Lenton flats - memories


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Hello there,

I work for Nottingham City Homes and as part of the huge redevelopment we're currently doing in Radford and Lenton, we've been looking at the social history surrounding the building and history of the communities of the Lenton and Radford high-rise flats. I'd love to to hear the memories of anybody who remembers them being built, or who lived in or near them at any point.

Also, I've noticed there are a couple of threads including photos of the flats being demolished. If people would like me to post regular photos in this forum from the time-lapse camera we've got at the very top of Newgate Court (the one closest to Derby Road) then let me know and i will do :). I can also try my best to answer any other questions you might have about the works going on

Really looking forward to hearing what memories people have! :)

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Thought this may be of interest to some people, too. It shows Clifford Court in Radford being demolished earlier this year. Builders are on-site now and construction work is supposed to be going full steam ahead soon.

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Welcome Kay.

We look forward to your input for posterity :)

As a Kid in the 60s I played in the derelict houses that stood before the flats were built.

I lived Norton Street/Hartley Road junction. Later we played on the building site for the flats.

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as a teenagerin the 60s we had a friend who sadly died after falling out of the window of the 15th floor of newgate court his firt name was grenvil and he lived with his mum in this flat he always maintained it was inposible to fall out the windows but he did just one week after ia a few others had been in the flat for coffee after a night out i was not there the night it happened but several of the same people were..

in the 80s i did a lot of voluntary work at the local community centre one of those jobs was with the over 60s lunch club one of the things i used to do was fetch and returnby wheel chair some of the group who could not get there under their own steam many of our group lived in the flats and i had at least one person in every block some of them i would make two trips to and fromthe flats it always was a very nice community to work in the problems arose if the lifts were out of order some times i had to take the people back to the community centre to wait for the lifts to be sorted out befor they could go home other times it ment they could be strandded in the flats as it was imposible to get them down the steps for some it was their only trip out of their flats all week leaving them feeling very isolated, but i can not remember one of them saying they did not like living there the flats were warm and cosy when you were in them a lot of the later problems when they started moving in lots of young people among the already aging population some of who were very anti social loud music parting till the early hours ect this was i think when things realy started going wrong in the flats

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Welcome Kay.

We look forward to your input for posterity :)

As a Kid in the 60s I played in the derelict houses that stood before the flats were built.

I lived Norton Street/Hartley Road junction. Later we played on the building site for the flats.

Kids playing on the building site!! I can imagine the sharp intake of breath I'm going to get from the builders we've got on site now when I tell them that one!! I must admit though, I've been on site a couple of times now since work started and find it really interesting, so it's only to be expected that kids would love it if they could get on and have a play!

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as a teenagerin the 60s we had a friend who sadly died after falling out of the window of the 15th floor of newgate court his firt name was grenvil and he lived with his mum in this flat he always maintained it was inposible to fall out the windows but he did just one week after ia a few others had been in the flat for coffee after a night out i was not there the night it happened but several of the same people were..

in the 80s i did a lot of voluntary work at the local community centre one of those jobs was with the over 60s lunch club one of the things i used to do was fetch and returnby wheel chair some of the group who could not get there under their own steam many of our group lived in the flats and i had at least one person in every block some of them i would make two trips to and fromthe flats it always was a very nice community to work in the problems arose if the lifts were out of order some times i had to take the people back to the community centre to wait for the lifts to be sorted out befor they could go home other times it ment they could be strandded in the flats as it was imposible to get them down the steps for some it was their only trip out of their flats all week leaving them feeling very isolated, but i can not remember one of them saying they did not like living there the flats were warm and cosy when you were in them a lot of the later problems when they started moving in lots of young people among the already aging population some of who were very anti social loud music parting till the early hours ect this was i think when things realy started going wrong in the flats

Sorry to hear about your friend falling out of the window, sadly it seems as though it wasn't an uncommon problem over the years as many people came to the same fate.

It's really interesting what you say about the flats being warm and cosy - loads of news reports from the time they were built say the same thing, however part of the reason we're replacing them is because they're terribly hard to heat. It just shows the differences in people's expectation between then and now. We've also found when looking through old news reports that the quotes about the reasons for slum clearance were along very similar lines to why we're replacing the Radford and Lenton high-rise block... "they're no longer fit for purpose" etc. I've got scans of a couple of news reports if people want me to post them on here :)

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Bit of a memory of Lenton Flats.

