Prefabs

Trojan · Post by **Trojan** » Thu 25 Sep, 2008 10:38 pm

I saw this in the paper this morninghttp://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2008/ ... -20751505/

bluebell · Post by **bluebell** » Sat 08 Nov, 2008 1:54 am

Hi, just joined today.I left Leeds in 1954 but I have always been interested in the place I grew up in. We did not feel poor in post-war austerity Yorkshire and I had an idyllic childhood on a Leeds council estate 1947-54.I lived in a prefab in Queenswood Drive from 1947 until about 1953.We then moved into a brand new council house up the road in Queenswood Drive as did our neighbours.My father died suddenly at 39 in 1954. He worked at Fairbairn Lawson Coombe Barbour & son (think that may be nearly right!) and my mother and I moved back home to our birthplace in Dundee. I was nine years old then.I have some photos and look forward to adding them and hearing from you guys. Oh.. and I saw an Avro Vulcan flying up Queenswood Drive (lol) in the early 1950s before we had ever seen a triangular aircraft!!!

BLAKEY · Post by **BLAKEY** » Sat 08 Nov, 2008 11:31 am

bluebell wrote: Hi, just joined today.I lived in a prefab in Queenswood Drive from 1947 until about 1953.We then moved into a brand new council house up the road in Queenswood Drive as did our neighbours.My father died suddenly at 39 in 1954. He worked at Fairbairn Lawson Coombe Barbour & son (think that may be nearly right!) and my mother and I moved back home to our birthplace in Dundee. I was nine years old then.I have some photos and look forward to adding them and hearing from you guys. Oh.. and I saw an Avro Vulcan flying up Queenswood Drive (lol) in the early 1950s before we had ever seen a triangular aircraft!!! Hello Bluebell, and a very warm welcome from ....yes, you've guessed it - the Headingley end of Queenswood Drive, where I live in a multi storey block of flats built in 1964, so I daresay you've never seen the two towers.You have the name of your Dad's firm spot on - although "Fairbairn Lawsons" has been demolished long ago to make way for a new road layout and the inner city loop road.We look forward to hearing many more of your memories about this area in "your day."Take care.

bluebell · Post by **bluebell** » Sat 08 Nov, 2008 5:21 pm

We were in digs firstly in Chapeltown 1946-47 and the prefabs completion was delayed by the appalling winter. We moved in in about April 1947 (according to my mother who is nearly 90).Our prefabs were located on the sw side of Queenswood Drive - probably near those cul de sacs named Woodbridge ......This picture is taken at the back of one of them. c1950. (PROBABLY MORE LIKELY 1948 OR 1949)I am the boy in the centre front.Either side of me are my best pals, brother and sister whose father - a policeman - became well known in the City.I cannot remember names of others.One is possibly a boy whose father "had been a Hurricane pilot" and was now a bus driver with the corporation. Name was Collinson. I remember being impressed when we were on a single decker and could see thro the glass he was driving. Incidentally, the (double decker) bus terminus (citybound) was across the road from our prefabs - would it be no 75 service? We look like urchins but did not know we were not rich - everyone around us was more or less equal.The prefabs were scorching hot in great summers like those of the late 1940s, but were cold in winter.My father, working class, but very academic, was forced to leave school in Dundee at 16 due to family circumstances - home being a 2-roomed temement for granny/grandpa, my father two uncles and my aunt!I remember him going to the tests at Headingley - his peers in the Scottish industrial city that was home would have been horrified! (but perhaps not surprised).My memories include talk of Len Hutton, Pudsey, Stanley Mathews and during the day hearing the summertime drawl of John Arlott (IIRC) on the radio. Dan Dare on Radio Luxemburg at abot 7pm was another thing we listened to. Children do not concern themselves with damp and condensation prevalent in prefabs at that time, but I remember how impressed I was when my dad got his best suit out of my bedroom wardrobe and it was bluey-green with mould!I regarded the part of my childhood spent on a post war council estate in Leeds as an idyllic time.

