The photo above shows an Elizabeth Line train at the Abbey Wood terminus. The Elizabeth Line coming to Abbey Wood has brought economic growth to a previously overlooked and somewhat deprived part of the London Borough of Bexley. Just last week news was released of a major new development close to the station and in the heart of the town. It was announced by the local press that a large Travelodge hotel with 132 bedrooms may be built in close proximity to the station, and that the popular Abbey Arms pub next to it was to have a major refurbishment and extension. The Travelodge should be popular with business people, as it will only be a short walk to Abbey Wood Station. The Elizabeth Line, Thameslink and Southeastern trains All call at the station and provide connectivity to large parts of London, Heathrow, London City and Luton airports. One can even travel from Abbey Wood directly to Reading. Alternatively, one can get a Southeastern or Thameslink train into Kent. The Popular Abbey Arms pub will have a large extension which will include a coffee shop in addition to the pub itself, the upper floor, which I believe is currently vacant will turn into a games room with darts and pool. The pub is already popular with locals, and has historically hosted craft and farmers markets located in its car park. It has also been well known for its pizza oven and high quality homemade pizzas. The extension and refurbishment would involve a substantial investment, and shows confidence that this can be recouped in an acceptable time frame. I think this will be helped by the large number of new residents in the nearby tower blocks, many of whom work in the City or West End of London, and have relatively large disposable incomes. One question that occurs to me is how many local jobs will be created in the hospitality industry by these two enterprises. I have been told by those more in the know about local property that Abbey Wood is very much an up and coming area principally due to its excellent public transport connectivity since the station was rebuilt, expanded and the Elizabeth Line started. Unfortunately, as I mentioned last week, the proposed extension of the Docklands Light Railway to Becton and Thamesmead will not to be terminating at Abbey Wood station, but instead will end at a new station called Thamesmead Riverside. As I wrote last week, apparently the reason for this is principally down to budgeting or lack thereof. Nevertheless, it will substantially improve connectivity in an area which historically has always felt very cut off from the rest of the borough. Overall, I think the construction that has been proposed is to be welcomed, albeit with some reservations. As we saw with the example of the construction of Thamesmead in the late 1960s, The architects and developers promised much and failed to deliver on many of those promises. I am hopeful that this will not be the case with the Travelodge construction and the refurbishment and extension of the Abbey Arms pub. No doubt time will tell. Comments to me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.
As local drivers and users of buses, especially the 99 will already be aware, roadworks have been taking place in Fraser Road - the main road which connects Upper Belvedere with Erith for a great many months. Unfortunately things are only going to get worse. Whilst the road has been partially accessible to traffic heading from Bexley Road in the direction of Upper Belvedere, this will be changing on the 25th of June, when Fraser Road will be completely closed to all traffic in both directions until at least the 31st of August, and possibly considerably longer if the roadworks do not proceed as planned. Local Councillor Nicola Taylor has been following the situation. Last week she posted the following update:- "Message from the Street works Manager about Thames Water works on Fraser Road -"Just wanted to make you aware of the ongoing works in Fraser Road Erith that have now resulted in a full road closure due to the position of the new main. Unfortunately, it will not leave the required 3.25m, 3.50m minimum width for HGV’s which means the road will need to be closed. Thames Water will be closing the road from the 25th of June to 31st August. I have asked that a letter drop is undertaken and they do a drop-in session for residents and business."I have asked for access to be given for residents of Hawthorn Place as they will be cut off if the road closure continues from the Quarry roundabout and also access to Wickes and other businesses". One business that has been adversely affected by the long time closure of Fraser Road is the excellent and very popular T-Bones Cafe which has been serving customers for many years, and gets some extremely positive reviews. It relies heavily on passing trade from truckers and other commercial drivers, as it is in an area where there is little passing pedestrian activity. It has been able to get by serving the workers on the roadworks, but little in the way of its regular customer base, which seems to include a lot of motorbike riders. The total closure of Fraser Road can only be very bad for its business. Bearing in mind that many independent small businesses are struggling at the present anyway, this could be disastrous for the cafe. If anyone has any inside information about this, I would love to hear from you and you can do so in complete confidence and remain anonymous if you so wish.
And now for a subject that I feel that many people might disagree with me regarding, but I will continue anyway. There has been so much hype and press coverage about the World Football cup, that I find entirely mystifying. I cannot understand why so many normally intelligent and articulate people can make so much fuss about 20 grown people chasing around an inflated pigs bladder for 90 minutes, then jumping in the bath together. It seems to me to be a completely pointless waste of time. I have no interest whatsoever in any kind of sport, and think that those involved could instead be involved in charitable activities and volunteer work within their communities, rather than being horrendously overpaid for nothing other than running around and getting out of breath. I have never had any interest in any kind of sport, and I know I am a member of a large community who think the same way, but have declined to say anything about it, as a certain section of opinionated sports fans tend to treat this as some kind of personal affront. The yobbish and tribal behaviour that you quite often see at sports events just underlies this situation. I have no objection whatsoever to those people who enjoy sports such as football, rugby and many other participant activities. I just wish that a certain subsection of them would not treat people who have no interest, as some kind of pariahs.