My grandma lived in Digby Court approx 1972-77. I remember driving there in my first car - Vauxhall Viva (!) to bring her to our house at Clifton for Sunday tea. I don't remember the inside of the flat at all; she was on the second or third floor and looked out towards Park Street and the 'new' shopping precinct.

She had lived in Lenton for most of her life; in Dunlop Avenue from around 1920 until the mid 1960s. When her husband died, she left Dunlop Avenue and went to the newly-built Hyson Green flats - a bizarre move which I still don't understand. She lived in the Hyson Green disaster for a few years until she transferred to Digby Court.

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The old terrace houses were demolished and replaced by flats.

On a weekend we would go through all the derelict houses looking for stuff that folks had left behind after moving.

I once found a box containing old postcards from around 1914-1920, in one of the dustbins.

Amongst them I remember there being some embroidered cards showing soldiers, sent from France by troops serving during

the first world war.

One day around 1965, I read the Nottingham Evening Post. In it was an article and photo.

"Radford Resident receives Postcard 50 years late". I showed a local couple holding one of the postcards.

One of the postcards! How did it happen, my younger brother had popped one in the postbox.

I went to the address and the occupants just said you cant have it back... weren't interested in the explanation.

Those cards would have been worth a fortune nowadays, dunno what happened to them.

I think me mother must have pout them in the bin?

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I remember Grenvil, the night he died he was drinking in the White Hart, at the table next to some Nottingham Aces and 41 Club bikers including me. I heard that he was trying to prove to some mates that it was impossible to fall out of the window. He got out of the window but his mates could not get him back in. Eventually he slipped from their grasp and fell.

Another of the Aces, Big Baz Price was driving a taxi on Derby road and saw him fall.

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The old terrace houses were demolished and replaced by flats.

On a weekend we would go through all the derelict houses looking for stuff that folks had left behind after moving.

I once found a box containing old postcards from around 1914-1920, in one of the dustbins.

Amongst them I remember there being some embroidered cards showing soldiers, sent from France by troops serving during

the first world war.

One day around 1965, I read the Nottingham Evening Post. In it was an article and photo.

"Radford Resident receives Postcard 50 years late". I showed a local couple holding one of the postcards.

One of the postcards! How did it happen, my younger brother had popped one in the postbox.

I went to the address and the occupants just said you cant have it back... weren't interested in the explanation.

Those cards would have been worth a fortune nowadays, dunno what happened to them.

I think me mother must have pout them in the bin?

That's really cool! Just shows some off the stuff we chuck away without thinking about what it could be worth one day! Saying that, I'm terrible for keeping stuff!

I've heard some pretty interesting stories at work about what's been left behind in some of the flats now as they've been being emptied, although nothing as interesting as old war postcards!

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you are right ace grenvils death would never have happened if he had not have been so obcessed with the fact you could not fall accidently and trying to prove it to others but still a sad loss of a young life, and his mum was a realy nice lady who was often in the whitehart for a drink with him and his friends i know she was never able to go back into the flat and was rehoused shortly after to a bungalow other people had to go in the flat to pack and move her i think grenvil was an only child

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you are right ace grenvils death would never have happened if he had not have been so obcessed with the fact you could not fall accidently and trying to prove it to others but still a sad loss of a young life, and his mum was a realy nice lady who was often in the whitehart for a drink with him and his friends i know she was never able to go back into the flat and was rehoused shortly after to a bungalow other people had to go in the flat to pack and move her i think grenvil was an only child

That does sounds awful, such a terrible accident and loss of young life! I'm not surprised that his mother needed to move after the incident, must have been some really painful memories for her!

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I have some post cards sent to my grandmother from my grandfather who was in the trenches of the great war, in one of them he writes saying "Thankyou for sending me the ham in the tin, I shared it with my friends as the canteen facilities are not very good here at the moment", brings a tear to my eyes when read that one, they are not worth as much as you think Mick, just a few pounds each but these are priceless to me. by the way when he did return home after the war the place wasn't "A place fit for heroes" no jobs and little to eat and he threw his medals down Wilford grove and never spoke of the war, as an aside my Gran and some of her friends used to knit gloves and balaclavas for the troops and sent regular parcels from Bridgeway hall over to them,must have been very comforting for the troops knowing they were'nt forgotten

Rog

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May be of interest . This news clip of residents protesting in an unknown street in Radford in 1967 about being rehoused

http://www.macearchive.org/Archive/Title/midlands-news-25041967-protests-by-residents-at-radford/MediaEntry/10413.html

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That brings back a few memories maternal grandmother lived on a similar street untill 1976 when she died

Grandmother & Grandfather were born Gate Street Radford Woodhouse(next door to each other) (& only a day or so apart) in 1887.

