A century of pulling points

3:11pm Friday 4th April 2008

THE first residents of Highams Park had to go a long way to get a pint and had to wait more than a decade before they could drink one in a local public house.

A century ago Highams Park was a young commuter village, built around a train station and the new headquarters of the British Xylonite Company, which discovered celluloid, and expanded rapidly.

The settlement, near the rural hamlet of Hale End, got its name from the nearby Highams estate, the seat of Higham Bensted, and its surrounding park.

Technically an outpost of Walthamstow, the village soon started attracting businesses and by 1908 was a buzzing community with a butcher, a baker, a greengrocer and a library operating from a shop.

But it was clear to many residents that what the new community really needed was a pub.

Not everyone was keen. The British Women's Temperance Society collected a petition of 37 signatures opposing the application and the local vicar, Rev Barnes, said there was no need for a public house in the neighbourhood as it was not increasing as fast as expected.

Whatever the vicar thought, the community was exploding. By 1908, there were 725 houses in the quarter mile surrounding the pub, 383 of which had been built in the previous three years.

There were 900 season ticket holders registered at Highams Park Station, 300 more than had existed the year before, and 40,000 passengers were using the station, 13,000 more than had used it in 1906.

Three premises applied for a licence to serve alcohol and The County Arms, then called The Trust House, was the first one to succeed on February 29, 1908.

The pub, in Hale End Road, became a much-loved boozer for the whole community including, it seems, its animal residents.

Joy Gailer, of Church Avenue, remembers The County in the 1970s.

It had a hardcore of regulars, known as The Old Boys who always sat in a semi-circle drinking their beer - and they brought their pets with them.

"Dear old George and Lily Phillips would bring their poodle, Judy, and she would sit up with the rest of them," she said.

"One day Judy arrived and sat up and the others announced George was on his way but then someone said that George and Lily were away on holiday and whoever was minding Judy must have left the gate open."

Mrs Gailer herself used to play the pub's piano accompanied by her Westie dog, named Haggis, whose speciality was the Wipper Poop Song. Regular Chris Hills, also of Church Avenue, has been going to the pub for two decades and said it had not changed much.

"It used to be two bars but it's still the same as it's always been," he said.

Mr Hills, who held his wedding reception at the pub, as well as his 40th and 50th birthday parties, added: "It's just a bog standard local pub.

"It's not themed, it's not trendy, there's no pressure, you can go there to have a quiet pint or a noisy pint. It's my local and long may it continue."