The Greenwich Phantom

Dull Demolition

2010-03-11T08:41:00.001Z

Bad news to anyone expecting a Greenwich Hospital Tower-style big-bang with the concrete Syrol towers on the peninsula. They're now going to use a tedious method
with no explosives at all but some 'long reach unit' which literally nibbles the concrete structures from the top down.

To say this will be duller than watching paint dry wouldn't be true because you can at least watch paint dry.

Because they're not blowing it all up, there is no reason to delay the closure of the riverside path for TWELVE WEEKS from Monday 15th March while they creep-down the silos in secret. Much of it's already been closed down for so long already that it's a complete yawn for anyone who enjoys the Thames Path, but 12 weeks is one long time. Bad luck to anyone who's planning on doing the whole of the Path from Thames Head to the Barrier - well, they'll get so far and then have to start all over again at a later date...

Window Cleaners

2010-03-10T08:58:00.004Z

Okay - try as I may I can't get Blogger to upload pictures this morning so the curious thing I had for you will have to wait until it starts behaving.

In the meanwhile, Kirstie, who lives on Trafalgar Road, is looking for a reliable window cleaner. I've been regaling her with stories about the scam-merchants who knock on the door, take your cash and clear off, but can't actually come up with any names of the Real McCoy.

Any ideas?

The Quiet Meridian

2010-03-09T08:12:00.006Z

There's been a lot of hoo-ha about the Meridian recently (its 125th anniversary was last year). And if you go to the Observatory on any day of the year you'll find hoards of tourists queuing up to straddle the shiny line representing the imaginary delineation between East and West so their mates can take a picture of them.

I have never seen anyone having their photo taken straddling this part of the Meridian line, yet in many ways it's just as charming as the 'big one' and with some really curious stuff to be had in the background...

I don't recall these little plaque/paving/stud markings being created; I'm guessing the millennium - but so much was happening that year, it's impossible to remember everything. Like much that's in Park Vista, not least the Plume of Feathers (or the 'Plumbe' of Feathers as described in the temporary road sign during the Trafalgar Road works) it's 'our' little corner, protected from the bulk of tourists.

While you're there, don't miss the only Tudor building above ground in Greenwich, now part of the vicarage - the wall was specially cut-out by a Victorian vicar so that people could see the plaque on the old conduit head. It's worth seeking out the other plaques and decorations in Park Vista for a bit of fun on the way to the Plume for your Sunday lunch...

Furry Green Velvet Steps

2010-03-08T08:29:00.002Z

Something I love about Greenwich Beach is that although virtually no one does go down onto it (it's ridiculously under-used...) everybody can go down onto it. The steps are open and available (as they are at various places along the Thames in the city. Many public-spirited people have discovered them over the past week on the big spring tide cleaning project, but they are open all the time.)

I just love these steps - at low tide they're great for sitting on and enjoying of a Summer's day; at high tide, they're gently lapped by the river.

But I was walking past yesterday and noticed that the winter weather's had quite an impact on them - they're suddenly almost furry with seaweed. A bright green velvet pile, they're beautiful to look at - but mighty slippery.

The worst thing that could happen would be for the Health and Safety police to close it off rather than just give them a clean, so I'm almost hesitant to suggest that, pretty as they are at the moment, they're a mite slippery too. I'm not really sure who's responsible for the upkeep of the steps but they could do with a good scrub. In the meanwhile, take care if you're fancying a spot of beach combing.

Folks - don't you think we should start thinking about interesting things to do with Greenwich Beach this summer? Deckchairs and 99s, anyone?

Caravan Club

2010-03-05T14:02:00.005Z

This, claims VisitLondon, is the world's smallest pop-up hotel (as opposed to the world's smallest hotel, which, astonishingly, is not in London, but the Bavarian town of Amberg).

Here you can see it in all its airstreamy glory at Covent Garden, on its tour around the capital; its frankly superfluous excuse being to remind tourists that you're never more than a five minute walk from 20 top London attractions.

I am assuming that they don't mean this literally (in my case the 20 top attractions include Morley's Chicken, several dead stores, King William IV pub, KFC, two charity shops, Tescos and the Yummy Yummy Chinese takeaway) - or that they don't count Greenwich as London (right 'n all) but nevertheless, it IS coming to our neck of the woods and YOU have the opportunity to win a night's stay in all its shiny luxury.

Just imagine getting out of your swanky double bed, gliding straight into the en-suite shower whilst watching your flat screen TV and listening to groovy sounds on the stereo, before stepping into the morning glory of the Old Royal Naval College...

And why not, I guess? Who ever actually stays as a hotel guest in their own town?

Not for me this one - caravans give me the willies - but if you fancy being a tourist in your own town on the 19th March, register here, before March 7th...

