It could lead to prison as wellAgree, awful sport Pen, along with many others. Did wonder what 'pedestrianism' was all about. The words pedestrianism and sport don't, today, sit together. The wonders of bygone pastimes !
See Mike's 1855 maps on the previous page. The green undeveloped area was once mainly back-to-back housing either side of Irving Street with Sutton St to the east and Speaking Stile walk to the west. I was born in 1949 in a house located about half way down the area on the east side - at 1/66 Irving St. My Bodfish, Sewell and Smith ancestors occupied quite a few of the houses in the area. We were moved out of 1/66 in about 1956 for the whole area to be "slum-cleared". We expected the area to be redeveloped but it lay derelict for a couple of years until it was transformed into a sports ground, presumably for local school(s) to use. It had a large oval running track with a sprint straight down one side and javelin, shot-put, and long jump runs marked out inside the main track. I used to visit the area to stand on the site of the house in which I was born - it coincided with the long jump sand-pit! - which looks to have now been filled in. The area was white-line marked out each year in the Spring for athletics and in the Autumn, sometimes as a small football pitch. Older versions of Google Maps showed the markings. I don't think it was ever connected in any way with the Bowling Green Grounds. It now looks abandoned as a formal sports ground, although I think I see two goals erected on it, perhaps for some football kick-about?Theres now a thread on the subject of pedestrianism linked below. Thanks Lady P. Link to that thread is here:
A small addition to my last post about pedestrianism, below is the link to a BBC article:
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The strange 19th-Century sport that was cooler than football
Pedestrianism was a sport of epic rivalries, eyewatering salaries, feverish nationalism, eccentric personalities and six-day, 450-mile walks.www.bbc.co.uk
Off topic I know so it's my last post on this thread and quite interesting!
In relation to this sport, the Bowling Green Inn and the Prince of Wales Ground held pedestrianism events and seem to be linked. Were the Prince of Wales Ground and Bowling Green Grounds one and the same as that at the Bowling Green Inn/Tavern site ? On the pedestrianism sport thread I've posted a press cutting which also describes a 'Subscription Ground' at Holloway Head. Could this be how it developed? And by public subscription? There was a new 'pedestrian' ground opened in 1863.
On present day maps there's a large green undeveloped area and I wonder if this is/was connected. It would have been right on the edge of the early Bowling Green Inn/Tavern site.
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