FREEDOM PASS WETHERSPOONS PART 4
FREEDOM PASS WETHERSPOONS PART 4
The warmest February of the modern era has coincided with me being able to walk painlessly for the first time in three years following a total hip replacement. So I've been out most days for the last few weeks, a real winter bonus.
I have to be honest and admit that just visiting Wetherspoons can get bit boring as most are pretty similar - which is no criticism. So I've become increasingly more inventive in finding nearby places of interest. Also, for this issue I had a little help from my friends scattered around the capital who have responded admirably to my appeal to meet up in their nearest Spoons.
It's also good to show I'm not just some sad old man roaming the streets of London in a duffle coat and beanie hat carrying a Lidl plastic bag (cue Ralph McTell).
.... and my beanie has cool built-in speakers (£12, Amazon).
The George - Wanstead (part 4)
It's a bit of a shock, but it seems The George is under offer to another chain and may convert to a gastropub. The building is owned by Alan Sugar and Wetherspoons' lease is about to run out. Personally, I will especially miss it as my go-to place for breakfast with the Sunday papers, bottomless coffee and a chat with the scouse cleaner on the state of Liverpool FC. Being adjacent to the tube station it is also the perfect place to intercept visitors. At least The Walnut Tree in Leytonstone is also within walking distance.
There are other Spoons facing closure but that is no indication that Wetherspoons is in trouble. In fact Tim Martin recently said he was looking to expand his 809 pub empire to around one thousand in the near future.
The Plough & Harrow and The William Morris - Hammersmith (with Bob)
It only takes seven minutes to walk/stagger between these two Spoons, both on Hammersmith's King Street where I'm joined by my old (work and flat) mate Bob.
The layout of The Plough and Harrow, named after a pub which once stood nearby, is a bit like a works canteen. Still, the curry and beer were fine. Tegestologists (beer mat collectors) should like the wall décor.
The William Morris is busier, and the more traditional of the two.
From 1878 until his death in 1896 William Morris lived beside the Thames in Hammersmith, at Kelmscott House (below).
In 1816, Sir Francis Ronalds ran the world's first electric telegraph from the garden of Kelmscott House to a spot eight miles away. At the time his invention was rejected as being 'wholly unnecessary" by Sir John Barrow, Secretary at the Admiralty. Two decades would pass before it came into general use.
Kelmscott House is next door to The Dove, one of London's most historic pubs. It was established in the early 18th century.
The front bar (above, right) is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the smallest public bar in the UK.
Apart from being William Morris's local, The Dove has also been patronised by Graham Greene, Ernest Hemingway and Dylan Thomas. Charles II brought his mistress Nell Gwynne here. And, in 1740, it is alleged James Thompson wrote the lyrics to Rule Britannia! over a pint in The Dove.
Doves Press books had their own unique typeface, Doves Type. It was cut by Morris's punchcutter Edward Prince.
The partnership between Cobden-Sanderson and Walker was dissolved in 1908. As part of the dissolution agreement, all rights to Doves Type were to pass to Walker on the death of Cobden-Sanderson. But, to prevent this, Cobden-Sanderson, over 170 visits, threw the matrices and punches off Hammersmith Bridge into the Thames.
In 2015, designer Robert Green recovered 150 pieces of the original type from the riverbed and re-created Doves Type.
Gustav Holst taught at St Paul's Girls School in Hammersmith from 1905. He wrote most of The Planets there and is remembered with a blue plaque. It's still a girls school. So, Bob and I, who both worked at the BBC in the 1970s, thought it wise not to check it out. Just three years before his death in 1934 Holst wrote his Hammersmith Suite.
The Rocket - Putney (with Penny, Annette and Badger)
This superb pub is the only Wetherspoons actually on the Thames. It is housed in what was previously the Rocket Restaurant, alongside Putney Bridge.
Since 1845, the starting point of the University Boat Race has been run from Putney to Mortlake. But you won't see any of it from The Rocket as the starting is the other side of the bridge - as is the finish at Mortlake.
I was intrigued to discover Putney has an Antique Breadboard Museum. (If you don't believe me click here). But sadly they have very limited opening hours, 'by appointment'.
So, instead I took a thirty minute walk along the Thames from The Rocket to ....
The final two photos are of birds not originally native to these shores. Before Captain Cook arrived in 1778 there were 25,000 Hawaiian Geese (or Nēnēs) living on the Hawaiian Islands. But, dodo-like, they naively ambled straight up to the early settlers. A hundred years later, mongooses (mongeese?) were introduced and the Hawaii Goose was well-and-truly cooked. By 1949 only 30 of Hawaii's state bird remained. They were saved from extinction by being bred in sanctuaries like the London Wetlands Centre. But the total population is still less than 4,000, including 800 returned to the wild, making the Nēnē the world's rarest goose.