Five Foot Walk

2010-03-05T08:25:00.004Z

This has to be one of the first examples of a pre-Section 106 forcing of institutions or companies to make provision of access to all, and, in many ways set a precedent that continues with the Thames Path (albeit shakily sometimes, with some of the large developments quietly just locking the gates of some parts when the initial fuss has died down. Must do something about that...)

When Christopher Wren designed Greenwich Hospital, finishing the development at the shoreside seemed like a great idea to improve security around the area, but the townsfolk didn't share his opinion. They used that way all the time and they weren't happy having any of their routes closed off to them. Hell - even the Queen had had to build her palace with a bridge going over the road a little further south. The people weren't going to let this valuable communications corridor stop them getting to places.

The authorities can't have been happy about it. It meant extra work, extra cost and the loss of land. What was worse, whenever the sovereign arrived, there'd be hobbledy-hoi loitering around the King's Steps.

I often find myself wondering what kind of pressure the people must have put on the Navy to get what they wanted - I mean in those days developers were no more happy to listen to locals than they are now. Whatever it was I'd like a piece of it now. They succeeded, albeit by a squeak.

The authorities gave in in 1731, creating an embankment exactly wide enough to walk down, and nothing else. A little lane, five feet wide, beach one side, the iron railings of the ORNC the other, that in the summer, tourists still shuffle down towards the Trafalgar Tavern, though passage is much easier now that cyclists are redirected through the ORNC (my favourite bit of Greenwich for cycling, smooth and open - and yet I still see idiots crashing their way through the Five Foot Walk on bikes. What gives?)

It's not very long - just skirting round the ORNC, but it has a real charm, with a great view both sides of it, lovely old railings and weathered stone slab paving. Fabulous worn steps still allow you to get onto Greenwich Beach, though not many people go there these days. Shame, really.

It widens out at each end - east, where of a warm summer's evening people spill out from the Trafalgar pub to enjoy a pint, as in Benedict's picture above, or west, sit by Bellot's Obelisk with a M&S sandwich. It tends to get flooded if there's rain at Spring Tide (Sarah captured this at an Autumn one). Happily as I look out of the window it's sunny just now. Phew.

Act In Haste...

2010-03-04T10:08:00.001Z

Folks - I just emptied my Spam folder - and, in that second before it actually dies forever, I noticed that one of the mails wasn't spam. If you sent me something this morning and I haven't replied, do email me again - it might just have been your missive I accidentally tipped in the trash.

The Old Bottle Shop

2010-03-04T08:48:00.003Z

Hands up who remembers the Village Market? It's not a year yet since the market closed, and yet it seems like forever ago. The site sits forlornly waiting for anything to happen while the traders have been scattered to the four winds.

The Old Bottle Shop lady made a stab at keeping going - from that secretive little upstairs warehouse marked only by a giant plastic geisha (whatever happened to her?) - to what some consider to be even more secretive Trafalgar Road - one of the many, many many empty shops along a sad-sack street that desperately needs a revamp.

She certainly shared the space with some oddities. Whenever I went by there was something new jostling with the assortment of vintage glassware - ladies' knickers, grow-bags, saucy stockings. But it's been closed for some time now.

Adrian was curious, and the next time he saw her, asked her what was going on. It's a sad story. He says "Apparently, she has been evicted by the landlord and her stock seized by the bailiffs. And sure enough, Saturday's catalogue at the Greenwich Auction was full of beautiful old bottles of all shapes, sizes and hues - a life's work of collecting under the hammer. "

Adrian tells me she has still has some stock in a small space in the basement of the Junk Shop (where several Village Market refugees seem to have established themselves) and was talking also about doing more car boot sales, etc. but she won't be taking on another shop.

Perhaps it was inevitable. Tourists just don't get down as far as Trafalgar Road - and let's face it, why should they? It's just a bog-standard, local street full of takeaways and a few decent shops, but with a constant flow of heavy goods traffic and narrow pavements that don't invite browsing. The shops are tiny - and would be perfect as cutesy little gift stores (I wish The Home Front every good thing, btw - a lovely shop, and a brave move) but anyone stopping to look in a window would hold up the entire street.

The East Greenwich Traders Association are keen to make Trafalgar Road a 'cultural corridor' for the Olympics. I guess if nobody's allowed to cars during the games, they could spill out onto the road, but personally, I think they have an uphill struggle ahead. Any ideas for how Trafalgar Road could be made - well - a bit nicer than it is?

Tudor Judo

2010-03-03T08:31:00.004Z

A couple of people have been asking me recently if I know any quirky stuff about Shooters Hill. To be honest, it's not my manor, but I always keep an eye out, and yesterday, whilst looking for something totally different, I found this tiny snippet.