bluebell · Post by **bluebell** » Sat 08 Nov, 2008 5:26 pm

sundowner · Post by **sundowner** » Sat 08 Nov, 2008 8:59 pm

bluebell wrote: We were in digs firstly in Chapeltown 1946-47 and the prefabs completion was delayed by the appalling winter. We moved in in about April 1947 (according to my mother who is nearly 90).Our prefabs were located on the sw side of Queenswood Drive - probably near those cul de sacs named Woodbridge ......This picture is taken at the back of one of them. c1950.I am the boy in the centre front.Either side of me are my best pals, brother and sister whose father - a policeman - became well known in the City.I cannot remember names of others.One is possibly a boy whose father "had been a Hurricane pilot" and was now a bus driver with the corporation. Name was Collinson. I remember being impressed when we were on a single decker and could see thro the glass he was driving. Incidentally, the (double decker) bus terminus (citybound) was across the road from our prefabs - would it be no 75 service? We look like urchins but did not know we were not rich - everyone around us was more or less equal.The prefabs were scorching hot in great summers like those of the late 1940s, but were cold in winter.My father, working class, but very academic, was forced to leave school in Dundee at 16 due to family circumstances - home being a 2-roomed temement for granny/grandpa, my father two uncles and my aunt!I remember him going to the tests at Headingley - his peers in the Scottish industrial city that was home would have been horrified! (but perhaps not surprised).My memories include talk of Len Hutton, Pudsey, Stanley Mathews and during the day hearing the summertime drawl of John Arlott (IIRC) on the radio. Dan Dare on Radio Luxemburg at abot 7pm was another thing we listened to. Children do not concern themselves with damp and condensation prevalent in prefabs at that time, but I remember how impressed I was when my dad got his best suit out of my bedroom wardrobe and it was bluey-green with mould!I regarded the part of my childhood spent on a post war council estate in Leeds as an idyllic time. Hi Bluebell i have said on SL in the past it did us no harm to grow up in that environment to me it was a good start in life.I have drawn from it ever since i might be a bit set in my ways but i have allways been fair and would sooner do someone a good turn than a bad one.I never yern for things i dont have i have a lot more than i ever had when i was a kid and im thankfull for that. By this i mean creature comforts money is not a big deal to me has long as i can pay the bills and we are all healthy and happy thats enough for me.I try to bring my grand children up with the same outlook but we live in differant times i just hope a bit rubs off if it does i will be a happy man.We may have been snotty nosed little kids but didnt we have great times.

Brandy · Post by **Brandy** » Sun 09 Nov, 2008 1:14 am

bluebell wrote: d Brilliant picture bluebellBut i bet you cant remember what was going on to the right of the photo,where three of you are looking lolThe kid on the far right looks like a young Pete TownsendA warm Welcome to the site also

bluebell · Post by **bluebell** » Sun 09 Nov, 2008 3:41 pm

Here is a view taken at the rear (SW side) of our prefab on Queenswood Drive.About 1948.

bluebell · Post by **bluebell** » Sun 09 Nov, 2008 5:08 pm

My mother thinks our prefab address was 123 Queenswood Drive.Here is a picture of my mother (about 29 years old) holding a neighbour's baby which had just been christened (Alan Hind, IIRC). The picture was taken in the garden of our neighbour's prefab.My mum who is now in her 90th year, reckons this must be about1948. She says she was proudly wearing the post-war "new look", but typically for the times, she had inherited it from her brother-in-law's blonde "girlfriend" ("they were always blonde...!") of the moment!Interestingly, the embossed street sign to the left of my mother says "Woodbridge Cross" if enlarged and mirrored.I reckon from maps this is now called Woodbridge Close.Our prefab was on the southeast corner of the Queenswood Drive/Woodbridge Cross junction and our neighbour (and new baby and its brother) lived across Woodbridge Cross on the NW corner.Straight across from our prefab, the ground was still vacant with small trees and hawthorn bushes. I believe after we left Leeds in 1954 a pub was built there. "Google satellite" shows a largeish building with a car park. As I said in an earlier post, a bus terminus for into town was located across the road from us and just down the Drive. The two-storey semi-detached houses across the road (looking northeast) were being built at the time and we in the prefabs moved a few hundred metres northwest up Queenswood Drive to live in them. I was only nine when I left Leeds, but those houses were of great quality, I would say.Beyond the new houses can be seen mature trees, almost certainly within the Beckett Park estate. The fences had gaps in them and everyone walked freely in there. For us kids, it was paradise - and a refuge. Especially if the watchman on the building site found us playing among the bricks, cement, lime and other dangerous building paraphenalia and we had to run like hell!

bluebell · Post by **bluebell** » Sun 09 Nov, 2008 5:10 pm

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