By contrast, Rose Ring Parakeets are thriving all over London. It is alleged they are all descended from one pair of escapees who were either pets of Jimi Hendrix or extras during the filming of The African Queen. But the most likely explanation is that in the early 1950s there was a parrot flu (psittacosis) scare in Britain. It can be fatal for humans if caught from pet birds. So it's almost certain some people took the precaution of releasing their parakeets into the wild.
* NB Parakeet is the generic name for many small and medium-sized parrots including budgerigars.
The Goodman's Field - Whitechapel
This busy modern city pub stands in the area originally known as Goodman’s Fields, named after Roland Goodman, a prosperous fishmonger who farmed the land for the nearby nunnery.
The impressive mural in nearby St George's Gardens commemorates The Battle of Cable Street ....
Many Jews lived in the area and they were joined by the Irish, socialists, communists and anarchists to confront the Blackshirts. When Mosley saw what they were up against he took his marchers elsewhere, leaving the police to battle with the counter-protesters, around 150 of whom were arrested. Following the Battle of Cable Street political parties were banned from wearing uniforms and it became illegal to march without permission from the police.
It's a bit of a mystery as to why Mosley is depicted in his underwear. The red plaque is on the junction of Cable Street and Dock Road.
The Jack the Ripper Museum is also nearby. If you need a barber Jack the Clipper isn't far; likewise Jack the Chipper. But you don't come to Whitechapel for fish and chips when you can go for a curry in Brick Lane. I tried Sheba which was voted the best curry house in the UK in 2015. The food and service was very good, but a tad pricey, perhaps cashing in on their former glories.
Originally an ale house in the mid 1700s, Wilton's became a 'Magnificent New Music Hall' in 1859. Many of the original features have been retained and you get the impression 1859 was the last time it was painted. But that all adds to the atmosphere.
I didn't know what to expect. But that's the beauty of these Wetherspoons throw-of-the-dice experiences. The Tiger Lillies are described as a macabre three-piece band featuring accordion, theremin and musical saw. David Hoyle is a gay cross-dressing performance artist from Blackpool. So, plenty to feed my dark sense of humour. Plus, the audience, as always, was eccentric and friendly, especially the nice lady from Budapest sitting next to me.
J.J. Moons - Ruislip Manor (with Paul & Badger)
On our way to lunch somewhere somewhat more salubrious in the wilds of Uxbridge we met up in this pleasant bog-standard Spoons. Some interesting retro adverts adorn the walls.
The Sovereign of the Seas - Petts Wood (with Ken and Martin)
For over two hundred years, England's leading shipbuilders were the Pett family. The Sovereign of the Seas was the finest ship of her age, designed for Charles I in 1634 by Phineas Pett who leased Petts Wood to provide timber for his ships. It was the first ship to have three full gundecks, carrying 102 guns, and was elaborately adorned with gilded carvings by Anthony van Dyck.
Phineas Pett's son Peter supervised the construction of the Sovereign of the Seas at Woolwich Dockyard. The actually wood, somewhat smaller, still exists and is owned by the National Trust. We would have visited it but there was heavy rain all day.
The Great Harry - Woolwich (with Don & Tony)
Henry, Grace a Dieu (Henry, thanks be to God), better known as The Great Harry was built from 1512-1514 for Henry VIII at his new Woolwich Dockyard. At the time she was the biggest and most powerful warship in the world.
Unfortunately the ship was top heavy, making her unstable and her guns ineffectual in anything other than becalmed seas. This was much improved with a remodelling in 1536.
Woolwich Dockyard closed in 1869. Many other famous ships were built there including Charles Darwin's HMS Beagle and HMS Repulse, the last wooden battleship built for the Royal Navy.
Woolwich is in the borough of Royal Greenwich, twinned with the borough of Reinickendorf in Berlin. Buddy Bear, opposite the pub, was a gift from Reinickendorf in 2016 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the twinning.
The Royal Arsenal at Woolwich was founded in the 17th century. By the time of the First World War it had reached it's peak, employing over 80,000 people in an area covering two square miles within which was 120 miles of railway track. Thereafter it was gradually scaled down and closed in 1967.
In 1893 Woolwich Arsenal, founded by munitions workers, was the first club in the south of England to join the football league. They moved north of the Thames in 1913 and became Arsenal FC, the Gunners, a team we all love ..... or hate.
I took the Woolwich Ferry home and two buses (top deck) home. It's certainly not the quickest route but more interesting than going underground. I was the only foot passenger on the ferry which is mainly used by commercial vehicles too big for the Blackwall Tunnel. There are two boats - the Dame Vera Lynn and the Ben Woollacott - continually criss-crossing the Thames.