Pretty much everything I read about the area tends to be about people travelling through it - it was the main road to Dover (immortalised in the opening of A Tale of Two Cities, as the Dover mail coach lumbers over the hill.) It often turns up as a notorious haunt of highwaymen and footpads, but in the past I've really only read about 18th and 19th Century villains.

But yesterday, whilst looking up the history of Britain's penal system (it's a long story) I found a strange little (uncredited) paragraph that describes a much earlier attack - and one where some weird sort of martial art seems to have been applied for the purpose of relieving an Elizabethan gentleman of his cash...

"Faith, I have had a foolish, odd mischance that angers me. Coming over Shooter's Hill, there came a fellow to me like a sailor and asked me for money. Whilst I stayed my horse to draw out my purse, he takes advantage of a little bank and leaps behind me, whips my horse away and - with a sudden jerk, I know not how - threw me at least three yards out of my saddle. I never was so robbed in all my life."

Sadly I know no more about the incident - the book in question does not tell us where the quote comes from and after that just goes on to talk about 'eight idle wandering poor' who stole a cartload of cheese, which, if there was ever a woodcut of the event, would just invite a caption competition.

But the idea of some weird technique that the 'sailor' used is curious. Perhaps a move he picked up on his travels? Who knows...

Inside Greenwich Power Station

2010-03-02T08:21:00.003Z

Something a bit special for all you Secret Greenwich fans today, folks. I was absolutely delighted to be contacted yesterday by Peter, who had read about our futile attempts to get inside Greenwich Power Station, our speculations about what might be inside that giant hall - and my Phantom fantasies about the secretive turret that surely must at least contain a Mrs Rochester-style lunatic from a Gothic romance...

Peter tells me "About a year ago now I had the privilege of having what may have been the last tour of the power station before health and safety intervened and put so many barriers in the way of said tours that they may never happen again. A group of us were given a short presentation of the history of the Power Station and got the grand tour that followed, with access to all those little glory holes you never normally see when on a guided tour."

Peter took some photos while he was there, and thought we'd like to see them. He apologises for the quality; the light levels were low, but IMHO he has nothing to worry about - for me, who has never seen any pictures of the interior, it's a revelation to see something so beautiful on our very doorstep, and yet completely impossible to view unless you actually work there.

I mean - just look at this wonderful high ceiling, with the giant, vertigo-inducing gantry spanning it. Presumably the original turbines would have taken up more room than the present ones. "Big rooms of empty space," admits Peter, "a small staff and 7 gas powered Rolls Royce jet engines to run the turbines."

A lot of people think that the power station isn't actually used any more. That's not true - but it's not permanently switched on. "The site only gets run up occasionally to test the jet engines that provide instant power when needed and even more occasionally to provide emergency backup power for the Underground."

Nevertheless, it still requires staff and sadly not, as I've often liked to imagine, Oompa-Loompas. "The site is manned by relatively few people that actually live (some of them) many hours drive away," says Peter. "When they are off-shift they live and sleep in barracks on site...so in an emergency there's often more than just the shift on duty available."

He says that a lot of overdue maintenance is done, as a labour of love, off-shift, as a way to pass the time in the barracks, though he also saw an old Jaguar car resting up under tarpaulins the restoration project of one of the site engineers...sadly there are no pictures.

As a nod to security issues, Peter hasn't included any pictures of the control rooms, but he reckons "really, there was only one thing of interest and that was a beautiful cast iron bracket off a column and supporting a beam above, lovely curves on the webbing of the bracket – other than that it's just grey boxes lights and dials."

But what of that secretive turret, perched, somewhat pointlessly on the south-east edge of the site? Sadly we still don't have an answer. Peter tells me that the cottage (the station manager's house)has been abandoned for years - and someone's lost the key to the tower.

How can they live with such a mystery? There could be anything behind that door. Some day, one of those barracked workers will, in a moment of stir-crazed lunacy, fashion a rudimentary key out of a paperclip and enter another world.

Perhaps he will find the mad master of the station who became trapped and forgotten during the Blitz. Maybe, like Sir Walter Scott who became a national hero rediscovering the lost Scottish crown jewels by looking in a cupboard no one had bothered to try for ages, he will find the great Greenwich Hoard of Anglo-Saxon gold. What if there's a magic portal through to a parallel universe, and we don't even know about it?

I can't believe no one's looked, and hope someone does soon. But in the meanwhile, for all you industrial history fans, whilst tipping the spectral tricon to Peter for taking compassion on a frustrated Phantom who's so long wanted to see inside, I leave you with some rivets to enjoy...

Market Appeal

2010-03-01T08:41:00.009Z

There's much to be positive about this month - not least the re-opening of the Visitor Centre, now rather poncily renamed Discover Greenwich , a name I wouldn't have chosen, but it's what's inside that counts, and it's looking exciting indeed - and the long-anticipated opening of the brewery at the Old Royal Naval College.

