Content Pane
lives at 29 Lorn Road.
- David wrote (2005-04-06):
Lets face it Stockwell is pretty mundane. We do have real live dramas everyday with screaming police sirens and all the other things which add pockets of excitement to the slow depreciation of our properties while the mortgage still hasn't been paid off, but these happen everywhere, even in Slough. Yes Stockwell is round about average, despite a small band of residents who gallantly attempt to 'big it up' to use local terminology.
Now I don't want to get down on you all, so let me relate one of those 'pockets' of excitement I've encountered. Our house vibrates. OK, you're thinking so what, so I'll spice that up a bit. Our house mysteriously vibrates! This has been corroborated by all members of the household and by visiting guests. You mainly notice it while lying in bed when still awake, especially if you have your head to one side, ear to pillow, and/or a palm flat down on the mattress. You can feel the house vibrate at a fair rate, the mystery being why.
I don't know for certain, but I will kick off the speculation (cue here for responses). I'm going to rule out earthquakes, although anyone else is welcome to rule them back in, because I've been in a few earthquakes now and it doesn't feel the same. The 8.5 in Alaska a couple of years back made the walls move several feet towards my face, and who can forget the 4.2 near Birmingham. Not good for the Staffordshire pottery one would imagine. We do get earthquakes here in London and quite often in Kent (notice the continual cracks on the A2/M2, well if you will build a road right along a fault-line). The North and South Downs being the ripples at the end of the relentless crash of Africa into the Eurasian plate. I'm not convinced that's the answer. My experience of mild earthquakes is that they still shake or wobble rather than vibrate like a washing machine. Given that there isn't an alien base down there, or some kind of Wellsian subterranean city, what could be happening?
Remember that two pence worth I paid for my view on The Stock Well? Seems while it was in the bank it made interest allowing me to spend a further tuppence on the vibrating house. I've noticed that the pavement sunk rapidly, over night. One day it was level with the front garden path, next day it was an inch lower. A group of people from Hyde Southbank and their contractor told me tree roots suck the water from the ground and the drier earth compacts with this volume removed. Mmmmmm really, just recently? After all the years these two mature trees have been there they suddenly drink all the ground water? I said this to the assembled group of worthies and got an ignorant silence for a reply. Plus I'm certain I saw two of them share a worried glance and a sharp intake of breath before they quickly scampered off before more questions could be asked. A conspiracy? Are there aliens down there? What I know is down there are voids and water. Voids from bomb damage certainly and there are small streams (stocks) all over, a few converted into drains many years ago. I know the watertable level can get very high with all the London clay preventing it from draining away, and that one Underground station in Tooting has to continually pump water out from it's lower level. They said it was dirty water but was drinkable if filtered. So the Peckham Spring may not be such a figment of Del Boy's imagination. Not so long ago a huge hole suddenly appeared in the middle of the road outside Clarke's Motors at the top or east end of Lorn Road. Vooooom, big hole. Yeah all this doesn't point to vibration though. Maybe the results of though.
My guess is the Underground (clue in the title). I think it's the Tube. I think it must go right underneath (or very close by) this house. I've been trying to visualise the line from the air going from Brixton to Stockwell and on to Vauxhall and the Northern line from Oval to Stockwell and on to Clapham North. All of these lines would appear to be too far west from number 29 Lorn Road, but then do these railways go directly place-to-place?
Does your house rock? Is your home in prime vibration territory? Have you felt it vibrate before and always put it down to your imagination? Well now the truth is out there.
- David wrote (2005-02-21):
I am a founder of Credits Actors Agency Ltd., and currently Chair of it's owner Credits Group, but most people here will know me as the guy who used to work at Slade Gardens Adventure Playground. I have spent all my life living in Stockwell. I went to school at Durand Primary and onto Italia Conti in Landor Road.
The subject of my e-mail is the Stock Well. On various occasions throughout my life I've had people tell me that the well for which the area is named after is on their property, usually in the basement. Also people have told me that they know the people who have the well. While I was working at Italia Conti the son of the then owner, my boss, told me it was under the boiler in Avondale Hall. As they line from the song goes ' two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong '. So far, as far as I know, the well is in Groveway, Lorn Road, Stockwell Park Road, Landor Road and Stockwell Park Crescent. No one from Stockwell Green has said anything to me, which is odd because if there were a well, The well, this would probably be where it would have been. Perhaps I just don't know enough people from Stockwell Green. I have my doubts that there was any well at all, even commonal garden everyday not famous ones, because there would have been so much water flowing about anyway. Ever wondered why those houses on the Brixton Road between the petrol station and the Old White Horse aren't on the pavement but set back. It's not because they had long front gardens, it's because they used to be right on the bank of the Effra.
It's just my opinion that Stockwell was named for a very ordinary water crossing. Lets go way back to green fields and maybe some farming in the area. Running from the hill, which Landor Road now climbs, a small stream or a stock ran to join the River Effra. I remember reading that one use of the word 'well' was oldAnglo-Saxon for a fallen tree or old unhewed log. I think that at this place nowhere in particular a well fell over or was placed over the stock at the bottom of the hill. Since it was a handy place to cross and few homes got built which would be near where Stockwell green is now.
So there you go, that's my theory. My apologises if you've worked this all out for yourself before, I don't claim to be a genius. As far as I know there may be a book with all of this in. If there is all I can do is claim ignorance of such a tome. Maybe you'll find it of interest to put on your website. It's got to be better than a blank page, which shows just one hit. Oh wait was that me! Oh no I'm a Stockwell geek!