Ever wanted to be part of a real ghost investigation?
Lazy Hound Productions will be staking out Enfield’s Hop Poles tonight to see if George, the pub’s resident poltergeist, will put in an appearance. The ghost is said to be that of a pot boy who was killed on Lancaster Road over a hundred years ago. According to the site, the pub is scary enough for a Sky TV to have fled, leaving their equipment behind them.
The investigation begins at 9pm and participants will be provided with including Infrared Cameras, Digital Voice Recorders and EMF Meters. Those with a nervous disposition should not attend.
For further information, advice on last minute ticket availability and future events, call 07920 875840, email bookings@lazyhound.biz or call into The Hop Poles. For more scary videos visit http://www.lazyhound.biz/
Hear a spooky voice (or a creaking door) recorded at the Hop Poles here.
Its been a busy October for us Palmers Greeners. A few of the things we learned this month …
Enfield Council, together with the Broomfield House Trust and Friends of Broomfield Park put in a £4 million bid to the Heritage lottery fund to restore Broomfield House. There is a new website to accompany the bid. We should find out whether it has been successful in February 2013 … David Burrowes MP could be getting his edges tweaked in the new constituency boundary changes prop0sed by the Boundary Commission. The changes are currently subject to consultation … Theresa May announced that Palmers Green hacker Gary McKinnon will not stand trial in the US after a long national campaign. David Burrowes threatened to resign as PPS if McKinnon was extradited … Well over one thousand people in people in Enfield had already signed up to the petition about local control of GP services as part of the campaign being run by 38 Degrees – sign and view the latest total visit http://action.38degrees.org.uk/ccg_postcode. A meeting was held at the Harvester in Arnos Grove to discuss how to ensure the Clinical Commissioning Group being established for Enfield takes into account the wishes of local people …
Worried about neighbours building a sky scraper in their back garden and overshadowing your dahlias? Enfield Council said no how, no way, were they going to implement the government’s changes to the planning system, while in another part of the forest, delegates at the recent conference of Civic Voice also called on the government to scrap the proposals … The North West London Waste Authority began a charm offensive, with a stall in Morrisons and local leafleting. There, a massive incinerator on your doorstep at Pinkham Way doesn’t seem nearly as bad now, does it? …..
If you are planning a Sunday trip up town, First Capital Connect provide some advice on how you can get there in only an hour and a half – pretty much no direct trains to Kings Cross until Christmas on a Sunday, unless you get up early. ……. heading the other way up the railway line, a new farmers market opened at Crews Hill. Good reports so far and we wish them wellbut it is a little bit naughty to say on their website that they are the first and only farmers market in the borough of Enfield. It would be lovely if a few more people could visit our long established farmers market in Palmers Green – Sundays, station car park. There have been a few new stalls recently, and with more footfall it could expand further.
This month we also learned that …
Image reproduced by kind permission of James Birtwistle
in the old days, you could crash your plane into a roof in Palmers Green, and calmly smoke a cigarette before even bothering to climb down …. Myddleton Road was once paved with wood …. Southgate Town Hall is featured in the new Morse prequel Endeavour … The Duke of Chandos may once have lived at Broomfield House, and the Lanscroon murals currently reputed to be languishing in the basement of the Town Hall could have been created to impress a monarch. We also heard about the charms of the long gone Broomfield House Museum… but could it live again?
And finally
David Waumsley of the wonderful Palmers Green based Art Cove cards (sold by Anita at PG station cafe) challenged us to a Smiths lyrics stand off a la Chris Packham, and got bored before we did. I am sure that a common experience among PGJITN’s readers. Without the Smiths bit.
Anyway, enough wittering. If there is a topic you would like to write about, why not get in touch, especially if its about history and people? We would love to hear from you. There is a huge knowledge about Palmers Green out there … lets try and put it all together.
May November bring you great good fortune.
Sue, Palmers Green Jewel in the North
Coming soon
Friday 2 November Bob Mills at the Electric Mouse Comedy Club at the Fox. Ricky Grover will also be performing in December.
Sunday 4 November Preparing the Garden of Remembrance in Broomfield Park for Remembrance Sunday. If you have some time to come and help park staff, please come to the Garden between 10 and 12
Friday 9 November Big Green Bookshop Bookswap featuring special guest the Rev Richard Coles Great Northern Hotel Hornsey (new bigger venue for this regular event from the fantastic independent Wood Green bookshop)
Sunday 18 November Herbs and their uses at the conservatory Broomfield Park
If you were a child (or even an adult) in Palmers Green between 1925 and the early 1980s, chances are that a highlight of a visit to Broomfield Park would have been a nose around Broomfield House Museum.
