Memories

I can remember we used to have to walk to Llay every Sunday morning to come to church and that was the way we came was across those fields, before it was made into the park. Like I say I'm going back 40 odd years ago now, longer than that.

There used to be a footpath through but it was just made through people walking, it wasn't an actual tarmac footpath or anything.

We used to just come across there, Sundays, and then walk back that way and it used to bring us out in top Bradley, then there was a walk down Barratts Hill, which was an old farm, over the river and then back up to Bradley.

Barratts farm it was - I think he had a few cattle there, mostly cows I think it was down there, because he used to have a little dairy and a great big haystack. But them fields were just crops when we used to come through them and it was so lovely because they had all the wild flowers in there as well.

Vera Lloyd, born 1942

The park when I was little was a farm field, cos they used to have the corn in there. There's always been paths there, we always used to go for walks up and down what they called then the Pant Mawr.

I can remember, we wouldn't have been what 7, 8, 9? Maybe a bit older. That was our play area at the time. We could go over there and they'd have all these haystacks stacked up and we used to hide in the middle and play hide and seek and things like that.

They always stacked them as big haystacks then, not like they do today with these round ones, these were big oblong ones, they had steel ties on them. Two or three of us used to move them out of the way and we'd put them back when we'd finished

It was a play area, it was fun.

Margaret Hayes, born 1942

I remember the roads being dripped with sand, wet sand dripped down the lorries and onto the road in front of you. They were grey the lorries, weren't they. United Gravel.

I remember seeing the sand holes on the bus, double decker buses, you used to see how deep the ground was here and in the next place it would be right down low where they'd taken all the sand out.I remember the sand dunes and they were big, some were really deep. You'd have a bank there and they'd literally dig down the side of it so you'd have a big empty square. Where the children's park is, I remember that being really, really deep down.

Chistine Edwards, born 1950

As you go through the gates there, there's a big road going straight through where the lorries used to go up and the canteen was there and the garages and all that for the lorries.

In 72 we put a plant in there, for the Drylene, for Mcalpines, you know - doing the road, the bypass, to process this Drylene ready for to go on the roads.

Drylene's like a semi-dry mix, because they wanted to put tarmac on afterwards to take the road up to bridge, when they were putting the stuff on before, it was soft and when they were running on it, it was dropping below the bridge level so they formed this stuff and it consolidated it - hardpacked. When they put the tarmac on top they were up to bridge level, well, slightly above bridge level.

There were conveyor belts running for miles. I know this one lad, he had a conveyor running onto a conveyor and he went home. He switched one conveyor off and forgot to switch the other one off. When he come back everything was buried! He'd buried everything! One belt would feed on and the other one would feed off and he'd stopped the one from feeding off, so it just kept feeding onto it. It'd buried the hut and everything when he came back! I think they dismissed him. I remember him telling me about, he's dead now, it to be honest, the lad. But he told me about it, the lad did, when it happened.

Randall Lloyd, born 1934

Dad used to go there for to get his beansticks. Me dad put some beansticks in and they took root didn't they - they grew up as high as the house! We had to cut them down in the end! Willow and ash - long straight ones - they had to be straight.

Randall Lloyd, born 1934

Every morning, very early in the morning, I'd be walking the dog through the park. And during the summer there was always a sky lark sat on top of the cloud sculpture singing its head off until the dog ran up and decided to try and be friends with it and it would fly off!

Andrew, born 1965

I actually like going round and seeing the different things, you've got your beehive and that and you can sit there and talk with people and it's surprising how long you can sit there for. You'll sit down there talking, the kiddies are playing, whoever you're talking with will go, but as they're going, somebody else is coming, always somebody coming.

Taking the little uns over there they like to see everything and of course you've got the little bits of sand and gravel where there's a hole and they can play sand castles, just natural holes and of course you've got the bank with big sandy holes, I say they're fox holes to the kids. My little uns love it. I'll take them over there time and time again, they'll always find something different

Margaret Hayes, born 1942

It's really our own piece of countryside.The children can play and it's free. I don't mean free in money, but freedom. Jamie likes to run and you can't let them run on the roads can you? And you can let them run on the park and they can go, you're not following them shouting "Come Here! "Don't do that!"

There's only there that we can go now. Where we used to go as children is houses. People have got to live somewhere but you need that piece of countryside to go to, not just children. I used to know someone who would borrow a dog to have an excuse to go!

Chistine Edwards , born 1950