Forty two years ago, a computer was launched that, on paper should have set the world alight, but instead went on to become infamous. It is a computer that failed so massively, very few people in the UK will have even heard of it, as it sank without trace. Ironically because of its’ lack of success, the machines are now desirable collectors’ items among old computer enthusiasts. The machine in question is the IBM PC Junior, otherwise known as the “Peanut”. It was designed to be a computer which was software compatible with the full IBM PC, but with better graphics and sound, to appeal to a home user. Back in the 80’s, IBM could do no wrong. They were massively respected and totally dominated the business and government computer market worldwide. There was a popular saying at the time “nobody ever gets fired for buying IBM”. Which was pretty much the case; IBM kit was well made, expensive and came with excellent technical support and training. The original IBM PC (the 5150 model) was the first time IBM had designed and manufactured a computer from “off the shelf” standard components, something which would both make the PC the industry standard, and also in time mark the end of IBM as a major producer of desktop hardware, as other companies introduced cheaper and more capable “clone” computers. At the point where the PC Junior was introduced though, IBM was still king of the hill. The launch of a home computer built by the company was thought to be a guaranteed hit. The problems with the Junior were pretty much obvious from the outset. The Junior came with a absolutely terrible “chicklet” type keyboard, which was virtually impossible to touch – type on. The keyboard used a wireless infra red connection which was very unreliable – even of you could get some typing on the keys themselves, quite often the link would break, and you would get half a sentence along, before you realised that the words had stopped appearing on screen. To add to this, the expansion slots and joystick ports were non – standard, making adding third party devices very difficult. If this was not bad enough, the PC Junior only came with 64K or 128K of RAM; this meant that most full PC software, such as Visicalc and Wordstar which required 640K, would not run on the machine – the much vaunted software compatibility was not anywhere near as good as the marketing people said. The factors are small when compared to the main problem – the PC Junior was over twice the price of the Commodore 64 – which at the time was the most popular and successful home computer in the world, which had a plethora of third party software and hardware available for it. The PC Junior was launched in February 1984 to poor reviews and public indifference. The IBM marketing people were largely perplexed; they were used to dealing with large corporations, not individual private consumers, and really did not understand this strange new market. The few people who did buy the PC Junior complained so vociferously and so long about the awful keyboard that IBM eventually decided to provide users with a full stroke keyboard as used on the Juniors’ big brother – the full PC, but this was too little, too late, and the company pulled the plug on the whole PC Junior project within eighteen months. Ironically this also marked the slow decline in the full IBM PC. Because of the open design of the PC, other manufacturers realised that they could make computers which were software compatible with the IBM product, but which were considerably faster, cheaper and easier to upgrade. Dell, Compaq and HP all started producing PC compatible clones, and very soon these became ubiquitous, not just in the office, but in the home as well. The PC took on an identity apart from IBM, and within a decade, IBM had sold their entire desktop manufacturing division to Chinese PC makers Lenovo.
A famous American actor who had strong links with the local area - primarily living for a while in Nuxley Road, Upper Belvedere (not Nuxley Village - there is no such place, and never has been). He lived at number 44 Nuxley Road, whilst stationed in the UK during World War II. It was reported that he was a regular at the Royal Standard pub, almost directly opposite his house, during his period of local residence. He was an actor who is not particularly well known in the UK, but was very famous and well liked in the USA. As a child, Efrem Zimbalist Jr. received a boarding school education. Acting in school plays, he later trained briefly at the Yale School of Drama but didn't apply himself enough and quit. As an NBC network radio page, he auditioned when he could and found minor TV and stock theatre parts while joining up with the Neighbourhood Playhouse. Following WWII war service with the Army infantry in which he was a commissioned junior officer; he was awarded the Bronze Star for heroism, and the Purple Heart after being wounded in combat, a director and friend of the family, Garson Kanin, gave the aspiring actor his first professional role in his Broadway production of "The Rugged Path" (1945) which starred Spencer Tracy. With his dark, friendly, clean-scrubbed good looks and a deep, rich voice, Zimbalist found little trouble finding work. He continued with the American Repertory Theatre performing in such classics as "Henry VIII" and "Androcles and the Lion" while appearing opposite the legendary Eva Le Gallienne in "Hedda Gabler". Zimbalist then tried his hand as a stage producer, successfully bringing opera to Broadway audiences for the first time with memorable presentations of "The Medium" and "The Telephone". As producer of Gian Carlo Menotti's "The Consul", he won the New York Drama Critic's Award and the Pulitzer Prize for best musical