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The Grand Union Canal at Apsley

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The Ace

Notorious Rockers café at Stonebridge Park, Wembley.  Motorcyclists used to hold 'time trials' between the 'Ace' and 'Neasden Roundabout' on the North Circular Road.  The Ace gave way to a Fast Fit Tyre bay and the roundabout at Neasden was removed to cope with today's heavy traffic.  The Ace has now been restored to it's rightful former glory as a motorcycle café venue.

 

The Busy Bee

Out of town Transport Café popular with Rockers and swamped by motorcycles in the evening.  Situated on the Watford bypass, the Busy Bee became the Beehive Hotel and subsequently the Hilton National.  There is a story that a 'mod' strayed off course into the Busy Bee for a cuppa only to later find that his scooter had been 'accidentally' consigned to Carlisle under a tarpaulin on the back of a flat-bed truck.

 

59 Club

Ton-up Vicar's motorcycling club.  Attracted many followers from the 'Ace'.

 

Dickinsons

John Dickinson set up his paper factory in Apsley just outside Hemel Hempstead taking advantage of the river both in paper manufacturing and driving machinery.

John Dickinson was the major employer of the area and many can recount it's history at first hand, or with film and photographs.  I visited an older part of the JD complex in the early 1980's and it had still retained much of it's character from a century earlier.  The extensive rabbit warren of a site was bulldozed and given over to the Kings Lock riverside homes development and Apsley Retail Park.  There are plans to re-create a heritage paper trail around Apsley, but the original JD has long gone to other locations throughout the UK and world-wide.  I expect many of the baby-boomer generation remember being made to write to 'Auntie and Uncle' using Lion Brand ruled notepaper, then progressing to Basildon Bond without ruled lines after mastering joined-up writing?!   

 

Top Rank Watford

The Nightclub/Disco venue of the 70s, later became 'Baileys'.  Top artists and pop music performers appeared including Genesis, Barclay James Harvest, Status Quo, Arthur Brown, Black Sabbath, Major Lance, Roy Orbison,  Slade, and many more. More recently catered for the clubbing scene as 'Kudos' and ‘Destiny’, but now known as the Oceana.

 

 

The Starlight Ballroom

A disco/club of the 60s in Alperton, Middlessex.  A then regular venue of Gino Washington and the Ram Jam Band!  Famous artists that also appeared at the Starlight included the Walker Brothers and Georgie Fame with the Blue Flames.

 

 

Uxbridge Road Trams and Trolley Buses

 

Will it be a case deja vu if and when tramcars return to the Uxbridge Road ...

Yes, one upon a time Hanwell Broadway had it's own Tram Depot.  The service fed Shepherd’s Bush from the western suburbs.

Trolleybuses replaced trams on the Uxbridge Road route from Shepherds Bush westwards though Ealing, Hanwell and beyond.  The tram rails were removed and, for power, the electric Trolleybus used a system of dual overhead wires and complex network at road junctions.