...
Radipole Lake before Radipole Park
I love this old image in so many ways. It is a snapshot of where I grew up in Hanover Road, living virtually next to the original Alexander Bridge shown here. But more importantly, it shows just how extensive Radipole Lake ( the Backwater) was until Radipole Park Drive was built in the 1920's and the land between the new road and railway lines was infilled for Radipole park and gardens in the 1930's. You can't see it in the top image, but on the lake side of the railways lines stood the Western esplanade, created for Victorian nannies to walk their delicate charges along when the...
What did the park look like many moons ago?
Basically, Radipole park looked like this...
Bygone images of Radipole Park
Anyone who knows me also know I have a weakness for collecting old images of my home town. Amongst my somewhat extensive collection of old postcards and guide books are a few of Radipole gardens which I thought might be great to share on here. Goodness only knows why they called them New Melcombe Regis Gardens, presumably because they continued on in a manner from the old new Melcombe regis gardens. Might jog a few memories? Certainly do for me because these were my childhood stomping grounds....