But we can't afford to take our eye off the ball. Most people now know that Greenwich Hospital Trust are appealing the same proposal for redevelopment of the market that was UNANIMOUSLY thrown out by Greenwich Council last year.

It was thrown out because it was wrong for Greenwich - too big, too tall, too brash, too uncaring of what Greenwich is about - a World Heritage Site (at least for the moment, until we finally get rid of all our heritage and we join Dresden in the ex-World Heritage Sites of Shame Club...) loved around the world for its history and mellow beauty.

The proposal deliberately smashed up old buildings to make room for wheelie bins (after first being carefully 'preserved by record' - some PR guy's very proud of that phrase...) and ripped up cobblestones to be replaced with Bluewater plus a few craft stalls. The proposed hotel, not a bad idea in itself, was far too tall for the site, another example of cash over care.

That Greenwich Hospital Trust is appealing the decision shows exactly the kind of bullies we're dealing with here. Caring not a jot for the opinions of locals, historic integrity or the longtime viability of a World Heritage Site without-any-heritage in favour of making the fastest buck for the charity (short-termism or what?) they will keep on appealing until they get what they want.

We can't let that happen. Can we?

It certainly doesn't help that we will have to fight our own MP, who is on record as supporting the development that his own party on the council rejected as being bad for the area. An MP who only ever seems to speak in parliament about his declared interests in the construction industry, and who doesn't need care about what his constituents might think because he's sitting in a safe seat.

What is to be done here? Paul, who was very active on the original protest, tells me

"They do accept submissions from the public, by the way. I think the appeal can take different forms, one of which is like a public enquiry. WE as residents will have to get our act together, and also pressurise some of the amenity groups to resubmit objections."

I understand from another 'source' that it "goes to the inspectorate which is supposed to adjudicate on the basis of planning law - which means the entire thing is a long argument between barristers. People really need to write in to the inspectorate with their views - and they need to stick to 'planning' and legal arguments - the inspector won't listen to anything else."

Trouble is, I've spent time this morning trying to work out how to send in those submissions, and I can't quite work out how. I can't even find the inspectorate in question. I've looked in all the obvious places and can't see anything, but I'm not the most technically savvy Phantom in the world. Is it too early, perhaps? I need some help here, folks...

Easter Egg Hunt

2010-02-28T12:12:00.005Z

Easter Eggs by Anna Cervova

Remember when you were a kid and all hens' eggs were white? Some of them had little lions stamped on them (very carefully, one presumes) but they were white all the same. Brown eggs were a novelty.

Now it's the other way round. Apparently market research shows we think that white eggs are somehow 'manufactured' and brown ones 'healthy' so the white ones have gone the way of the dinosaurs. I confess it's not something I think about on a day to day basis, but it's proving to be a problem for Maggie. She says:

"I'm organising some Easter activities for children. One activity will be decorating eggs - but where can you buy white eggs these days? All the supermarkets sell brown ones but you need white ones for dyeing and colouring."

You do indeed. Can anyone think of anywhere round Greenwich where they still sell white eggs?

Crime Figures

2010-02-27T09:34:00.002Z

Here's an interesting little chart showing official crime figures in the borough. Either, generally, people have stopped reporting or figures really have gone down - which is a plus.

Over the months we've talked about drink-related crime (most of which seems to happen in St Alfege Passage) but although there's no figures that show which offences are alcohol-fuelled, in general 'violence against the person' is actually down a little from last year, as are nearly nearly all other kinds of offence. Burglaries, especially, of all kinds seem to be fewer (though still plenty enough to be getting on with.)

Having said that, there was one more homicide than last year, 'gun enabled' crime is up and sexual assaults other than rape have gone up considerably (I wonder if some reclassification's gone on there so they can say rape is down? God, I'm cynical. Soz...)

There's a place on the map where you can click to get individual ward figures. They're a bit random-feeling as they're done slightly differently as number of crimes per 1000 of population, so it's hard to work out exactly how much actually went on.

The Big Bang

2010-02-26T14:46:00.003Z

Dang!

I've been waiting for months for the controlled explosion of the silos at the old Syrol site - I knew they were coming (though not exactly when) but I've had so much on my plate recently I clean forgot.

I didn't even remember when Lucy asked yesterday if anyone had heard an explosion. It was just when finally getting to peruse some local blogs that I discovered this on the greenwich.co.uk site.

Sounds like there are still two to go - so maybe I won't miss them...

A Use For The Rotunda?

2010-02-26T09:16:00.005Z

Rather slow off the mark this morning, folks, thanks to a tedious hacking incident with Twitter. Apologies to anyone who discovered rather more than they needed to about "The Phantom's" love life...

All fixed now, I hope - thanks to everyone who let me know about the security breach.

