Shotton Memories
Steve Howarth from Ashton Hayes, Cheshire writes:
I moved to 25 Nelson Street in 1960 (give or take a few months). We lived there until 1981, It was a great time (the 60s...) to be an imaginative and adventurous kid! We used to hang out in "The Backs" on the railway embankment behind the houses, and had a den under the old signal box. We carved out a labyrinthine network of hidden paths through the undergrowth and brambles that we called the "Wonder Way" (no computer games to distract our attention in those days!). Myself, Pete Treadwell, Ian Reid, David Hughes, Eddie Taylor, Mike Scarfo etc. Where are you now guys?
I remember tree climbing at the back of the only bungalow near the bottom of Nelson Street and tearing my leg open when I fell onto a spiked/corrugated iron fence (28 stitches and loads of elastoplast). I loved living in Shotton, and I guess it made me the person I am today in so many ways. To us, the place was one big adventure playground. The River Dee banks, Ewloe aka, Castlehill Woods, the twin footbridges at the end of Jubilee Street where we used to spend Saturdays equipped with our sixpenny catapults from the "Jokey" (The Joke Shop was, I think, next door to Wing Wah Chinese Takeaway).
Does anyone recall the "Burning Hills" an area of Higher Shotton off Killins Lane where subterranean fires from coal mining activity would smoke and smoulder when it rained? The same phenomenon occured on the upper railway line, just before the railway bridge across the Dee. So many years of memory distilled into a few random recollections. Every girl seemed to be called Kim in those days, and it may amuse to note that, still daubed, in fading yellow paint on the brickwork of the "Ranch" as I believe it is still known, at the bottom of Nelson Street is the sentiment "KC to SH". Well, just for the record that was inscribed in 1962, and refers to Kim Cussons (who used to live opposite, and was a 5 year old at the time, and myself of similar age. Good times, well remembered.
