Owl Prowl: a Bromley attraction in summer 2022. This one is called Nocturnals, by Amanda Quellin
Oldham Athletic’s descent into the National League obliges me to face my own prejudices. They came most sharply into focus recently as I walked through Bromley, looking for something to say about it.
But if I found Bromley characterless and uninteresting, and if I expect to react in much the same way to Wealdstone, Dorking and others, I should perhaps try to see Oldham through the eyes of supporters of those clubs. When Bolton Wanderers’ first taste of European competition was against Lokomotiv Plovdiv in the UEFA Cup in 2005, ticket sales were initially disappointing. Plovdiv, it was suggested in the UK press, were not the most attractive opponents. Nobody thought to ask residents of the cultural capital of Bulgaria how they regarded the prospect of a trip to Bolton.
The Darwin mural, Market Square
In Bromley, I wandered idly up the High Street, along West Street and back down East Street where, to pass the time, I ate an outstanding pie in the Cow & Pig. The route brought me back to Market Square, where echoes of a more bucolic past go beyond the name.
First, there’s a municipal water pump on the eastern side. Behind it, occupying a three-storey gable end, is a mural devoted largely to Charles Darwin.
Darwin, depicted as a younger man than the Biblical white-beard we are familiar with, is sitting beneath a tree. He appears to be taking notes. References to his accomplishments are recorded at intervals across the foliage. Darwin lived at Downe, a few miles away.
There are nods to other notable locals. The trail-blazing archaeologist John Lubbock is a small figure in the distance to Darwin’s left; and emerging from the upper left of the tree is HG Wells.
Wells was born only a stone’s throw away, on Bromley High Street, and this same wall had previously been adorned with a mural celebrating his work. Wells may no longer merit his own mural but the site of his birth – now Primark- has a blue plaque. This isn’t a National Heritage plaque – that one is close to Regent’s Park – but it indicates the abiding popularity of the author. At least 11 plaques, in various colours, record the presence of Wells at various stages of his life in places as far apart as Sevenoaks and Stoke-on-Trent.
Bromley Picturehouse: a six-screen Art Deco cinema beautifully restored
It would be dishonest, though, to leave the subject of HG Wells without noting that he didn’t appear to be particularly fond of Bromley. He might also have found the rest of the town’s literary heritage decidedly middle-brow. Enid Blyton lived for a time on Shortlands Road, recorded by another non-EH blue plaque. Richmal Crompton, creator of William, lived the last years of her life at Bromley Common. But more recently Hanif Kureishi was born and grew up in Bromley.
At the match, the question of whether Bromley was or was not dull became entirely moot. The only relevant fact about Bromley that afternoon was that it had a much better football team than Oldham. Onwards and upwards? Not necessarily…
See you next year? Oldham players applaud the fans after a rare victory
It has long been my contention that the legendary Jack Sprat was and is an Oldham Athletic supporter. Now it turns out that he is related to Old Mother Hubbard, and the cupboard is finally bare.
Would Jack have been among the pitch invaders on Saturday? I suspect not. I see Jack as a philosophical fellow, accustomed to long years of decline at the club he has followed for decades. He is too old and too phlegmatic to be crossing any lines. Also there were a few minutes left to play… Athletic might have snuck a couple of goals past a tiring Salford.
Jack would have looked with regret at the online fans’ forum afterwards. Here, the people to whom Oldham Athletic’s fortunes really mattered were in an unforgiving mood. They vented their anger not only on the club’s owners and directors (past and present) but also at each other. Later, some apologised (though not to the club’s owners and directors).
Jack might have tried to get an optimistic thread going, to offset the sorrow and occasional ferocity. Rather than apportion blame, how about acknowledging those individuals who emerge from the wreckage with any credit? The efforts of manager John Sheridan, above all, deserved recognition, but also those of club captain Carl Piergianni and a number of other players (though fatally somewhat fewer than 11). And the supporters who responded vocally and in huge numbers to Sheridan’s return… they deserved better.
Or he might have looked for silver linings. Fans of the other relegated team, Scunthorpe United, had no top-tier success to look back on, no League Cup final nor FA Cup semi-finals. In fact Oldham may be the most distinguished team ever to appear in the National League – Notts County have more history, but not much within living memory.
