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Stuart Goodman At Broadway Market

June 26, 2016
by the gentle author

John Sims

Take a walk through Broadway Market in March 1982 with Photographer Stuart Goodman, when it was quite a different place to the fashionable destination of today.

A former Fleet St Photographer & Picture Editor, Stuart sent me these pictures last week. “They were first shown in 1983 at an exhibition at the Royal Festival Hall, organised by the Greater London Council,” he explained, “which was ironic really because the GLC had a massive 1000-property compulsory purchase scheme to construct a nightmare version of the Westway through East London, that included the market.”

“I first found Broadway Market by mistake in 1976 and fell in love with the place, the cobbles, the people and the Cat & Mutton pub. By 1977, I was a partner in Hot Shots, a short-lived screen printing extravaganza, and I lived in an exceptionally squalid flat above and below the shop at number 52. I met both my wives there too, though – thankfully – not at the same time.

Although I lived in Broadway Market for a few years, I only photographed it once, wandering around for a couple of hours. Now I live in Norwich but I still have connections with the place, my sister-in-law was the ladybird book lady, running a stall opposite where I once lived, and my brother sells vinyl in the upmarket bit up the road.

I miss the place, not the squalor, the outside loo, the cold – but the people, the community and, somehow, the optimism. In those days, there was not a gastro pub in sight and no-one had ever heard of a buffalo burger. ”

Photographs copyright © Stuart Goodman

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38 Responses leave one →
  1. June 26, 2016

    I think, should I ever become a ridiculously rich, one of the things I would do would be to buy some London land and set up a huge market hall, with low rents in perpetuity.

  2. Jo Gourlay permalink
    June 26, 2016

    Such evocative photographs, thankyou. And had forgotten the name Percy Ingle!

  3. June 26, 2016

    Nice photos, haven’t been there since the early 60s. Valerie

  4. Peter Holford permalink
    June 26, 2016

    The seventh photo that shows the abandoned mini with the smashed windscreen brought back memories of how cars were often abandoned in that era. They could be in situ for months getting progressively vandalised, set alight and with jagged bits of metal. It seemed that nobody cared that they were there until the problem became so endemic that eventually local councils started to take action. Strange what memories can be triggered by a photo!

  5. Joel Drouet permalink
    June 26, 2016

    Brilliant, haunting, and evocative.

  6. Andy Sluckin permalink
    June 26, 2016

    How it’s changed! Good to have Stuart reminding us of what has been.

  7. Barbara permalink
    June 26, 2016

    I remember it well , buying mice from Carr’s pet shop , breeding them and selling the young mice back to Mr Carr for sixpence each ! Later , as a schoolgirl of about 15 , I had a Saturday job at Fox’s chemist . I remember Sims the florist , also Tiddiman’s Butchers and there was a fruit and veg stall run by Fred whose son took over when Fred passed away . Cook’s pie and mash shop is still there I believe which is a bit of a miracle . Great to see these photos .

  8. Caroline Gilfillan permalink
    June 26, 2016

    Excellent photos. I lived close by for a decade, and these photographs vividly evoke how it was. I’m sorry that these markets and small communities have been gobbled up by rampant money making – high rents and the sale of social housing. Beautiful London, shrinking by the day.

  9. June 27, 2016

    Ah, always look in vain for people I knew, in the 70s or 80s street pictures. One day!
    Funny, never ever noticed ‘squalor’ in my early roaming-around days. Unlike now, t’streets always felt so darn comfortable…
    ‘Beautiful London, shrinking by the day’ – love the comment.

  10. SPQR permalink
    June 27, 2016

    Fascinating photographs, so full of details that are stories in themselves. And I love reading the comments of people who knew these places—like Barbara, who bred mice bought from the pet shop and sold back their offspring.

  11. SPQR permalink
    June 27, 2016

    A shop called I. A. Blight—too perfect. You’d be thrown out of a fiction-writing class for calling a shop ‘Blight.’

  12. Annie Henriques permalink
    June 27, 2016

    I used to teach just up the road from the market in the late 70s and early 80s and I’ll always remember Bradburys which is still there! It’s the kind of ironmongers shop that sells absolutely everything – perfect for a school teacher that was always looking for unusual bits and pieces to make education that much more interesting. And that was before we had screens that did it all for us.

  13. June 27, 2016

    In those times I have been in England and Scotland. Big memories!

    Love & Peace
    ACHIM

  14. Peter Whear permalink
    June 27, 2016

    Every good photo tells a story and Stuart has told some captivating stories here.