But onto happier things. You may remember Robbie, who plays with local band The Mores. Well, he's getting married to his 'Amazonian photographer' (what an image that conjures up...) and wants to have the wedding somewhere around Woolwich.

I don't normally cover wedding-venue questions on the main blog any more, since they got so frequently asked that they've got their own page these days, but something he's been saying intrigues me.

He says " I have been dealing with Major Gleeson on the matter of hiring the Rotunda for our party. All was going well, we went to have a look at it, he seemed fairly excited by the idea, saying nobody had ever done anything like that before (that's what I like to hear!), and thought it could be done.

He came back with a fairly stiff figure for the hire charge, but we managed to swallow it, until today when he called to say that the fire regs guy had just had a look, and would only allow us to have 60 guests in there! No good. So I am currently trying to negotiate some sort of fire safety situation with the army, possibly hiring a fire engine to sit outside for the day, but it is looking like it might be a shade too pricey for us."

Before I get onto Robbie's next question, which of course, is about alternative venues, let's just think about this.

A few months ago, I was very worried about the Rotunda, and I continue to be concerned about what will happen to it - when we discussed it before, we wondered if it could be done up and used for dignitaries during the Olympics - but using it as a wedding venue afterwards would bring in money to pay for its upkeep and give us that all important 'legacy' that everyone's talking about. I know it's not an obvious area for the type of people who can afford such places, but I suspect that word might get around and it could be a newly trendy spot (not least from Household Cavlary people...)

The reason why the fire safety guy must be concerned about it is, I presume, the somewhat fragile condition the place is in - but it it was given proper upgrades and facilities, it's surely big enough to take more than 60 people - not least because of the space around it, now that the big guns are gone. It has a wonderful green area around it, it's not that hard to travel to and it could make some serious cash for the Army, who own it.

I truly hope that Robbie manages to work something out with the Major - the guy's a good bloke, charged with an impossible task of protecting a truly unique building with no cash. If it works as a wedding venue once, perhaps he could be persuaded to petition for money as a long-term investment.

In the meanwhile, though, we have to assume that Robbie and his Amazonian Beauty (don't you just long for them to have a Midsummer Night's Dream-themed wedding - with the pair of them dressed as Theseus and Hippolyta, her being given away by Oberon, Titania being head bridesmaid and the Rude Mechanicals as the ushers? I'd pay good money to hear Bottom's best-man speech...) have to make alternative arrangements.

I've already directed him towards the Phantom Shindigs page, but there may be a bit more thinking-cap required. He says:

"We are really desperate to have our wedding party somewhere in Woolwich, we think it is a fantastic area with so much potential, and we have a brilliant opportunity to get a large number of people to come and see the place.

I am really running out of ideas for suitably quirky places for us to have our party, we'll be expecting around 200 people or so, and we don't have too much time left, especially if the Rotunda isn't possible.

We really don't want to do anything that is too traditional, we have been trying to do something that shows how amazing an area this could be if people just use a bit of imagination, and realize it's potential. If you can think of anywhere, however weird, indoors, outdoors, derelict, someone's house, it doesn't matter, I would hugely appreciate your thoughts."

My first thought would be Peggy Middleton House - I don't actually know what state it's in just now I haven't been to that area for ages - but if it's a shell, it would be a great bow-out for the place - very grungy (good luck persuading the Council...)

Another, slightly left-field idea would be to contact the Council Film Unit and ask them what they have on their books - I bet they have abandoned warehouses etc.

Woolwich isn't quite my area - but it definitely IS some Phantophiles' manor - so - any ideas, guys?

The Phantom Falls Off The Curry Waggon

2010-02-25T08:34:00.002Z

Over the past couple of years the Phantom Waistline has been taking a bit of a beating, so a few months ago, I started to try to do something about it (eek). I'm not talking anything desperate, like running or anything, but I did make a bit of an effort not to eat curry every night. It's possible you even noticed I stopped reviewing Indian restaurants for a while...

But let's face it - that kind of thing never lasts. There are some times when only a good old fashioned British Curry will do. Scales be damned.

I hadn't been to the Royal Nepalese for some time. It takes a long while to work your way round all the curry houses of Greenwich - and they change chefs or close more quickly than I can get to them (I mean - what is going on at Kerala Zone? Last I was walking past it, a couple of blokes were manhandling out a giant mattress covered in the most dubious-looking stains imaginable. An hour or so later, I walked back and the mattress was back inside, leaning louchely against the tables - still set for dinner. Ick...)

But back to the Royal Nepalese. Funny - I never really think of the place. It's always there, and the last time I went there I enjoyed it well enough - I just never remember to go back there.

As soon as we walked in, we were treated like we were the only people in the place. Which, actually, we (almost) were. It was freezing, raining, and sleeting outside - a filthy night - which, I am sure, accounted for the fact that there were only two other people in there the whole time we were there.

