Day 68
Oval - Oxford Circus
Another short-ish day of travelling today, since I only have two stations to visit to complete the 'O's.
The name of the first, Oval, will be familiar to anyone who's a fan of the game of cricket and - very probably - most other people too.
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| Oval |
There are certain places - Wembley and Twickenham for example - whose names have become almost synonymous with the sports played there. With cricket it's a little trickier, since other names like Lord's, Edgbaston, Old Trafford and Trent Bridge are perhaps equally familiar. Nevertheless, The Oval could, with reasonable justifiability, have laid claim to being the 'home' of cricket, if Lord's hadn't already claimed the title.
The inside of the tube station certainly leaves no doubt as to the local preoccupation.
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| Spot the theme... |
The cricket ground, which is - not surprisingly - oval shaped, is a few minutes walk away from the station, on an oval shaped road, called Kennington Oval. However, the shape of the road was not (in spite of what you might think), determined by the shape of the cricket ground, but rather the other way around. The Kennington Oval was originally a market garden owned by the Duchy of Cornwall before it was leased to Surrey County Cricket Club to build their home there in 1845.
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| The Oval |
It also has the rather dubious honour of being the venue for the 'death of English cricket' - as facetiously reported by The Sporting Times in 1882, when Australia beat England in a Test Match here. The newspaper wrote that the 'body' of English Cricket would be 'cremated and the ashes taken to Australia', prompting English team captain Ivo Bligh to vow to regain them the following year - which his team succeeded in doing.
A trophy (a terracotta urn containing the ashes of a burnt cricket bail) was presented to Bligh by a group of Melbourne women (one of whom he later went on to marry) and thus the rivalry over 'The Ashes' was born.
I walk around the Oval and manage to catch a glimpse of the pitch through one of the locked gates. I had hoped there might be a tour of the grounds I could go on, but sadly these only start in February.
Looking through the gate I see the huge gas storage tanks (or Gasometers) which form the backdrop of the Oval.
I complete my circular (or rather, elliptical) stroll around the grounds, then head back to the main road, across which is Kennington Park.
When I visited Kennington Station, some time ago, I was in something of a rush, and didn't get to see inside the park - an oversight I correct today.
It's a fairly typical park - trees, grass, playgrounds and so on - though it does also have one or two curiosities.
The first is a rather striking monument to the victims of the bombing of an air-raid shelter in 1940.
The wording on the monument reads:
"History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, but if faced
With courage, need not be lived again"
It's a quotation from a poem written by American writer Maya Angelou, and read by her at the inauguration of President Bill Clinton.
Given the current state of world politics, and the fact that this week sees the inauguration of a new, and, ahem, unpredictable American president, it might be a sentiment we should bear in mind...
Also in the park is a 'Lodge House' (now used as offices), which - while not a palace by any means - nevertheless seems a rather grander affair than is usually found in public parks.
A sign nearby tells me the reason for this - it was commissioned by Prince Albert as being a 'model for working class family homes'.
The Prince, philanthropist, though he undoubtedly was, clearly had a naively rose-tinted view of what most working class people could aspire to.
***
I head north from the park to Kennington Station, and thence to Tottenham Court Road. From here it's just a ten minute walk to my second - and final - stop today: Oxford Circus.
Oxford Circus is quite possibly the busiest place in London.
As an interchange of the Central, Bakerloo and Victoria Lines, as well as being at the junction of two of the busiest shopping streets in London - Oxford Street and Regent Street - it sees an annual footfall of over 90 million people. Which of course gives the lie to the clichéd epithet; 'it's like Piccadilly Circus round here', applied to anywhere over-crowded. Piccadilly Circus sees barely half the number of people Oxford Circus does.
The fact that they are both called 'Circuses' does not, sadly, have anything to do with them being noisy, chaotic places full of people behaving like clowns and animals - it's just that circus is the Latin for a circle or, in this case, roundabout.
Given the number of people spewing up out of the tube station every day, it seems perhaps odd that it was only as recently as 2009 that the junction was modernised to include a Japanese style 'pedestrian scramble' type crossing. This is a crossing at which the traffic is completely stopped from all directions, and pedestrians are able to cross whichever way they like, all at the same time.
This being polite Britain of course, and despite the number of foreign tourists also no doubt taking part, the so called 'scramble' looks to be more of a leisurely promenade, though that might just be the time of day - I've no doubt that at rush hour it's every commuter for himself.
To the north of Oxford Circus is Portland Place, and in particular Broadcasting House - the home of the BBC's radio output since 1932, and now the corporations main headquarters in London.
Technically, the original art deco style building is now known as 'Old Broadcasting House, following the construction of a new wing to the east and a connecting glass fronted building between them, forming a horseshoe shaped courtyard familiar to fans of the self-mocking BBC comedy 'W1A'.
Back to the junction, and the streets are getting busier, as lunchtime approaches.
As I alluded to earlier - if The Oval is synonymous with cricket, then the two streets which converge here - Regent Street and Oxford Street - are synonymous with shopping.
Many of the familiar high street department stores started life on Oxford Street, including HMV, Selfridges and John Lewis. The latter, despite famously being a 'partnership' (or 'worker co-operative') in which the workers have a say in the running of the business and receive a share of the annual profits as a bonus, began life somewhat differently as something of a dictatorship run by the first Mr John Lewis - known as a bit of an autocrat.
He would happily sack members of staff on a whim, and his management style led to disputes both with his workers (who went on strike) and his sons, one of whom (John Spedan Lewis) would take over on his death, and change the whole ethos of the company by setting up the partnership.
Around the corner from the tube station at Oxford Circus, on Argyll Street, is one of the most famous theatres (since the television age at least) in London.
