Peoples Stories - Bevendean History Project
Brian Donaldson Bevendean & the Self-Build Bungalows
Memories of the Bevendean Hotel
That was another one of our locals we used to go in there quite a lot, more so in those days for two reasons. My colleague lived next door and my wife knew quite a few people who lived up in that area, after she got bombed out when they went to live in Birdham Road. We only went on a Saturday, because we could never go drinking during the week, we couldn't afford it. Most Saturdays we would go in the pub up there sit and have a drink and play darts. That pub was more or less our local and in those days it had a public bar, a saloon bar and a private bar. For some reason or other we always seemed to be in the saloon bar. I don't know why we didn't go in the public bar perhaps we thought we were too posh. The other thing is when I lived in The Avenue, Dad never went out to pubs and he sent me up there every Saturday evening with a big Demi John container to get it filled with beer and bring it back for him. I used to have to go into the off-licence which was on the side. I think that the steps have been filled in now.
I have not been back to the Bevy since it reopened. I know my mate goes there quite a bit but I haven't had a reason to go there. I don't go into many pubs now anyway, I'm a bit nostalgic a bit old-fashioned. I like the pub with the old bar where you sat round and it felt homely. That's my view of pubs there's not many of them left, we have got a few of the Brighton ones which are not too bad.
The only thing I do remember, but I don't remember why, is when the pub up there, the White Admiral was built, for the first few weeks it was called the Red Admiral, then somebody dug something up from somewhere and said you cannot call it the Red Admiral so it was renamed the White Admiral.
I knew it was some stupid reason, someone got up a petition to get the name changed.
Changes in Bevendean
I have been here all this time and unfortunately, we have got to face it, life changes any way but in my opinion The Avenue and Bevendean and quite a few other places have been completely destroyed by the Universities. This is for lots of reasons, not only from the point of view of the lack of the community we used to have. It is the rubbish and the way it is left. I find it very sad, when sometimes I walk down to the bottom of The Avenue to the shops and look in all those gardens where all my friends used to live when we were kids. We would go and see them and have parties, and it nearly makes me cry to see what I can see now and nobody gives a dam do they? How can people, walk past all that rubbish and ignore it, because I couldn't do it and a lot of people I know couldn’t do it. Before it didn't matter who things belong to, you kept things as tidy as you could, but now and you know as well as I do, it is just a tip these days.
That sums it up because communities have changed, supermarkets have come and all the shops where you went and got your bits and pieces have gone. Lucky enough we've ended up with this fella who's opened up a shop in the Upper Bevendean Avenue shops who doesn't seem too bad, a grocer. We've got one up at the top of the estate if you want it, a chemist up there now and a Butcher who is excellent. You can get the odds and ends you need from the point of view of keeping yourself going there.
What is there here for the children now, nothing, look at Becca that's had to close mainly because there are no children. The reason is the estate is full of students.
We used to go over to the barn where Becca is now where the farm was. I think they used to have christenings there in the barn church.
They had a vestry in the barn church which the doctor and the nurse used, where we used to take the children to for weighing and check-ups and then it moved up to the sports place where Mr Smith down the road used to run the youth club. I don't know if it's still there. The Mr Smith who ran the youth club was not the Mr Smith who had the paper shop at the top of The Avenue; it was Mr Smith who used to go caravanning who ran the youth club.
There was a plan for Heath Hill Avenue that involved blocks of flats, possibly tower blocks, before you had the self-build scheme. There was a time when the entire hill up there had plans for houses, like the rest of the area. It was only when John Amerino packed it in; he was a chief clerk of works of Brighton Council. When he was still working he came to us one day and said you can relax because not only have they said they are not going to build up any more houses up here but they have actually destroyed all the drawings and everything. Any idea of developing the land was cancelled.
There were plans to put a road going from the end of the estate up to Warren road when they were building the estate in the first place.
In the seventies there was a plan to take the road from the end of the estate out to the Falmer road. Yes there was a plan to do that but people said it would make too much of a rat run through this estate. You live on one side and know what goes down, but you think what comes up and down here with us. To be honest with you even though I have been here and there's no reason why you want to move now. What would I gain by it we can go into the back garden and forget all that chaos out there?
20 mph, the only people who come down there at 20 mph are the women from the school with the pushchairs. They are the only ones doing 20 mph everything else can be doing 50 or 60 mph down the Avenue.