There were a whole bunch of new dishes on the menu, which meant that we deviated from the Phantom Control Menu a little.

For example, the Lamb Achari, cooked with mango pickle and really rather tasty. And the Vegetable Karahi - a little on the sweet side, but still slipping down rather well.

To get the best choice of lots of flavours, we ordered a selection of side dishes rather than main courses. The best, by a long chalk was the Bringle Aloo (You say Brin-Jal, I say Brin-Gal...) whose aubergines had clearly been cooking for a very long time (mmmmm....) and just melted on my tongue. But the rest were lovely and, I'm afraid to say, we didn't have much left over.

I'm not going to pretend that this is modern Asian/Indian fare. It's traditional 'British' Nepalese curry - but sorry - that really hits the Phantom spot. I loved it. Nouvelle Cuisine, Schmouvelle Cuisine. And while you can always put swift, attentive service in an empty restaurant down to boredom, I got the feeling that they would be like this whatever the state of their table plans. I had a good time (though the pictures on the wall are as creepy as ever.)

At the end of the meal, they offered us a liqueur on the house - presumably to make us come back . To be honest, I can't imagine drinking creamy spirits after a curry (I had the same thing in the Mehak recently (well, obviously, not that recently, ahem...) - they brought me a Baileys - very kind but - yeuch! Is this a latest fashion among Indian restaurants?) I passed on the offer - but points to them for offering.

So, why am I wittering on; not writing a proper review about this today?

Well, I'm afraid it's an excuse to write about a new Greenwich club I like the look of. Greenwich Curry Club is a bunch of curryphiles who are working their way around the Indian (and otherwise) restaurants of Greenwich and reporting on their findings in blog-form.

They're happy to welcome new friends to their ever-expanding membership (and waistlines, which, Daniel, who told me about it, tells me is no excuse.)
Check 'em out and join in, perhaps, on their next outing in March...

Travellin' Light

2010-02-24T08:44:00.003Z

Couldn't decide whether to put this in the Parish News or not - but hey - here it is on the main blog.

The picture above is of Ethel the motorhome. She belongs to Buddy and Bushka the dog (looking out of Ethel's window.) She currently lives in Devon but Buddy needs to move it closer to Greenwich for the summer - from next month until around September.

Buddy's called all the nearest camp sites that offer storage but they are all full and have long waiting lists. He's wondering if there's anyone out there in Phantomland who would have space for it on their land or property? He's happy to pay but it will need to be somewhere safe.

I can't imagine there are many people who have spare, safe land just standing idle in Greenwich - but you never know...

German Moore

2010-02-24T08:25:00.004Z

Following on from yesterday's post about the Henry Moore missing from Greenwich Park, apparently in the 'care' of the HM Foundation, Elaine sent me this pic of another Moore in pride of place on the lawn beside the Art gallery in Bielefeld in Germany. Peeping through is Madeleine, age 6. Her four year old brother Eric's playing with her in the next pic.

As Elaine points out, "they obviously have a more relaxed attitude towards their art in Bielefeld." Perhaps they have a more cultured class of thief. I suspect it's more likely that scrap metal prices aren't so high.

Of course it may just be that the Henry Moore Foundation haven't managed to get their sweaty paws on the Bielefeld sculpture yet. Or that the good burghers of Bielefeld didn't just roll over at the first signs there might be an issue with security.

But it is time to get the Greenwich one back. Seems like there's a bit of a head of steam building over this - I heard the Friends of Greenwich Park on the Today Programme yesterday demanding it back. Personally, I think if we don't get it back by 2012, we won't get it back at all.

Moore No More

2010-02-23T11:00:00.002Z

Gregor asks the not-unreasonable question:

"Now that there's a Henry Moore retrospective on at the Tate, Greenwich's own empty plinth feels a little emptier. Does anyone have any idea whether the Henry Moore foundation will ever return the statue to the park?"

The Phantom replies:

You know - even the mighty Today Programme had a feature on this this morning, Gregor. It would seem that the Henry Moore Foundation has got such a bee in its bonnet about it that it's taken it away 'for safekeeping' i.e. so no one ever gets to see it again.

Apparently the insurance cost became prohibitive - but I don't really get why - I mean the park is locked at night, the thing must weigh a ton - who's going to steal it? Besides - how can you insure something like that? It's not like it could be replaced.

I don't know when it's coming back, but it's the place Moore himself chose for the sculpture - and the plinth looks pretty damn silly without it.

Maybe we should be using the Olympic Panacea to get it back.

Remarkable Occurrences of Greenwich (1)

2010-02-23T08:20:00.004Z

If I'm ever bored (which is, frankly, rare these days, damn Real Life) then a quick leaf through Hasted's History of Kent can be guaranteed to come up with some extraordinary fact or other.

