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Toftwood Road, SHEFFIELD, S10 1SJ

Between the telephone pole and the electric light is the remains of a sewer gas light. It was always lit, so why doesn't it need to be now I wonder.

There is a gap in the terraced housing. Where the next house in the row used to be was the first house my mother and father rented. I was three at the time. We spent one of the worst winters in living memory in that house at no.56 In total, six houses were demolished and one bungalow was built in their place.

The first house my wife and I ever owned. We turned into a seven-roomed house, from four. We set a trend by installing a dormer window, but building an extension out back never caught on. We were also the first to have the gas and electric meters fitted outside, but it was a big mistake moving the gas meter as it froze up in winter. We decided to knock the wall down in between the lounge and dining room. It was interesting lifting the 13'6" girder up into place. Having the walls sandblasted and waterproofed was OK in one respect, because it spoiled the look of it. It hasn't weathered much in 42 years, so it just shows what the lack of coal fires does. We installed central heating the year we left.

The road faces westwards – From 2nd September 1967 to 4th January 1974, I lived in a house on the brow of the hill and after a late–shift on a cold windy winter’s night, walking around the corner from getting off a moderately warm bus around 00:30 – this road was like the road to the frozen north. The cold prevailing wind would freeze my face numb before I got anywhere near home. On early morning shifts, walking down the road at 03:40 to catch the staff bus, it was no better. In the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, when I was a young lad, I used to go to work on my bike. Home back then was through the entrance to the right. So after work I would belt off home as fast as I could and then turn left off the main road, then a quick sharp right and hurtle into the yard as fast as I could make it, day after day after day. One day there was a car parked at the entrance and I slammed into it, like an idiot. The bloke in the car just wound down the window and told me to be more careful!

The rear entrance to the properties 235-239 Crookes. Unusually, the houses on Toftwood Road, at left, start at number six. The two houses in the distance are on Bolehill Lane.

The infield of this famous cricket ground was the yard. The outfield was anywhere out the yard, especially over the rooftops. The boundary was the tram tracks. The wickets, now faded away, were chalk marks once drawn on the brickwork to the right of this former garage. The match was declared over at teatime, dark or when a tram cut the ball in half. If the latter happened early on, the game reverted to hide & seek, marbles, or tig. For a wider view of the ground http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1234094#form

At the age of seven, way back in 1949, when I lived here above the former Sheffield Savings Bank http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1232062 this was a little known, but World Class cricket ground. From 1949 to the early ‘50s, many test matches were played here and many a sixer was belted out of the boundary only to fall foul of the dreaded tramcar wheels on the main road. The wickets were scrawled in chalk on the right–hand corner of the then garage. It can be seen here though that the garage doors have been removed and the garage turned into an outbuilding. Remarkably, only one window was ever broken and that was due to substituting the rubber ball for a golf ball. I dread to think what the result would have been if it had connected with the bowler’s head. Back then, the ground seemed so big and it was certainly in better condition. There were no Wheelie bins, only a bin for the waste bits of meat from Peat’s butchers shop. At times there was a bit of a hum from the bin, but on cold days it wasn’t too bad. The corrugated sheeting of the add–on was painted black back then and the building was a handy leg–up when the ball got lodged in the guttering. Similarly, an outside toilet that was to the right and at the back of the fence was useful for access to the upstairs kitchen window when I came home from school and no one was in.

I remember a time when there wasn't a lean-to here and the doorway was a mirror of the one on the left. It was built in the '50s and back then it was metal, rather than asbestos and painted black. The other must have rusted away. It was handy to climb on to retrieve tennis balls out of the gutter, not that there is a gutter on the extension now. It's remains are lying on top of the lean-to. As a child, I often wondered what the shopkeeper used the lean-to for, but never asked. The shop is A & K - Butcher’s Shop. It was Peat's back then and next door was Melias - Fruit & Veg, which later became Joe Winter & Son - Plumber and Building Contractor. The next property on is F.A.B.L.E. - Charity Shop, which used to be the Sheffield Savings Bank. The bank had a nine-roomed flat and this is where I lived with my parents. At the other side of us was a Bakers and Confectioners. Very handy, but we never monopolised them because they hosted cockroaches, which occasionally came through to the flat. They had a dough mixer, which droned on for hours sometimes. I don't know where they had the ovens, but they didn't keep our flat warm. Every winter our bath, wash hand basin and toilet froze solid.

Back when I was a child this yard had a smooth surface and was ideal for hopscotch and cricket. I've belted many a 'sixer' over these roofs, which was pretty easy as we used a sponge ball, or a tennis ball. There was an iron drain cover at the far end of the yard and we used to play marbles around it. The various passages, nooks and crannies and lowed walled gardens here and about offered excellent places for hide and seek. I got 'caught' smoking behind the lean-to once, by a policeman who came to check if the bank's (more about that here - http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/2181581 ) doors were locked. I was only eleven. My school mate nicked the cigarettes from his mother's shop and taught me how to smoke. Not a lot to thank him for. Across the road is http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1232525 Present Moments - Card & Gift shop, which was Macduff - Fruit & Veg Shop. As a child I once dug a trench through the thick snow for my mother to get to the shop. A bit later a milk float came down the road and bounced up and down the trench. I legged it when I heard the crashing of glass.

A general view of Crookes as seen from the bottom of Toftwood Road.