East Ham-born Vera Lynn (1917-2020) was the Adele of her time - and the 'Forces Sweetheart' during WWII. In 1952 - singing Auf Wiederseh'n Sweetheat - Vera was the first British performer to top the US charts. In 2009, aged 92, she became the oldest person to top the UK album charts (comfortably knocking Bob Dylan off that perch).
Ben Woollacott was a teenage deckhand on the Woolwich ferry who accidentally drowned in 2011 whilst untying mooring ropes. He came from a family of Thames watermen who had worked on the river for six generations.
The Moon on the Square - Feltham (with Chu and Barry)
The Moon on the Square, a Wetherspoons since the early 1990s, was formerly The Cricketers public house.
The charming Man on the Moon mobile is upstairs by the toilets (a mere two flights).
Feltham's two most famous former residents both started life in Africa:
Freddie Mercury (Farrokh Bulsara) was born in Zanzibar in 1946. There's a blue plaque outside 22 Gladstone Avenue, Feltham.
Sir Mo Farah (Hussein Abdi Kahin) was born in Somalia in 1983. He studied at Feltham Community College and ran for Feltham Athletics club.
The Red Lion & Pineapple - Acton (with Badger, Carol, Phil and Heather)
With over 500 establishments, The Red Lion is the most common pub name in the UK; but I'm pretty sure there is only one Red Lion and Pineapple.
There were originally two pubs side-by-side here - The Old Red Lion and The Pine Apple. They were both demolished in 1906 to make way for road-widening.
Within a couple of years a new pub with its unique name opened. What looks like the original red lion stands on the front parapet. I'm guessing there never was a pineapple. I can recall visiting the Red Lion and Pineapple in the 1970s when it was a Fullers pub, memorably with a tree growing through the centre. The tree is no more. The locals now call it 'The Goldfish Bowl' as it stands on the corner of two roads with the windows curving around a circular bar.
The video for the Flying Pickets hit 'Only You' was filmed in the pub in 1983. It looked very different from now. Also, there's no sign of the tree so maybe it had been removed by then.
After wetting our whistles in the Red Lion and Pineapple we headed for Java Fusion, a new Malaysian restaurant which Phil and Heather recently discovered. My late wife Keng-Gah was Chinese Malaysian so I can confidently report without fear of contradiction that this place is a gem - and already very popular. I have a delicious Nasi Kerabu. The blue colour of the rice comes from the petals of butterfly-pea flowers. I doesn't take much imagination to work out why the Latin name for butter-pea flowers is Clitoria ternatea.
Yes, we know Java is part of Indonesia not Malaysia, but didn't ask the obvious question. Anyhow, the predominant population (and cuisine) in both countries is Malay.
The London Transport Museum Depot in Acton is where they store the 320,000 items they don't have room for in Covent Garden's London Transport Museum. On a few weekends a year they have open days which are ticketed and well worth a visit. Allow plenty of time.
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TO FOLLOW IN PART 5 ....
The Hart and Spool - Borehamwood
The Fox on the Hill - Denmark Hill
The Kentish Drovers - Peckham
The Beaten Docket - Cricklewood
The Coronation Hall - Surbiton
The King's Tun - Kingston
The William Webb Ellis - Twickenham
The Moon and Sixpence - Hatch End
The Moon on the Hill - Sutton
STILL TO VISIT ....
The Willow Walk, Victoria SW1V 1LW
The Holland Tringham - Streatham SW16 1HJ
The Good Yarn - Uxbridge UB8 1JX
The Tichenham Inn - Ickenham UB10 8DF
The Village Inn - Rayners Lane HA5 5DY
The Greenwood Hotel - Northolt UB5 4LA
The Greyhound - Bromley BR1 INY
J.J. Moon's - Kingsbury NW9 9EL
J.J. Moon's - Wembley HA9 6AA
The Barking Dog - Barking IG11 8TU currently closed for refurbishment.
The Moon & Stars - Penge SE20 7QS
The Moon Under Water - Norbury SW16 4AU
The Moon Under Water - Watford WD17 2BS
The Moon Under Water - Hounslow TW3 3LF
The New Cross Turnpike - Welling DA16 3PB
The Nonsuch Inn - North Cheam SM3 9AA
The Richmal Crompton - Bromley BR1 1DS
The Sir Julian Huxley - Selsdon CR2 8LB
The Tailor's Chalk - Sidcup DA14 6ED
The Whispering Moon - Wallington SM6 8QF
The Wibbas Down Inn - Wimbledon SW19 1QT
The Furze Wren - Bexleyheath DA6 7DY
The Wrong 'Un - Bexleyheath DA6 8AS
The Star Light - Heathrow Airport Terminal 4 airside
The Crown Rivers - Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 airside
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