They were married in 1910 & first lived on Guthrie Street(mother born there) till 1929 & then to Middleton Street(No 60) till grandfather died boxing day 1975

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  • 2 weeks later...

I lived in Willoughby court for four years in the early 80's, I hated it, thoroughly. I mean, what kind of council puts a wheelchair user on the 5th floor of a block of high rise flats whose lift systems were always breaking down? The times I was carried down those stairs by my husband so that I could get to work in the morning. And I must have missed out on the community spirit, because I never knew any of the other tenants on my floor. The sooner the better as far as i was concerned.

Whilst I lived there, there was a murder on Frederick Grove just across the way; an old fella had come out of the Happy Return to walk the short distance home. In the pub he'd been spotted with a wadge of cash in his hand, so a couple of youths followed him out, waited a while then broke in and bludgeoned him to death. the police set up an incident caravan in the car park of Willoughby Ct.

I have no pleasant memories attached to the place...

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I have some post cards sent to my grandmother from my grandfather who was in the trenches of the great war, in one of them he writes saying "Thankyou for sending me the ham in the tin, I shared it with my friends as the canteen facilities are not very good here at the moment", brings a tear to my eyes when read that one, they are not worth as much as you think Mick, just a few pounds each but these are priceless to me. by the way when he did return home after the war the place wasn't "A place fit for heroes" no jobs and little to eat and he threw his medals down Wilford grove and never spoke of the war, as an aside my Gran and some of her friends used to knit gloves and balaclavas for the troops and sent regular parcels from Bridgeway hall over to them,must have been very comforting for the troops knowing they were'nt forgotten

Rog

This is so moving! Glad I'm at work, if I'd have been at home I reckon that would have proper brought a tear to my eye! I can't even begin to imagine some of the things the troops back then lived to see, no wonder it was hard for them coming back to a country that was pretty much in tatters and didn't have the means to support them. Especially considering ptsd and such associated things were not as widely supported as they are now - it seems it was very much 'send them back and let them get on with it'.

Interestingly enough (well to me, anyway) I live on Wilford Grove now. I often look out of the window thinking about what it would have been like years ago (I'm a right daydreamer!)

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I lived in Willoughby court for four years in the early 80's, I hated it, thoroughly. I mean, what kind of council puts a wheelchair user on the 5th floor of a block of high rise flats whose lift systems were always breaking down? The times I was carried down those stairs by my husband so that I could get to work in the morning. And I must have missed out on the community spirit, because I never knew any of the other tenants on my floor. The sooner the better as far as i was concerned.

Whilst I lived there, there was a murder on Frederick Grove just across the way; an old fella had come out of the Happy Return to walk the short distance home. In the pub he'd been spotted with a wadge of cash in his hand, so a couple of youths followed him out, waited a while then broke in and bludgeoned him to death. the police set up an incident caravan in the car park of Willoughby Ct.

I have no pleasant memories attached to the place...

It seems as though the general thing is that people tended to quite enjoy living there or absolutely hated it! That even seems to be fairly similar now too - there are some tenants who were only too happy to move on and others are sad about leaving the area and the friends they've made over the years.

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  • 4 weeks later...

It seems as though the general thing is that people tended to quite enjoy living there or absolutely hated it! That even seems to be fairly similar now too - there are some tenants who were only too happy to move on and others are sad about leaving the area and the friends they've made over the years.

Marmite then? :-)

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#15 Why would anyone complain about leaving those old Victorian houses.No indoor bathrooms, outside khazi,pee poor heating,rising damp, etc'.

I am aware of the strong community spirit,but I would have thought the chance of a new home with all the 'mod cons'would have trumped everything.

I was born in a 2 up 2 down. and was so happy to leave.

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We've had the timelapse video from the video producers, will be posting it soon when we've done the press for it :)

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As promised - here is the timelapse footage of Lenton Court being demolished. Some really cool stuff half way though with cameras inside the flats as the high-reach digger comes in. Well worth a watch!

The video was produced by Inside Out Timelapse, a local company who have also been prodcuing the on-going videos of transport projects around Nottingham :)

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  • 4 weeks later...

Is there any way of adding photos without using photobucket or similar? I've got loads of pics from a photocall event we did over in Lenton i want to put on here but our work computers block file hosting websites.

Thanks in advance!

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