"Sunday Night At The London Palladium" (and its many subsequent renamed guises) has been a fixture on British television from 1955 to the present day, and has made the theatre a household name for generations. This is the theatre your gran has heard of, and (if like me, you're an actor) the one at which she doggedly hopes to 'see you on the stage' one day.
Just down the road is another famous retail name - Liberty. A luxury goods store along the same lines as Harrods in Knightsbridge, the business was started by Arthur Lasenby Liberty in 1875. The present building, with its mock Tudor frontage, was constructed in 1924 and used timbers from two 19th Century British Navy ships - HMS Impregnable and HMS Hindustan.
Around the corner, and in marked contrast to the traditional façade of Liberty, are the hip and trendy fashion shops of the heart of 1960s Swinging London - Carnaby Street.
This is where the like of the Rolling Stones, The Who, The Small Faces and so on bought their gear and hung out with fashion designers such as Mary Quant. The whole area became a Mecca for mods, hippies and the 'In-Crowd' - so much so that The Kinks even wrote a satirical song about it; 'Dedicated Follower Of Fashion'.
It seems just as popular with the fashionistas today, and certainly has a lively buzz about it. I'm not sure how much more Paisley the world really needs, however, and you'd certainly need a figure more svelte than mine to fit into much that's on offer.
But none of that dampens my mood today, as I head back to the station and to home, having ticked off another letter on my alphabetical quest. Next time I'll be launching myself into the 'P's, of which there are a fair few, and with luck and a fair wind I'll be approaching two-thirds of the way through the list of stations before too long. Onwards!
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| The ground, with the gasometers behind |
I walk around the Oval and manage to catch a glimpse of the pitch through one of the locked gates. I had hoped there might be a tour of the grounds I could go on, but sadly these only start in February.
Looking through the gate I see the huge gas storage tanks (or Gasometers) which form the backdrop of the Oval.
I complete my circular (or rather, elliptical) stroll around the grounds, then head back to the main road, across which is Kennington Park.
When I visited Kennington Station, some time ago, I was in something of a rush, and didn't get to see inside the park - an oversight I correct today.
 |
| Kennington Park |
It's a fairly typical park - trees, grass, playgrounds and so on - though it does also have one or two curiosities.
 |
| Air-Raid Monument |
The wording on the monument reads:
"History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, but if faced
With courage, need not be lived again"
It's a quotation from a poem written by American writer Maya Angelou, and read by her at the inauguration of President Bill Clinton.
Given the current state of world politics, and the fact that this week sees the inauguration of a new, and, ahem, unpredictable American president, it might be a sentiment we should bear in mind...
Also in the park is a 'Lodge House' (now used as offices), which - while not a palace by any means - nevertheless seems a rather grander affair than is usually found in public parks.
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| Prince Consort Lodge - Information |
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| The Lodge - now offices. |
***
I head north from the park to Kennington Station, and thence to Tottenham Court Road. From here it's just a ten minute walk to my second - and final - stop today: Oxford Circus.
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| Oxford Circus |
Oxford Circus is quite possibly the busiest place in London.
As an interchange of the Central, Bakerloo and Victoria Lines, as well as being at the junction of two of the busiest shopping streets in London - Oxford Street and Regent Street - it sees an annual footfall of over 90 million people. Which of course gives the lie to the clichéd epithet; 'it's like Piccadilly Circus round here', applied to anywhere over-crowded. Piccadilly Circus sees barely half the number of people Oxford Circus does.
The fact that they are both called 'Circuses' does not, sadly, have anything to do with them being noisy, chaotic places full of people behaving like clowns and animals - it's just that circus is the Latin for a circle or, in this case, roundabout.
Given the number of people spewing up out of the tube station every day, it seems perhaps odd that it was only as recently as 2009 that the junction was modernised to include a Japanese style 'pedestrian scramble' type crossing. This is a crossing at which the traffic is completely stopped from all directions, and pedestrians are able to cross whichever way they like, all at the same time.
 |
| Pedestrians 'scrambling' |
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| Broadcasting House |
To the north of Oxford Circus is Portland Place, and in particular Broadcasting House - the home of the BBC's radio output since 1932, and now the corporations main headquarters in London.
Technically, the original art deco style building is now known as 'Old Broadcasting House, following the construction of a new wing to the east and a connecting glass fronted building between them, forming a horseshoe shaped courtyard familiar to fans of the self-mocking BBC comedy 'W1A'.
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| 'Old' and 'New' Broadcasting Houses. |
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| Oxford Street - John Lewis, House Of Fraser, Debenhams, et al |
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| Regent Street |
He would happily sack members of staff on a whim, and his management style led to disputes both with his workers (who went on strike) and his sons, one of whom (John Spedan Lewis) would take over on his death, and change the whole ethos of the company by setting up the partnership.
Around the corner from the tube station at Oxford Circus, on Argyll Street, is one of the most famous theatres (since the television age at least) in London.
 |
| The London Palladium |
Just down the road is another famous retail name - Liberty. A luxury goods store along the same lines as Harrods in Knightsbridge, the business was started by Arthur Lasenby Liberty in 1875. The present building, with its mock Tudor frontage, was constructed in 1924 and used timbers from two 19th Century British Navy ships - HMS Impregnable and HMS Hindustan.
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| Liberty |
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| Carnaby Street |
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| The home of Swinging London |
It seems just as popular with the fashionistas today, and certainly has a lively buzz about it. I'm not sure how much more Paisley the world really needs, however, and you'd certainly need a figure more svelte than mine to fit into much that's on offer.
But none of that dampens my mood today, as I head back to the station and to home, having ticked off another letter on my alphabetical quest. Next time I'll be launching myself into the 'P's, of which there are a fair few, and with luck and a fair wind I'll be approaching two-thirds of the way through the list of stations before too long. Onwards!
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