But Jack did not. His heart would not have been in it. The tone of the majority of deeply disappointed supporters struck a sympathetic chord. If Jack felt it less acutely, regarded it as a matter of regret rather than of any real importance, to have said so would have been to give gratuitous offence.
Besides, there was the question of whether the club would actually survive to begin the next season in the National League. Relegation from League Two stripped away any lingering sense of the club being special. Why, then, might it not stumble down the same ill-lit path as Bury and Macclesfield Town? It was hardly in rude health financially. Supporters might look at the National League table and contemplate visits to Eastleigh, Wealdstone and Bromley with dismay, but that was better than nothing.
Phlegmatic but occasionally prone to sentimentality, Jack would have let his mind wander back to October 1961, when his dad had first taken him to Boundary Park. Playing in the old Fourth Division, now League 2, Oldham had beaten Accrington Stanley 5-0 that day. The result was later declared void as Stanley went out of business. It was an unhappy augury.
Jack would have felt sorry for the younger fans in particular. He, at least, could look back on good days; he’d had his money’s worth. For a period of a few months in 1990 Oldham were the Team of the Nineties. But there had been no promotions since 1991, little to savour apart from an odd result here and there. A generation of fans below the age of 20 had known only mediocrity, decline and, now, fall.
Jack Sprat would have gone home on Saturday knowing that Oldham Athletic offered him even less to look forward to than usual. As he tucked into his dinner – the top off his father’s egg – he would have reflected on the perverse satisfaction he derived from that, the curious fit of the club’s fate with his own character. Mrs Sprat, who had abandoned Manchester United for Manchester City some years earlier, had the usual 5-1 win to celebrate.
“Along Central Drive, the Irish Sea soon fills the skyline. The horizon looks as if it is ring-fenced by turbines”
Barrow people must be heartily sick of seeing their town stereotyped. A couple of days before my visit Barrow happened to appear on the ITV News. The reporter was flogging a ‘Death of the High Street’ horse. Boarded-up premises and proprietors with stiff upper lips were prominent. If ITV found anything attractive to point their cameras at, the editors chose not to show it.
“On the natural skyline, brooding promontories slope down to the sea”
Barrow Town Hall: “Above the town’s streets, dramatic Victorian towers and spires soar”
Where might they have looked? The snowy uplands of the Lake District, perhaps. Or the Walney Island seashore, barely 20mins walk from the town centre. To get there they’d have passed the Dock Museum and crossed a bridge with views Constable might have painted, in either direction. On the natural skyline, brooding promontories slope down to the sea; above the town’s streets, dramatic Victorian towers and spires soar.
“A number of the thoroughfares are so wide you’d wonder whether Baron Haussmann did some moonlighting here.” In the background, Devonshire Dock Hall: “the six-pack on steroids that butts into the town’s southern horizon like a theatre flat”
Barrow is a town of sweeping vistas and unexpected
panoramas. In part this is a result of Victorian town-planning. The town
centre’s grid system carries the eye down otherwise ordinary streets to
horizons improbable distances away. A number of the principle thoroughfares are
so wide you’d wonder whether Baron Haussmann did some moonlighting here. They
tend to flow into each other at elaborately decorative roundabouts.
One such boulevard is Holker Street, which older readers
will recognise as identifying Barrow AFC’s ground in days of yore. Holker
Street runs from the railway station to the Progression Solicitors Stadium and
has pavements that must be 10 or 12ft wide. If these are not the widest
pavements expediting the movement of large numbers of people to or from an
English football ground, I’d be very surprised. (As if to compensate, the
Wilkie Road pavement running along the north side of the ground is so narrow
you’re more or less obliged to jaywalk.)
Barrow is also a town of unexpected squares, many of them
given over to car-parks. During the last war the German bomb-aimers were
notoriously inaccurate, hitting the town as often as the docks; if these
squares are the result at least some good came of it. Even where there are cars
there are generally also encircling trees. In the absence of cars, you’ll find grass
and an occasional memorial, often complemented by statuary, plaques or other
features. Barrow is a town of oddly shaped benches: some commemorative, some
sponsored, some just expressive of a bench-maker’s joie de vivre.
The statues also vary. In the middle of roundabouts and outside
the magnificent town hall there are conventional frock-coated Victorians.