The best bits are usually in the notes, added by Henry Drake in 1886, and which are only bettered for sheer exuberance by Sir Thomas Urquhart's 17th translation of Rabelais's Gargantua and Pantagruel. Sometimes there are only four lines of Hasted's original to a (very large) page, the rest being taken up by Drake's notes.

In a section marked "Remarkable Occurrences" I found this little entry:

"In 1273 a whale, 12 toises long, 5 toises in girth, was captured in Greenwich and taken to London Bridge to be cut up."

My first thought was was 'well - that's not so remarkable - we still occasionally get lost sea mammals up the Thames - like this poor chap, which John found not so long ago whilst walking his dog. I wouldn't click on the pic if I were you - it'll give you nightmares, but it's a stranded porpoise - very sad.

My second thought was 'what the hell is a 'toise?'

In finding out the answer to the second question, the first was answered.

A toise is a unit of measurement that dates back to pre-revolutionary France, or so Wikipedia tells me. It doesn't help that the actual size of it changed over the centuries - exactly six pieds (feet)until 1812; exactly two metres between 1812 and 1840. (BTW I was tragic enough to check out the etymology of 'tortoise' at the same time - no relation...) But whatever measurement Hasted means, it was a big bugger.

Twelve toises long? That makes it TWENTY FOUR METRES. Okay - I'd call that remarkable.

Allotments - Again

2010-02-22T08:51:00.003Z

This has to be one of my most frequently-asked of all frequently-asked questions (along with cleaners and wedding venues...) "How can I get my green fingers on an allotment?"

To look at last week's Greenwich Time's double spread, you'd think all you'd have to do is call up the nice people at the council and arrange for a viewing so you could take your pick from the array of available plots.

Quite why they spend two pages telling you of the joys of allotmenteering when there aren't any patches of soil available in the entire borough is a mystery to me. It only makes the council look bad for having sold them all off and insensitive for rubbing our noses in it.

The Council website reiterates a sorry tale for anyone living in Greenwich town centre. Not only are the very few sites totally full, but the waiting lists are so long they've been closed. And don't even think about the Prior Street Allotments on the old railway line - privately managed and with the Waiting List of Doom.

Sadly Phantoms don't get any favours - I'm hanging about, spectral spade in phantom paw with the rest of you.

There are one or two sites where you can go on the waiting list - but they're way out in the further reaches of the borough - and at some point you have to ask yourself how far you're prepared to (wait) to travel for a few spuds.

If you look at an old map from the turn of the last century, much of East Greenwich and the Peninsula were given over to allotment gardens, now lost to Progress.

I have wondered to myself if the council have no intention of doing anything with the old hospital site for a year or so, whether they could do some kind of short-let thing. The ground's piss-poor but keen gardeners have a way - besides surely the council has access to a load of compost from our organic bins...

No, I'm not holding my breath either.

There are plot share schemes. I have my reservations about them, personally, but if you're desperate, it's worth a try. The most local one I know of is Transition Westcombe's Patch Match programme - and you will probably meet some interesting folk along the way.

In the meanwhile, if you're up the Deptford end of Greenwich, and you have a few hours on your hands, you might be interested in a different thing entirely.

Jonathan is a teacher at the Nursery at Grinling Gibbons Primary in Deptford. For the last two years they've run a rather splendid growing/allotment project in the spring/summer where the children have planted, grown and eaten a variety of vegetables between April and July. But he has a problem.

"The person who assisted us, a gardener, has gone AWOL and I could really use the assistance of someone with some experience of growing veggies etc. who wouldn't mind spending an hour or two a week working with myself and some great 3-5 year olds," he tells me.

"The upside is the chance to grow and eat your own produce or just to help out on a valuable project educating young children that a) all food doesn't come from the supermarket and b) cooking and eating your own veg is great!"

He doesn't tell me a downside, but I can guess. You'll probably need to be police-cleared to the Nth degree. But if you enjoy getting soil under your nails, find the company of little children pleasurable and are keen to eat tasty school-grown veg, maybe the CRB check wouldn't be so arduous after all...

Happy Waiting Lists, folks.

Deptford And The Founding Of The National Trust

2010-02-19T08:25:00.005Z

I don't normally put two Old-Photo Days so close to each other, but I was reading in bed last night and was astonished to see this picture of Sayes Court in a book from the 1920s.

I'd always assumed that John Evelyn's house was demolished in antiquity, but here was a photo of it, in glorious Sepia-Vision. To be honest it wasn't what I'd imagined, but hey - Wonderful London told me it was his old gaff, and who was I to disagree?

Turns out that it's only part of the place Czar Peter the Great trashed on his gap-year visit to Deptford. The main mansion where Evelyn wrote his diary, tended his beloved garden and entertained Sir Christopher Wren and Sam Pepys was demolished in 1728 for no good reason that I can see. What was left suffered the ignoble fate of being turned into St Nicholas Parish Workhouse.