  15. Alison Ashfield permalink
    June 28, 2016

    Oh my! I worked in Broadway Market between 1992 and 1996, in the new general practice: The London Fields Medical Centre. The street seemed to be at something of a nadir, very quiet, mostly shabby and generally forgotten. I believe the previous practice had been above the chemist’s shop at number 3 and was run by Dr. Tony Fernando. Nearly 4 very happy years spent there, I used the Post Office opposite, Percy Ingle’s bakery (Belgian buns and coffee meringues), the sandwich shop and the print shop and the supermarket which opened up next door and was run by an enterprising Turkish family. I was intrigued by the flat-breads that they sold, golden as harvest and huge. Nothing like the pallid, dusty white things ‘pitta bread’ sold in Sainsbury’s. Every summer and as often as I could, I would buy a pound of cherries from the coster-manger who had a stall just on the corner near ‘The Dove’ pub and eat the lot, mentally chanting ‘Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor….’ as I ate my way through my lunch. Happy memories.

  16. June 29, 2016

    A very early memory, perhaps 19 46 0r 7. Free oranges were being given out . one per child, my grandad and I lined up for what seemed for ever, then we went to the back of the queue and lined up again.
    Nan and Grandad lived in Pownell Road.

  17. July 3, 2016

    I lived around the corner at Trederwen Rd in a prefab and as a 9 year old would go to the stall holders on a Saturday morning and take their urns for tea and charge them a penny! My dad, grhs, had a ‘shmutter’ stall opposite a bookies and we always did well. I’m talking about 1960 to 1964 when we emigrated to Los Angeles. I went to London fields primary school and went back last year. Blimey! what a difference.

  18. John Walton permalink
    August 5, 2016

    These pictures partly sum up the reasons why the level of migration out of Hackney in the 1960s-1980s was so high for those that could afford to do it. As a family that came from Hackney, no one now lives near. I too have returned and the change is transformational. For anyone that wants to see how the market looked like on the big screen check out the intro to the Phil Collins film “Buster” (1988) which was filmed in the market shortly after these images were taken.

  19. ian silverton permalink
    September 10, 2016

    Remember Harry Tiddermans Butcher shop on the broad way,he was my fathers friend,and we used my the family pub the Westminster Arms,as we used his shop,great meat. Remember him buying a American car from another friend Freddy Jones,big old lump,his wife hated it, very rare site in the 60s rundown east End.

  20. Pat Davies permalink
    September 18, 2016

    Hello Gentle Author

    I am writing this, because, I have heard of the sad news about, Colin O’brien.

    I am one of Barking and Dagenham, Hoppers, who you have met before, at the Holding Hands for Norton Folgate and we spoke at Heathway Library. You went out to Scotney Farm, with the Hoppers last September and also with Colin, this year shortly before his death. I unfortunately, was away on holiday, both times, but would have loved to have been there.
    We all went back to the farm on the 9th September, Kathrin and Sussanah, told us the sad news.

    I just wanted to send my Sincere Condolences. I admired Colin’s work, very much.
    I hope to be able to attend the memorial service. Perhaps you will let me know, Please, where and when it will be held.

    Kind Regards

    Pat Davies

  21. Kevin adams permalink
    October 30, 2016

    What memories!
    I used to work for John Sims the florist when I was about 10 and lived just around the corner in Dericote Street. The house with the motorbike covered up was ours and the Commer van opposite belonged to my dad.

  22. stuart goodman permalink
    December 5, 2016

    i’ve just heard the sad news that trevor, who ran the cat and mutton with his wife brenda at this time died a couple of years ago. the pub was one of the reasons i moved to the market, a brilliant home for so many!!! will never forget brenda’s mum dancing on the bar during the rio grande hot tango orchestra gigs on the occasional saturday night.

    we were there a couple of weeks ago and i cannot believe the changes. i photographed the market again with the poet caroline gilfillan for a project in ’05, which we showed at steve selby’s off broadway gallery. the changs since then are even more spectacular and in a way more depressing. maybe we’ll put the stuff up to the gentle author to show here.

  23. Alan Dearman permalink
    May 18, 2017

    My Mum was born in Duncan Road (off the Broadway), she and her family were moved out when Duncan Square and the odd numbered side of Duncan Road came down as part of the overcrowding/slum clearance of the early 1930s. However, I think that their house on the even numbered side of Duncan Road remained for several years as Mum’s aunt and cousins continued to live there (at no 4). Does anyone remember when that side of the road changed?

