Mary Teasdale interviewed about living in Hemel Hempstead

Interview for the ICO project New Towns, Our Town: Stories on Screen

Interviewed for the ICO New Towns project, Mary Teasdale says that she came to Hemel Hempstead and moved into a three bedroom end of terrace council house in December 1956. The houses were built by Wimpey for the New Town. Mary was born in Bushey Heath, Watford and had a flat over a sweetshop there until she had to move out because she was expecting a baby and the owners did not allow babies. She then lived with her mother-in-law and sister-in-law in Northwood but was glad to move out. They were able to move to the New Town because her husband had a job with Timothy White’s and Taylors, the pharmacist’s and houseware company which was opening a shop in Hemel Hempstead. Mary says that the residents got to know one another and she retained long friendships. She worked for Kay’s, Lipton’s and the Co-op. She recalls that in the 1950s you could leave a job on the Friday and start a new job on the Monday after giving a week’s notice, because jobs were plentiful. Mary remembers the wages she received over the years – she started at £1-7-6 and ended at £3.69 an hour at Sainsbury’s which was also her grandson’s starting wage there. Mary says that trips into the town centre for older people now involve a lot more walking because the taxi rank is less accessible than it used to be. She and her husband would each go to the cinema on their own on separate days leaving the other to look after the children because they would not have a baby-sitter, then they would talk about the film afterwards. Mary used to take the children into town for the day to go shopping or feed the ducks. The interviewer mentions that one of the archive films shows children paddling in the River Gade. Mary remembers this, and also taking the children to the canal near Boxmoor station, where there was a rope across the water used by children to get from one side to the other.