Elsewhere monuments of different characters recall Barrow’s industrial,
nautical and sporting past. Emlyn Hughes is one of the first you’ll encounter
if you arrive by train.
The Spirit of Barrow: “From some angles the four shipyard workers have a Soviet-era look…”
In the centre of the shopping district a bronze grouping
called The Spirit of Barrow is particularly wonderful. From some angles the
four large shipyard workers have a Soviet-era look, and the words ‘Courage’,
‘Labour, ‘Skill’ and ‘Progress’ around the base reinforce that. But the quartet
suggests Pride in and Affection for the town and it lifts the spirits.
There’s more Barrovian baroque at the Dock Museum. This occupies an old dry dock close to the Walney Island bridge. On the day I visited, the Significant Form exhibition of the South Lakes Art Collective opened in the atmospheric space at the lower level of the dock. Above, there are displays celebrating Barrow’s history – natural and industrial. Not surprisingly, the models of vessels built in Barrow are sensational (and in the case of one submarine in particular, quite chilling). Equally sensational and not at all chilling was the flapjack in the museum café.
Sir James Ramsden: credited with bringing industry and prosperity to Barrow. “He also brought the most remarkable pair of mutton-chops.”
Notable buildings (aside from the Town Hall) include the one
now occupied by the Citizens Advice Bureau. This was formerly the bath-house
presented to the town in 1872 by Sir James Ramsden, the town’s first mayor and
the man most regularly credited with bringing industry and prosperity to it. He
also brought the most remarkable pair of mutton-chops.
Next door on Abbey Road is the Nan Tait Centre, now an arts
centre but originally in 1900 Barrow’s Technical School. Redbrick, terracotta
and vast panels representing Ars Longa Vita Brevis and Labor Omnia Vincit –
what more could you want?
Devonshire Dock Hall sounds as if it could be another
Victorian palais, perhaps where Music Hall breathed its last in 1914. It is,
certainly, one of the most prominent buildings in the town: it’s the six-pack
on steroids that butts into the town’s southern horizon like a theatre flat. Occupied
by BAE Systems, it is an indoor shipbuilding complex.
The sea-front is well worth a detour. Apart from anything
else it’s a pleasant walk (or a short bus ride). It takes you through
Vickerstown, a UK example of a phenomenon more common – and notorious – in the
USA: the company town. The provision of housing for employees sounds
enlightened but it could equally represent self-interest as companies sought to
discourage unionisation, offset wage rises by rent increases etc.
Along Central Drive, the Irish Sea soon fills the skyline. The
horizon looks as if it is ring-fenced by turbines: what you’re looking at is the
Walney Wind Farm, the largest offshore wind farm in the world according to the
BBC. Opinion will vary about whether it’s unsightly: I’d say No, and I’d offer
in support the decision of ITV not to show it. The turbines are far enough away
to be matchstick figures on the horizon and you could make a case for them
providing points of interest in the view.
To the east is Morecambe Bay: go by train along the scenic Furness Line
The beach here is of pebbles. I’m told you’ll find sand
further along the front in both directions; behind Walney there are mud-flats
and to the east is Morecambe Bay. In other words, the variety of marine
environments is wide. And in the background is the Lake District. It’s quite a
place.
* While I was taking a photograph of The Spirit of Barrow, a couple of buskers offered a spirited version of Wish You Were Here. I happily made a donation but I was less sure about the sentiment. Did I wish You were here? If I’d invited You to Barrow, in January, You might think the magic had gone. But I was guilty of the stereotyping decried at the top of this piece. I withdraw the remark and apologise. Don’t let anything discourage you from going to see Barrow, at any time of year – and go by train.
Barrow 2 Bromley 0 Progression Solicitors Stadium, 18 January 2020
Lightbox moment: a weathered bull watches the canal cruise boat preparing to disembark
Visiting supporters who approach Woking from the M25 are directed by road signs towards the carpark at Heathside. Why? Who knows. Heathside is not close to the ground. Nor is it particularly convenient for the town centre. Perhaps for these reasons (and if my experience of Heathside on a matchday Saturday is anything to go by) you’ll have a wide choice of parking bays.