  24. chris steele permalink
    November 9, 2017

    I lived at the top of Trederwen Road from 1950 to 1971. I think I can remember the name Joe Waterman though I went to Gayhurst, walking across London Fields every day. Does anyone remember the three little shops on the corner of Lansdowne Drive and Trederwen Road. The first was the ‘cats meat man’ and another was Harry, Tovah Radio. The shops and the houses in Trederwen Rd were demolished in the late 70’s along with the Bus Garage and Ivydene Rd when a new housing estate was built. There was a road at the bottom of Trederwen we called ‘the curly turning’ which went through to Broadway market. The current Trederwen Rd is a relignment to the south. I’d love to learn if anyone knows of any photos of that area between Brougham Rd and Lansdowne Drive.

  25. Peter Robinson permalink
    June 9, 2019

    Alan I also lived at 4 Duncan Road as a child in the 60s and my dad says we are related in some way to you. I was looking at the picture of Stanton’s ice cream palour which was a favourite haunt and that leads to these comments. Small world. I think the even side was pulled down in the early 70’s. We had moved out to Waltham Abbey by then.

  26. January 14, 2020

    I remember Mrs Carr who had the pet shop in Welshpool Street, just off Broadway Market. Stantons Ice cream shop on the corner and Billy who worked there. Billy had a hard time from his father and Mrs Stanton often found a place for him to sleep when he was in fear of going home. Harry Tidimans Butchers shop, his son Henry who took it over, and Henry’s sister Pauline who worked there at weekends and sadly died in 1986. Henry died in 2014. The butchers shop is no longer there. I have many memories from the Broadway Market. I now live in Newquay in Cornwall but my memories of life in Hackney will be with me till the day I die.

  27. Terry Allen permalink
    July 19, 2020

    I was dragged up in Broadway house and went to school at Seabright in the 60’s the headteachers being Ms Soames and Mr Eveans in those days we were feral, I ended up in the army, boxed in the pros and then worked as a Clinical Hypnotherapist for several years and I discovered how we create our experiences which led me into two of my dream jobs. The first was in pro football as a sports psychologist then I became a peripatetic chess coach which lasted for 19 years as I taught in both State and Private schools which were a real eye-opening experience. I often wonder what my old school teachers would say if they could see me do that.
    At close to 60 I am doing a Law degree with the OU as I am still irascible and iconoclastic when it comes to authority. I have not paid Council Tax now for the past 8 years citing English Constitutional Law which we were never taught at school when it should be imbibed with our school milk as the reason to not pay it.
    I am writing a book on Consciousness and Near-Death Experiences at the age of 6 I jumped out of the window of my parents flat in Broadway House and the Angel saved me that day and I have had a few brushes with mortality since but the Demiurge as not managed to checkmate me yet.
    Be lucky and remember all things in moderation including moderation one of my mottos in life.
    If Nietzche is correct we get to do it all over again there does seem to be strong evidence for the Eternal Return, next time around I will play for Arsenal!

  28. Alan Rawling permalink
    September 28, 2020

    We moved to Marlborough Ave in 1950 when I was 3 yrs old. My first memory of the area was the strong scented smell coming from Bush’s factory and visits to the toy shop in Broadway Mkt.
    My Dad was a baker in Kossoff’s bakery. He and my brother shared many a pint in The Market House opposite,
    Saturday mornings for us kids would be a visit to the Broadway to browse Derek’s comic stall outside Stanton’s, pay a visit to Cookes’s to look at the live eels on the stall outside and have pie & mash if we could afford it. Another pastime was browsing Carr’s window admiring the fishing equipment. In those days he had a good selection of basic angling tackle as well as tortoises, puppies and budgies.
    I went to St Pauls infants in Brougham Rd and then onto St Pauls junior school.
    We moved out of Marlborough Ave in the late 60’s when the are was redeveloped.
    So many memories.

  29. May 1, 2021

    brought back fond memories, my great aunt’s shop in several pictures, I.A.Blight

  30. Christine Tearle (nee BLIGHT) permalink
    May 11, 2021

    Yes – Blight, my family name – my aunt and uncle owned the shop, I.A. Blight. Perhaps Graham Walker and I are related?

    “Bella’s” was like Bradburys, sold everything and anything. I used to have a Saturday job and I
    remember going down into the cellar to weigh out flour and sugar into, I think blue paper bags, and desiccated coconut which was sold from a big oak drawer under the counter. Oh the memories.
    When I grew up and had a family of my own, my young daughter bred hamsters, and like Barbara, sold them to Mr. Carr.
    My brother in law bought me a lovely black and white stretch canvas picture of the shop, from Stephen Selby’s gallery in the Broadway.
    My mum and dad in law ran the “Market House” pub for a while in the early 1980’s

    The Broadway used to be a brilliant market, an eclectic mix of everything for years, then slowly but surely went into decline then died. The council tried to resurrect it by making a “Columbia Road” type market on a Saturday, but it didn’t really take off. Now, well, what a difference, it’s jam packed every Saturday, once again selling everything and anything.
    ,
    I remember my cousin Ron and his fiancee Doreen, who I haven’t seen for years, also aunt Bella’s sister Alice, it’s such a shame when families lose touch, but I’m sure that “The Broadway” will carry on for years.