That was another one of our locals we used to go in there quite a lot, more so in those days for two reasons. My colleague lived next door and my wife knew quite a few people who lived up in that area, after she got bombed out when they went to live in Birdham Road. We only went on a Saturday, because we could never go drinking during the week, we couldn't afford it. Most Saturdays we would go in the pub up there sit and have a drink and play darts. That pub was more or less our local and in those days it had a public bar, a saloon bar and a private bar. For some reason or other we always seemed to be in the saloon bar. I don't know why we didn't go in the public bar perhaps we thought we were too posh. The other thing is when I lived in The Avenue, Dad never went out to pubs and he sent me up there every Saturday evening with a big Demi John container to get it filled with beer and bring it back for him. I used to have to go into the off-licence which was on the side. I think that the steps have been filled in now.
I have not been back to the Bevy since it reopened. I know my mate goes there quite a bit but I haven't had a reason to go there. I don't go into many pubs now anyway, I'm a bit nostalgic a bit old-fashioned. I like the pub with the old bar where you sat round and it felt homely. That's my view of pubs there's not many of them left, we have got a few of the Brighton ones which are not too bad.
The only thing I do remember, but I don't remember why, is when the pub up there, the White Admiral was built, for the first few weeks it was called the Red Admiral, then somebody dug something up from somewhere and said you cannot call it the Red Admiral so it was renamed the White Admiral.
I knew it was some stupid reason, someone got up a petition to get the name changed.
Changes in Bevendean
I have been here all this time and unfortunately, we have got to face it, life changes any way but in my opinion The Avenue and Bevendean and quite a few other places have been completely destroyed by the Universities. This is for lots of reasons, not only from the point of view of the lack of the community we used to have. It is the rubbish and the way it is left. I find it very sad, when sometimes I walk down to the bottom of The Avenue to the shops and look in all those gardens where all my friends used to live when we were kids. We would go and see them and have parties, and it nearly makes me cry to see what I can see now and nobody gives a dam do they? How can people, walk past all that rubbish and ignore it, because I couldn't do it and a lot of people I know couldn’t do it. Before it didn't matter who things belong to, you kept things as tidy as you could, but now and you know as well as I do, it is just a tip these days.
That sums it up because communities have changed, supermarkets have come and all the shops where you went and got your bits and pieces have gone. Lucky enough we've ended up with this fella who's opened up a shop in the Upper Bevendean Avenue shops who doesn't seem too bad, a grocer. We've got one up at the top of the estate if you want it, a chemist up there now and a Butcher who is excellent. You can get the odds and ends you need from the point of view of keeping yourself going there.
What is there here for the children now, nothing, look at Becca that's had to close mainly because there are no children. The reason is the estate is full of students.
We used to go over to the barn where Becca is now where the farm was. I think they used to have christenings there in the barn church.
They had a vestry in the barn church which the doctor and the nurse used, where we used to take the children to for weighing and check-ups and then it moved up to the sports place where Mr Smith down the road used to run the youth club. I don't know if it's still there. The Mr Smith who ran the youth club was not the Mr Smith who had the paper shop at the top of The Avenue; it was Mr Smith who used to go caravanning who ran the youth club.
There was a plan for Heath Hill Avenue that involved blocks of flats, possibly tower blocks, before you had the self-build scheme. There was a time when the entire hill up there had plans for houses, like the rest of the area. It was only when John Amerino packed it in; he was a chief clerk of works of Brighton Council. When he was still working he came to us one day and said you can relax because not only have they said they are not going to build up any more houses up here but they have actually destroyed all the drawings and everything. Any idea of developing the land was cancelled.
There were plans to put a road going from the end of the estate up to Warren road when they were building the estate in the first place.
In the seventies there was a plan to take the road from the end of the estate out to the Falmer road. Yes there was a plan to do that but people said it would make too much of a rat run through this estate. You live on one side and know what goes down, but you think what comes up and down here with us. To be honest with you even though I have been here and there's no reason why you want to move now. What would I gain by it we can go into the back garden and forget all that chaos out there?
20 mph, the only people who come down there at 20 mph are the women from the school with the pushchairs. They are the only ones doing 20 mph everything else can be doing 50 or 60 mph down the Avenue.
Brian Donaldson Photographs
31 July 2017
Story_026c