Price may be another factor that puts parkers off Heathside. If you arrive early enough for a cursory tour of Woking before the game, you may be in the carpark six or seven hours. That would be £10. And the Pay & Display machines don’t take cards or notes. Another dubious point in Heathside’s favour, then – if you arrive with pockets full of cash you’ll leave a great deal lighter.
I hedged my bets with £4.20 for up to three hours. False economy, I know, but that left options open: at around 2.15pm I could top-up and walk to the ground, or I could take the car and look for somewhere closer to Kingfield Stadium, home of the Cards (short for Cardinals).
The Basingstoke Canal: reopened in 1991 after a 25-year restoration project
Woking was being rebuilt that day. The many cranes stood idle, peering into the town like paralysed insects. Hoardings lined walkways, and low-level plastic barriers helped pedestrians to avoid blundering into roadworks. If, discouraged and disorientated, you headed north reckoning to find the Basingstoke Canal crossing your path, you wouldn’t go far wrong.
It’s a green and shady corridor and it will lead you to Woking’s better side. The canal was formally reopened in 1991 after a 25-year restoration project. For a restful 1¼hrs, a cruise from the town wharf is an attractive prospect.
Sir Alec Bedser: opening the bowling from the Town End
The canal is crossed at the wharf by a footbridge dedicated to the legendary Bedser twins. They grew up in Woking and their statues stand at either end of the bridge: Alec bowling, at the Town End, and Eric batting a little over 22yds away. The borough council offices are fielding at long-on and halfway up the wall is a sculpted cricket ball, as though hit for six.
Eric Bedser: looks to me as if he’s clipped it over midwicket…
Statuary and street art is a Woking speciality. The town’s association with HG Wells provides several instances. Wells lived here while he was producing The War of the Worlds. A dramatic Martian tripod dominates a small crossroads that glories in the name Crown Square, and nearby a space-travelling cylinder is embedded in the pavement. The canal cruises go past Horsell Common, featured in the book as the site of the first Martian landing. A statue of Wells himself, holding (and surrounded by) references to his work though not notably melancholic, sits outside the town’s Victoria Gate, on the Woking Heritage Trail.
… but the ball is picked up over long-on by the Woking Borough Council offices
Not all the town’s public art is as straightforward. ‘The Space Between’, celebrating The Jam, is mystifyingly modern – three tall chunks of timber. In the Wolsey Place shopping mall three willow-bound cyclists ride across metal waves that may represent hills or the roof of the Sydney Opera House. Painted bronze statues by Sean Henry, born in Woking, lurk around the town standing, seated and reclining.
Formal art provision is in a building called the Lightbox, close to Bedser Bridge. The architects, Marks Barfield, were also responsible for Brighton’s i360 tower – well, we all have our off days. The Lightbox grants free entry to a museum called ‘Woking’s Story’, to a gallery named for the Art Fund Prize, sculpture, second-hand books, a good shop and a very good café. Upstairs, galleries and special exhibitions cost £7.50. The main attraction on my visit was ‘Burning Bright: the Scottish Colourists’. If £7.50 sounds steep for a provincial art gallery, consider: a few hours in a carpark, or the opportunity to spend as long as you like in front of JD Fergusson’s Villa Gotte Garden?
‘A dramatic Martian tripod dominates a small crossroads’
Woking’s Story, it transpires, involves a surprising amount of spirituality. The town has the 1889 Shah Jehan Mosque, the first mosque to be built in northern Europe.
To the west of Woking is Brookwood Cemetery, the largest cemetery in western Europe and, indeed, in the world when it opened in 1854. Until 1941 it was served by a rail service known as the Coffin Express, running on the Necropolis Line from Waterloo. According to one story, golfers used the service to get to Brookwood Golf Club but had to wear mourning; since golfers are notorious for their lack of fashion sense, that can only have been an improvement. The 220 hectares are used by Woking people as an extended and presumably rather poignant park on their doorstep. Brookwood Military Cemetery, the last resting place of Commonwealth and allied victims of two world wars, lies adjacent.
A little way east of town, on the other side of the M25, is Brooklands Museum. If you were to take this in as well you might need to set aside a weekend. Motorsport, aviation and latterly Concorde are all associated with Brooklands. In 2018 it was one of the five nominees for Art Fund Museum of the Year, beaten eventually by Tate St Ives.
Woking 2 Ebbsfleet United 2 Kingfield Stadium, 14 Sep 2019