  31. Edward penn permalink
    August 12, 2021

    I was brought up in Welshpool st .born in 1942 . Remember the great peaple in my street so fondly . They looked out for me as i lost my father he was a Japanese prisoner of war .he never came home I was born the same month he was captured . But those peaple kept so eye out for me . After the war I remember my mother worked in stantons ice cream shop .I used to take some of my school friends round for free ice cream. She would give me a ticking off . I went to st,Paul’s infant and junior schools .I remember there Friday evening picture shows on the projector in the small hall .what stands out for me is when laurel n Hardy turned up one evening at the time they were in London. Great memories . Bombed out houses were our play areas . Pie n mash I never got fed up eating it .the canal was another playground . And playing football over London fields

  32. February 7, 2022

    Beautiful photos. i went to London Fields Primary School in 1983.

    Does anyone remember a TV Repair shop called Bryan and King Electricals? It was there in 1977. I am looking for the man who ran it. He is my dad. Never met him before. Apparently there was a fire in the shop and his pet dog passed away in it.

    I have been told he relocated to Chatsworth Road E5.

    Any information would be appreciated.

    Thanks Stuart and everyone.

  33. May 25, 2022

    What a surprise to see a photograph of my Father heading up the pages about Broadway Market.

    Thank you to my son James, who sent me the link to Spitafields Life.

    The images of the ’80’s certainly show the Market at its worst time. My recollections are of it as a busy and crowded place when I was taken to the shop as a child, during school holidays etc.

  34. June 1, 2022

    I hope someone replies to this ?

    Ive other photographs of The Broadway Market, especially 51 “Sims Florist” which I would happily share. Ive a number showing the various Pubs in the road (or on the corner 🙂 )

    So if ‘The Editor’ reads this please get in contact – or view them on my Ancestry page under John Henry Sims 2, and John Henry Sims 3 .

  35. Desmond St.Rose permalink
    July 7, 2023

    I attended London Fields Primary School from 1978 to 1985, and lived on Middleton Road until the early 90s. The Broadway market, as desolate as it was back then, was very much a part of my world. Give me 10p and I was straight down Kenny’s sweetshop for “10 pence worth of penny sweets”, not forgetting the “please” at the end. Looking at these old photos really brought a tear to my eye, as I recognised so many of the people in them. The broken biscuit stall was very popular back then, as was Rogers Delicatessen. Mum used to work as a machinist in Ada Street, and would leave me with Aunty Anne of a morning to later drop me off to school. She lived in the flats on Whiston Road, so we’d walk through the bottom end of the market most days to get to school.
    I always wondered why there were so few stalls in the market back then, but it had a soul back then, which is now long gone. It was a traditional east end market, and people knew each other. Our regular shops were Kenny’s, AW Bradbury for Paraffin and light bulbs, the Dry Cleaners, June’s Food store (mum’s cousin) for West Indian food, Percy Ingles, The Post Office, Clarks Chemist, Danny’s stall, John’s Fruit stall, Rogers Delicatessen and the Fish & Chips shop near Ada street .
    John Biddall’s funfair used to set up in the park, opposite London Fields School every summer. I cannot explain the euphoria I would feel just seeing the caravans and colourful rides pull up and quickly assemble into a fun land of thrills, lights, candy floss and the smell of hot-dogs. All perfectly visible from The Broadway Market, Hackney…….my world.

  36. Judi Hall (Swainsbury) permalink
    September 25, 2023

    I loved the Broadway, spent many happy hours roaming around there and London Fields, as a teenager. We lived in Middleton Road and I went to Gayhurst Road school. Although I have lived in Somerset for years now, I always call this area home. It was sad when the market got so run down but, I have visited it many times over the years and actually love what it has evolved into. So much better than it being demolished and forgotten.
    The whole area sits in my heart, it made me who I am today xx

  37. Tom Evans permalink
    February 24, 2024

    Great to see these photos.I lived by the kids play area at London fields.
    The market was packed in the 60s,but by late 70s so many people had moved away.
    I visited recently,so nice its all being looked after by the new well off community

  38. Mary Carmel permalink
    March 2, 2024

    I had a Saturday job in what was known as The Biscuit Shop which was next door to a grocery/deli owned by the same people. I believe it was called Raphael’s but I may be wrong?
    The shop sold every kind of biscuit, loose or in packets. Does anyone remember it?

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