Kenton Bar Estate - A Blast from the Past

There was another band whom I chanced upon to see from Kenton Bar Estate at the 'Dog and Parrot'...I do not remember their name, but a shiver went down mein spine when I heard them...they were as good as The Friendly Bombs!...now mind this was when I was no longer a young man, but an octogenarian old man aged about 30ish...what I can tell you after some research is that: a) The lead singer was a kid who was 3 years younger than me called 'Specky Eddy' who lived up at the top of the estate on Ryal Walk apparently...also Hendas(anarchist tendency lesser mortal award august 2010) was there watching them with a load of other ruffians and bounders... can anyone add more details re this brilliant band?...

At the behest of the master I found Shades original post in the comments in the post 'Types of houses'(sept 19 2009)..was this it Shades, or were you somehow able to identify more designations for each type of housing?...if so I will spend as long as it takes to find the comment! Shades said: 'Before we moved in we were sent a flyer telling us about the Estate and the different types of houses in it. The split levels were called a T1. The six types I remember are: T1- Split levels T?- The terraced ones with a single storey kitchen joining a two storey block running North/South T?- The electric only houses with underfloor heating running East/West T?- The cube three floor flata T?- The flat roof bungalows T?- The eight blocks of flats around the Pyry area. I don't really recall the other blocks of flats south of the Pyry near the Primary school- what was at Ground floor level? The two variants to the design were the Children's Home double bungalow at the eastern e...

The blog received yet another email from the' another anonymous tortured soul '...I whole heartedly agree with him... God WAS punishing him for his churlish stupidity re the stone owl and the trap... 'Long long ago I received the gift of a pair of roller skates on my birthday. At that time they were all the rage, before skateboards came along. Anyway, the day I got them I went out along Studdon Walk, an ungamely albatross on wheels. I tried to master to skate-I immediately failed with dire consequences-the wheels hit a pavement slab that was not set properly or perhaps had been dislodged by ruffians from down the bottom jumping up and down on it for the sheer hell of it. I found myself hurtling toward the map at Studdon, overbalancing and it was inevitable that a collision was to happen. Fear, trepidation, my life swam around me-it took a look and drowned me in its own existance-the stone owl-the trap-the sword of Damocles striking down at the behest of God to punis...

Can kindly Shades remind us again of the different house types and designation numbers?

At one point in the early 80's there were a few bands from Kenton Bar/Kenton doing gigs at places like the Coxlodge Social Club...everyone used to go and see them(aged 16-20)the best of these bands was without a shadow of a doubting thomas 'The Friendly Bombs'...they were so named after a poem by John Betjeman entitled 'Slough'..the first line runs 'Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!' they originally consisted of Fred Clark(lead guitar), Alan Clark(bass guitar) and Dave Nicholl(drums)...now this band was actually from Kenton/Hillsy, but I defy anyone to say they were not the best band at that time...unfortunately they did not get the accolades they deserved and never made it...why?...because at that time Newcastle was seen as a backwater where music was concerned... Lindisfarne: ' sitting in a sleazy snack bar sucking sickly sausage rolls...' Busker:... ' I'm comin' home Newcastle I might as well have been in jail I'd waak the st...

Once upon a time there was a kid who cried once( god knows why), but I never forgot that he did...I was maybe 9 and he was maybe 8...I do believe it was a duff that this kid had been challenged to do but could not...I know not his name...anyway, at the time as he burst into tears I commented laconically "He's crying"... After that, everytime I saw that kid for the rest of his life I always used to say to whoever I was with 'he's crying' (but so he could hear) ...at first he smiled...but then the novelty wore off..by the time he was 13 and I had said this to him a million times he know longer smiled...his mouth was a thin horizontal line, his brow furrowed...then one day I saw him on Kenton School field, in an army cadet uniform, marching down towards Kenton Bar Estate...he had now joined the Army Cadets and was marching down from their 'hut' up at the top of Kenton School field after training...he was now maybe 16...I started shouting(to my mate who wa...

we are doing swimmingly...I do believe we have all the plans for all the houses except the cube flats, long flats and 4 bed roomed houses... Incidentally I just remembered a long forgotten feature of the long flats(eg the ones that stuck out onto Kenton School field from Hartburn-near the lovely step pyramid)...as a matter of fact I loved these flats-the design was fantastic-anyway, the thing I remember that I had forgotten was that in the front room there was like a concertina door that you could pull out across to make the massive long front room into 2 separate rooms, a lounge and a front room...anyone else remember that?

