WOODBINE (BIKER) GROVERS

Turn the clock back 30, 40 or 50 years and this view would have been very different. For what's now the grassy park dividing South View Avenue and Hawthorn Avenue was once the site of a busy little housing estate comprising the Woodbine Avenue prefabs.
They were temporary homes hastily erected to help meet the post-war housing shortage/crisis.But many Brigg families enjoyed living there; the houses, although small, had a host of mod cons, including an indoor toilet in the bathroom, plus decent-sized gardens.
Some of the family names springing readily to mind from the late 1950s/1960s include: Quirke, Smith, Shaw, Stapleton, Kennedy, Bray, Parker, Howson, Whitehead and Fisher (yes, ours!).
The vehicular access - not that many families had cars - was off Preston Drive, the vantage point for this picture. The road ran down the centre of the estate, with the prefabs arranged off it in small clusters.
Unlike many Scunthorpe prefabs which have survived long enough to be celebrated in an exhibition at North Lincolnshire Museum later this year, ours did not. Nor did the other Brigg prefabs - down Cadney Road/Elwes Street.
Brigg Urban District Council, later to become part of Glanford Borough Council, had sufficient housing stock to be able to offer tenants alternative accommodation when the prefabs were demolished.
There was also talk the drains were an issue for the Woodbine Grove estate (this could be the case as a small brick-built pumping facility was tucked away in the corner, near the entrance, while the homes were lived in).
Few photos seem to have survived from the glory days of Brigg's Woodbine Grove prefabs, which is a shame...and the real purpose of this article.
For it would be great if Brigg Blog readers were able to forward a few examples so they could go into the communal archives - before it's too late. If you have any, please send your prints to Nigel Fisher, Scunthorpe Telegraph, 4/5 Park Square, Laneham Street, Scunthorpe, DN15 6JH. We will return them to you (undamaged) by post once scanned into our computer system. If you are 'into computers' please scan them in and email to nigel.fisher@gsmg.co.uk. We'd like to feature them on Brigg Blog and in a future issue of Nostalgia magazine.
In our family box of prints, many moons ago, I seem to recall seeing a 'Box Brownie' type one showing a group of young Woodbine Grovers, some with bikes, outside our house, No 16. Did that make us Woodbine Biker Grovers? (apologies to Ant and Dec for that one!)
We could have been heading off to Glebe Road School.
I'll see if my mother can dig it out for me, and will then be happy to share it with you. I think the late Tom Kennedy was on the picture (sadly no longer with us, of course).

On the extreme left of the above image you can just see the new homes being constructed by Lindum on what was the small area once covered by garages/used to store fairground rides, just off South View Avenue and behind Springbank. The new homes are coming along nicely and look out over the park towards the back of Hawthorn Avenue.