Recently I discovered your most interesting website while seeking information about the Obelisk in Bound Green Road opposite the Rose Garden. I passed this every school day in the 1950s to the Glendale Grammar School from my home at Palace Gates Road.
The Queen's Jubilee prompts me to send you a copy of my ticket to the road's Coronation Party - an event organised by my parents, who dragooned a small group of helpers to assist. My father was by trade a Manufacturing Stationer and produced our tickets - printed on a rigid card because he felt we would treasure them as souvenirs. Addressed, in his distinctive handwriting, mine is numbered 63 on the back, probably the total number attending.
The Football Club building, no longer there, was on the level ground adjacent to the lake and just above the Bunny Hills.
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It would be great to hear of any memories you have of Palace Gates Road, your school, and any other local features in the 1950s. Excuse my ignorance - what were the Bunny Hills? What did other streets do for the coronation - presumably there were street parties? What a lovely idea to have the party in the Park.
Fancy grouping together 'Prams and Cars' ... !
Thank you for your kind words about my Coronation Party invitation. To answer your question, Bunny Hills was the name given to the steep hillside area just below the old football field. The clay spoil from levelling the ground by internees or refugees during the 1st World War became overgrown with bushes and trees. This location became an ad-hoc adventure play area for youngsters - not always approved by their parents. It was fenced off as part of the mini-game reserve and deer enclosure.
Before the Coronation and on a more sombre note, I recall the cold, slightly foggy morning, early in 1952, going with my mother to watch the funeral train carrying King George VIs coffin when it passed through Alexandra Palace station on its journey to London from Sandringham. Many people lined the Bedford Road fence, but from the opposite side, we had a good view of the long train when it rumbled through the station, not fast, pulled by a shiny green mainline steam locomotive. It was all over in a few minutes.
Ah, that's interesting - I didn't realise that the old football field was levelled (nor by internees - must have been a marathon job ...). So that's where Go-Ape is now. And the slope below it is still covered in bushes and trees - but nobody is allowed to go there! Must have been a wonderful adventure play area for kids.
So the name 'Bunny Hills' presumably indicates that there were rabbits there?! That doesn't require great powers of deduction, but is interesting because I don't think there are any rabbits now in Alexandra Park - ? Maybe there weren't as many urban foxes then in the area (and less fast food for them to feast on).
Did you play on the Bunny Hills as a child?
I see from the History of Alexandra Park (publ. by the Friends) that internees levelled the Car Park above the football field, but that the latter was levelled by unemployed people - possibly during the late 1920s.