The exact dimensions of the rooms are:- LOUNGE 4.86m x 3.20m (15'11' x 10'6') DINING KITCHEN 4.83m x 3.22m (15'10' x 10'7') MASTER BEDROOM 5.54m x 2.78m (18'2' x 9'1') BEDROOM TWO 4.87m x 2.36m (16'0' x 7'9') BEDROOM THREE 3.10m x 2.81m (10'2' x 9'3')

There were a lot of these houses from top to bottom of the estate. They were ALWAYS oriented in a East-West axis – god knows why…. The peculiar thing about these houses is that they were all electric i.e. no gas. Even the heating was electric and indeed they had under floor heating certainly downstairs. I am not sure about upstairs. 1 bedroom was on the ground floor which is a little odd to say the least. One of the upper rooms is marked ‘s’ – does this mean study or storage? Well that’s it for now folks – if anyone has floor plans for the other types of houses then please send them.

This is the T1 or more commonly known as the “split levels”. Now – these in my view were an anomaly in that they were billed as having 4 bedrooms and indeed if you look at the floor plans here you will indeed see 4 bedrooms marked (marked with a ‘b’). In fact………. the top bedroom, the long thin one – was in fact ONE ROOM, in fact you can see it has ONE door. I think it was meant as a shared bedroom for two person like brothers or whatever. The only other type of 4 bedroom house on the estate – which truly did have 4 bedroom were the ones in Thirston Way on the lower half of the estate. The”split levels” were also the only type of house on the estate that had a garage attached, in fact it was underneath the house so to speak at ground level with the first floor being the first habitable level. There is a variant to the T1 called the T1a that had access to the flat rooftops – presumably for sunbathing and cocktail parties – this row of T1a’s were at the top of Hazeldene Avenue. The stai...

Thanks to our correspondents D and K, I have the following nugget to share from the Northern Architecture 1968 article. The development of 81 acres of land to provide housing, schools, public house and open space. Ryder and Yates and Partners, Architects and Engineers, in collaboration with the City Architect. The site is on the western edge of the main built-up area about 3 1/2 miles from the city centre. The main axis runs north-south, and falls in two planes, steeply (1 in 11) to the north apart from a fine central plateau. There are excellent long views of the Cheviot Hills. This north slope creates interesting problems with its conflict between orientation and aspect. The road and pedestrian framework has been designed to provide the shorter paths for pedestrians, while the roads feed-in radially from the perimeter. An area of 17 1/2 acres of additional playing fields was required and this was placed so as to draw pedestrians through the open square where the public buildings...

Fellow Kenton Bar Past and Present Residents, I received a fantastic document from our correspondents D and K. A scan of an article in the 1968 edition of “Northern Architecture”. The scan is only one page and I have tasked GoM to come up with more of it  - watch this space. The article has some very good illustrations of the T1, T3 and T5 floor plans and side elevations and rather than excite you all at once I have decided to drip feed the juice. Logically I am starting with the T5……. The T5 was commonly known as “The Bungalows” and was (and still is) to be seen on Studdon (Stubbon ) Walk and Hartburn Walk. The accommodation comprised a kitchen, 3 bedrooms and and lounge/diner – quite a modern feature eh? I really liked these dwellings although I never lived in one. Rumour has it that GoM was to be seen lurking around in these though… One feature missing from these floor plans is the outside storage cupboard next to the kitchen which must have been a later addition

The blog received yet another email from the' another anonymous tortured soul '.....I thought this tale also was frightful and dreadful...it brought even more tears to mein eyes...but you young people know best, as the master reassured me yet again...he ordered me to post it also... 'Once upon a time long long ago(20 years at least) as I have already said we made the trap for Mr( name removed by blog admin )...we awaited with baited breath for him to trudge wearily homeward and experience pain and suffering when he fell down down the hole at 5:30pm....but...alas, some damn blundering fools came up the path at 5:15pm...we watched with fear and trepidation...sure enough they fell downMr ( name removed by blog admin ) 's hole...they were both women....one was a shuffling old near death aged about 90 and another was young... thank god neither suffered terminal pain and suffering...even from the windows of the T1 we could see that they found the experience funny...s...

The blog received this email from another anonymous tortured soul .....I thought this tale also was too frightful and dreadful...it brought tears to mein eyes...but you young people know best, as the master reassures me...he ordered me to post it... 'Once upon a time long long ago(20 years at least) I knocked about with a kid who lived in the split levels at Hazeley Way...at that time there were fields leading to the newly built Kingston Park Industrial Estate...after a while there was a path across the fields forged by workers who worked there...He told me this tale: ' Me and ( name removed by blog admin ) noticed that Mr( name removed by blog admin )who lived in Hazeley Way always returned home at 5:30pm after work via the path across the field, regular as clockwork...my mate ( name removed by blog admin ) said 'wouldn't it be funny if we dug a trap on the path so that Mr ( name removed by blog admin ) unsuspectingly fell in it and suffered shock, pain & suff...