in 1950. An auspicious film debut opposite Edward G. Robinson in House of Strangers (1949) brought little career momentum due to the untimely death of his wife Emily (a onetime actress who appeared with him in "Hedda Gabler" and bore him two children, Nancy and Efrem III) to cancer in 1950. Making an abrupt decision to abandon acting, he served as assistant director/researcher at the Curtis School of Music for his father and buried himself with studies and music composition. In 1956, Zimbalist was put under contract by Warner Bros. and moved to Hollywood. Zimbalist's first recurring role in a Warner Bros. Television series was as roguish gambler "Dandy Jim Buckley" on Maverick, opposite James Garner in 1957, and making five appearances as the character. In 1958, Zimbalist played the co-lead Stuart "Stu" Bailey in 77 Sunset Strip, a popular detective series running until 1964. During this period, he made several concurrent appearances in other Warner Bros. television shows, such as Hawaiian Eye, The Alaskans, and Bronco. He also starred as the lead in several feature films for Warners, such as Bombers B-52, The Deep Six, A Fever in the Blood and The Chapman Report. Zimbalist was in such demand during this time that he was given a vacation by Jack L. Warner due to exhaustion from his busy schedule. Zimbalist was most widely known for his starring role as Inspector Lewis Erskine in the Quinn Martin television production The F.B.I., which premiered on September 19, 1965 and aired its final episode on September 8, 1974. Zimbalist was generous in his praise of producer Martin and of his own experience starring in the show. Those who worked with him were equally admiring of the star's professionalism and likeable personality. Zimbalist maintained a strong personal relationship with F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover, who requested that the show be technically accurate and portray his agents in the best possible light, and he insisted actors playing F.B.I. employees undergo a background check. Zimbalist subsequently spent a week in contact with Hoover in Washington, D.C. and at the F.B.I. Academy in Quantico, Virginia. The men remained mutual admirers for the rest of Hoover's life. Hoover held up Zimbalist as a model for F.B.I. employees' personal appearance. After 77 Sunset Strip he appeared in other series, including CBS's short-lived The Reporter starring Harry Guardino as journalist Danny Taylor of the fictitious New York Globe. He also appeared in leading and supporting roles in several feature films, including Harlow, A Fever in the Blood (a film about a ruthless politician), Wait Until Dark and Airport 1975. Zimbalist had a recurring role as Daniel Chalmers, a white-collar con man, on his daughter Stephanie Zimbalist's 1980s television detective series Remington Steele, and in the television dramatic series Hotel. In 1990, he played the father of Zorro in the Christian Broadcasting Network's The New Zorro. Zimbalist relinquished the role after the programme's first season due to the filming at studios outside Madrid, Spain, and the role subsequently went to Henry Darrow. He had a small recurring role in the 1990s hit science fiction television series Babylon 5 as William Edgars. Also in the 1990s, Zimbalist played Alfred Pennyworth in Batman: The Animated Series as well as in Superman: The Animated Series, The New Batman Adventures, Justice League, Static Shock, and the animated films Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, Batman and Mr. Freeze: SubZero, Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman; he also played villain Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man: The Animated Series. He appeared on the Trinity Broadcasting Network and as himself in the 1998 Smithsonian Institution production of Gemstones of America. He performed as the narrator in "Good Morning, America" by Elinor Remick Warren. Zimbalist wrote an autobiography, My Dinner of Herbs, published by Limelight Editions, New York. Efrem Zimbalist Jr's local connection was uncovered by Jacqui Davies, a local author, who met him as a baby. She recalls:- "I was always told by my elder sister I met Efrem when I was a baby. He was in Upper Belvedere during latter part of World War 2. A lot of American pilots and service men visited; also still not sure why but I know the married couple who managed the Royal Standard pub opposite my Nan's house in Nuxley Road had a lot of well known people who popped in there. I do not know if they were into entertainment but it would not surprise me. I was around 2 or 3 years of age; I was born in 1953 so must of been around 55 or 56 after war time yes I thought maybe he came back to visit people in the area as had association during the war. There was also a lot of Canadians around at the time I was told. My story goes my mum who knew the people who managed the pub took me over there to meet him. Why is a mystery believe me I have tried to get evidence all these years but nothing. The rest of my siblings were not taken it seems it was just me. My mum use to help with parties doing catering etc she also worked for Roger Moore and his first wife Dorothy Squires they threw a lot of parties also. I tried to contact Efrem's daughter but I only had Facebook to do it on I doubt she ever got my message as generally fans run these sites. I was hoping for some evidence but drew a blank".
The end video this week is something of a historical document; it features a BBC News report from back in 1993 on the protest march against the BNP bookshop and headquarters building, which at the time was located in Upper Wickham Lane, Welling. Comments and feedback to me at the usual address - hugh.neal@gmail.com.