“The idea of setting up a museum was first proposed in around 1912 by a Councillor Carpenter”, explains Peter Brown of the Broomfield Museum Trust, the small charity which was set up to keep alive the idea of a museum following the fire at the house in the 1980s.
“The move had followed a landmark case in Sunderland where it had been ruled that a museum could be set up in a public park (and fall within the legal definition of being for the ‘public benefit’) provided that it did not exceed one 10th of the area of the park.”
Opened in 1925, the museum was based on a collection of gifts of local people.
“It wasn’t intended to be a highly prestigious collection. It was a place you could take children. There was a stuffed fox, stuffed fish, a working beehive, a chest of narrow drawers with lots of butterflies and moths – children loved exploring it.”
Some of the contents of the museum were lost in the 1984 fire; others are now thought to be at Forty Hall.
The other cause for many visits to the house was of course the murals on the great staircase. We know them as the Lanscroon murals today, but according to the book Village London, first published in the 1880s, it was once thought that they were the work, not of Gerard Lanscroon, but of a much more famous artist, Sir James Thornhill (famous for his work at Greenwich Hospital, Chatsworth and his scenes from the life of St Paul in the cupola of St Paul’s Cathedral)
“The ceiling had floating angels and a beautiful lady who held a carpenters plane,” says Peter. “But why is a matter of conjecture.”
“Perhaps the Duke of Chandos may have lived at Broomfield House for a time; Chandos had ambitions to be warden of Enfield Chase and in 1728 he succeeded.”
“The lady may have been an allusion to Judith Jackson who owned Broomfield House; the plane may indicate that she was responsible for the staircase and the extension to the house where it was situated. It was rumoured that Chandos had ambitions to entertain George II at the house, and perhaps the murals were part of the preparation. Unfortunately Chandos never realised his ambition.”
Though the house is currently dilapidated, hopes for its restoration have been recently revived with the new £4 million bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund by Enfield Council in conjunction with the Friends of Broomfield Park. Meanwhile, the Broomfield Museum Trust continues mainly as a publisher of pamphlets, drawing on their research on the area.
Peter Brown will be speaking on the history of Broomfield Park on 24 January at Trinity at Bowes. The talk starts at 2pm and is an event not to be missed.
Peter will also be speaking on Overend and Gurney and the history of Chitts Hill, a now long lost great house in Wood Green, at the Edmonton Hundred Day Conference at Jubilee Hall Enfield on 27th October.
A full list of the Trusts books and leaflets about the area can be obtained by writing to the Trust c/o 37 Belsize Avenue, N13 4TL.
Palmers Green Triangle – an illustration by Peter Brown (c) Peter Brown/Broomfield Museum Trust
Could today be the day that Broomfield House’s fortunes finally begin to turn around?
Earlier today Enfield Council, in partnership with the Broomfield House Trust and Friends of Broomfield Park, formally submitted their four million pound bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund to restore the house to its former glory. The aim is to restore the House as faithfully as possible to its nineteenth century appearance, without the mock Tudor facade which was added in the 1930s.
A new website, www.broomfieldhouse.org, has been set up to support the bid and tell the story of the house.
A decision on the bid is expected in February 2013.
Autumn draws in, the leaves are browning. Time to jump on a train and do some pre Christmas shopping, catch a show, meet up with friends.
Well, you cant.
Trains from Palmers Green into Kings Cross are subject to disruption every Sunday from now until Christmas.
First Capital connect suggest that as an alternative, you might like to head north to Enfield Chase, walk to Enfield Town, jump on a Liverpool Street train, get off at Seven Sisters and make your journey from there by tube. It will only take you an hour and a half.
Gary McKinnon, the Palmers Green resident who hacked into US military computers, is to be spared extradition to the USA.
Home secretary Theresa May has this lunchtime announced that the threat posed to McKinnon’s health was too great. Speaking a few moments ago, May said
“After careful consideration of all of the relevant material, I have concluded that Mr McKinnon’s extradition would give rise to such a high risk of him ending his life that a decision to extradite would be incompatible with Mr McKinnon’s human rights. I have therefore withdrawn the extradition order against Mr McKinnon.
The Director of Public Prosecutions will now decide if McKinnon has a case to answer in a UK court. McKinnon, who has Aspergers Syndrome, has admitted to hacking, but claims that he was looking for evidence of UFOs. He has waited 11 years for a decision on his case.
David Burrowes had threatened to resign his unpaid post of Parliamentary Private Secretary) if McKinnon was extradited
Lazy Hound Productions will be staking out Enfield’s Hop Poles tonight to see if George, the pub’s resident poltergeist, will put in an appearance. The ghost is said to be that of a pot boy who was killed on Lancaster Road over a hundred years ago. According to the site, the pub is scary enough for a Sky TV to have fled, leaving their equipment behind them.