Things got worse - by 1852 it was an emigration depot, by 1853 a clothing factory and by 1856 just part of a bundle of land sold to the Admiralty, who promptly started demolishing it under the Metropolitan Building Act. They can't have got very far. The picture above is undated but there is no mention in the book that it's an old photo of something that's been demolished.

Things started to look up for the old place in 1869, when William John Evelyn, a descendant of the diarist, bought back as much of the old estate as he could. He made a nice park for the Deptford people, and brought plants for it from Wotton in Surrey, Evelyn's other house, which was, presumably, still in the family. He turned the house itself into almshouses - a bit nicer than a workhouse, n'est ce pas?

It all sounds rather charming - the 10-acre park had a bandstand, and a neo-classical building that had once been the dockyard's model-house, which would be a museum and library.

It was all going rather well. In 1884 Evelyn had a brainwave. Chatting to Octavia Hill, a well-known preservationist, he suggested that Sayes Court, with its eminent connections both from an intellectual and (slightly dodgy) royal standpoint should be saved for the nation in perpetuity. Trouble was, there was no organisation that could do it legally.

Nevertheless, Hill contacted her friend Robert Hunter ( a localish boy, from Camberwell), to try to thrash out a way it could be done. Several suggestions were made for a new Commons and Gardens Trust that could take stewardship of important buildings.

It took ten years of wrangling for the new, snappily re-named National Trust to emerge, far too late for poor old Sayes Court. Like the doomed Euston Arch, which died whilst the modern preservation movement built up a head of steam (read about the plans to rebuild it using the stones found whilst dredging the waterways for the Olympic site here,) it was to be a sacrificial lamb on the altar of Progress.

By 1886 only six acres remained, and Evelyn could only afford to dedicate an acre and a half to the public without the help of the fledgling NT.

I'm still having a few problems working out exactly when the house keeled over. I've found records of hits to the Victorian terrace nearby during WWII, but nothing to the house. I'm sure someone can put me right.

Whatever, by the 50s it wasn't there any more. A 'modern' park was built, and Convoys Wharf sprawled across the rest. Heaven only knows what will happen to it next...

The Body In The Garden

2010-02-18T10:52:00.003Z

Robert at Number 16 had a bit of a shock this morning, when he tried to put Black & White the cat out. He's used to combatting drunken oafs in his garden, but rarely slumped bodies. This one, despite last night's perishing cold, wasn't dead (God only knows how - perhaps the alcohol from the large amount of tinnies surrounding him kept his body temperature up or something) but definitely dead to the world.

Robert says the police and ambulance were there almost immediately he called and were very kind and efficient. It took them a while to revive the guy, who was in his mid to late 30s and not wearing very much at all. Apparently he was very polite when he came-to. He's been taken to hospital to thaw out.

The Phantom Tweets - And Accidentally Spams Everyone

2010-02-18T10:11:00.002Z

IanVisits and the Phantom Webmaster have finally persuaded me to join Twitter.

Since I'm not allowed my full moniker, I can be found on TGPhantom.

But I owe you all an apology. I'm afraid I just accidentally hit the "contact everyone that ever sent you anything by email'" button - so, if you've ever contacted me, I'm afraid you just got a spam email from Twitter. Feel free to ignore it - and please accept my apologies for the invasion. It won't happen again.

Park Row Police Station

2010-02-18T08:50:00.003Z

Did you know there used to be a nick at Park Row? No, nor did I. Steve's been sniffing around the Greenwich Heritage Centre at Woolwich Arsenal (something I wish I had more time to do; the b&w photos are from the wonderful collection there) and has discovered this short-lived little piece of penal history - erected too late to have been a star in Conrad's The Secret Agent, and lost too early to have been useful in dealing with those town-centre problems we all grumble about on a regular basis.

Rather sweet, isn't it? This picture's from 1908 - not long after it opened - at a time of great boom for East Greenwich. It reflects the huge increase in house building around that time, and a great excitement in the possibilities that the east end of Greenwich promised. Unlike today when most of the building is just housing rather than infrastructure, there was a whole load of public buildings going up - three schools (Meridian, Halstow and Annandale) a library, a fire station and two police stations (the other one's still in Combedale Road) just for starters - and I'm sure I've forgotten stuff.

Sadly, it didn't last. The 8th July 1944 saw a direct V1 hit to the not-even-fifty year-old building:

Steve tells me the ARP log of the incident reports that no one was killed, but three police officers and five 'others' were injured. It's not recorded as to whether these 'others' were overnight 'guests' of the constabulary or not...

In case you're trying to place exactly where the station was, here's a picture of the site today (still looks like a bomb's just hit it...) Bernard Angell House is on the corner of Trafalgar Road and Park Row, just opposite the NMM.