Living in the slums

[USUK 10]

One mans slum is another mans palace,our houses were eventually pulled down in the 70's

( Carwood Rd area ).I never saw them as slums ,there was a lot of pride in those homes,modern home owners could learn a lot from some of those people, how to live with what you've got not what you think you should have.

 

Well said Beezer. Ours was pulled down in the 70's also (Abbeydale area)

[hillsbro 32]

...I never saw them as slums, there was a lot of pride in those homes. Modern home owners could learn a lot from some of those people, how to live with what you've got, not what you think you should have.

You're absolutely right, beezerboy. The article brings out the community spirit of a post-war Sheffield community whose people were quite content with what they had, something which seems to have been gradually eroded over the years. Fortunately for the Low Road people most of them moved to council houses, flats etc. a bit further up the hill as the estate around Roscoe Bank, Deer Park Road etc. was being built in 1964 when the Low Road houses were demolished. And so these people remained in contact with each other. Some of them even had adjacent allotments in Rivelin Valley!

[soft ayperth 11]

Hi soft ayperth and bantycock - glad you enjoyed the article. The journalist who wrote it joined the Sheffield Forum and we did the interview by telephone. The house in Dykes Hall Road would have been fine if we could have secured the grant for a bathroom conversion. In fact we were stuck "in limbo" for so long that my dad said he wished he had paid the whole cost. In 1974-75 some houses further up the road were in a dangerous condition and had to be quickly demolished and the occupants rehoused. The council then looked at houses nearby with a critical eye. Ours was in good structural condition but the three lowest houses in the row of six were not - so the whole row had to be demolished. Here are views of the front and the back of our house. It was such a shame when it had to come down.

 

But as they say, it's an ill wind... And by buying No 29 in 1978 I had my foot on the housing ladder. And after dad died in 1984 I bought a bungalow in Wadsley for my mum and me. Mrs hillsbro and I still have it as a "holiday home" - but that, as they say, is another story!

 

The old row house looks cozy with the flowers in the windows. Bungalow looks very nice!

[euclid 10]

Anyone who is reading this thread and hasn't yet read "Weerz mi Dad" by the late Fred Pass should....:D

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Weerz-dad-collection-autobiographical-childhood/dp/1901587177

Edited February 14, 2016 by euclid

[brian1941 11]

I came from Grimesthorpe sheffield, i love the old house one bedroom and attic

with one dowstairs room and slop kitchen. We used the tin bath in the kitchen and

empty the water down the outside grate in the back yard, loverly old stories.

[ALAN 58 10]

I lived at No.8 Cricket inn road , opposite the Durham Ox pub up until the age of nine. a real slum.Its the middle one in the photograph. Cannot beleive that was my bedroom above the kitchen. ihttp://www.picturesheffield.com/frontend.php?keywords=Ref_No_increment;EQUALS;s22654&pos=28&action=zoom&id=25118

[darylslinn 10]

We lived in a two up two down house on Aizlewood Road until 1979, with the toilet at the top of the yard and a tin bath that resided at the top of the cellar steps.

No central heating but a gas fire and gas geyser in the kitchen..... needless to say moving from there to a new build at Intake was like moving from a cardboard box into Buckingham Palace.

The thing I did miss was the people who lived in the other five houses in that yard, we all knew each other and noticed whether anyone was missing or not been seen around.

We were lucky I suppose, people have lived in worse.

[carbrook lad 10]

grown up in a back to back in carbrook,Sheffield and the houses did have lavs outside but the house where not as bad as the photos,the people who lived in them looked after them kept them clean and would still be in them if they could have been mondernised,but the council wanted the land to build offices and shopping parks on the photos seem to be taken when, they started to knock them down,remember going down the cliff in the seventies and it did look run down,and not like i remember it.

 

hi nomoney grow up on carltonville rd from 1939/1968 houses were good kept clean great people and community spirt look after neighbour good shopping area 4 picture houses live entertainment plus 28 pubs from weedon st to stanforth rd plus skating rink what a great place to grow up move my parents to Greenland rd but never the same still have a great love for the eastend and still think Sheffield is gods country

[ukdobby 224]

I lived at No.8 Cricket inn road , opposite the Durham Ox pub up until the age of nine. a real slum.Its the middle one in the photograph. Cannot beleive that was my bedroom above the kitchen. ihttp://www.picturesheffield.com/frontend.php?keywords=Ref_No_increment;EQUALS;s22654&pos=28&action=zoom&id=25118

 

Was that anywhere near Hyde Park flats,my best mate in the 70s lived in a small road of terrace houses bang across from the flats.

[bantycock 10]

hi nomoney grow up on carltonville rd from 1939/1968 houses were good kept clean great people and community spirt look after neighbour good shopping area 4 picture houses live entertainment plus 28 pubs from weedon st to stanforth rd plus skating rink what a great place to grow up move my parents to Greenland rd but never the same still have a great love for the eastend and still think Sheffield is gods country

 

It was known locally that Grimesthorpe was gods little acre but laterley looks like the devil got the upper hand ....

[willybite 10]

An article (in the form of an interview arranged via the Forum in 2010) gives a glimpse of Sheffield life in poor-quality housing - here it is: http://www.24dash.com/news/housing/2010-03-09-reform-and-revolution-3-1950s-slum-clearance. The worst part was having to go down two flights of stairs and across the yard to the loo in the depths of winter. I'm the littlest one in the 1951 photo!

 

hiya i lived on bath st in the 40/50/61 then i got married, i remember a lot of how people lived in the old days,like every friday was the cleaning day inside and outside like, out side the front of the house had paving stones and still recall the way the family would wash the front and donkey stone the step and the flag that held the bin,the outside lav also had the same clean, also in the summer the pealing and scraping of potato's and shelling peas sat at a stool outside, these houses were a room,bedroom and the attic.

[Janet Olsen 10]

Brilliant read