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Thirty one years ago, my grandfather, thought it might be interesting to fix his cine camera to the outside of his car, and go for a drive from his home in Wimmerfield Crescent, down to Sketty and back.

Cine film at the time was not expensive, but still far from cheap, and also suffered from the small problem that every frame exposed had to be stored in the camera until the spent cartridge was removed and sent for developing, so as a result, home movies were short.

In order to keep the experiment from being too costly; to add interest, and to ensure the film didn’t run out half way around; the camera was slowed to (I think) 1/8 of it’s normal rate. The result was what we* all came to know as “Fast Run Round Sketty”, which in the days before video recorders was entertainment gold dust.

* I think I was probably my grandfather’s greatest movie fan, but the “we” included my cousins Jim and Ros, who often dropped by - I had the advantage of living within a literal stone’s throw of my grandparents so I was always able to ask for “films” when it was too wet to play outside.

The Film

The Route

The route takes in Wimerfield Crescent, Wimmerfield Avenue, the lower part of Goetre Fach Road, Gower Road to Sketty, Dillwyn Road, the upper part of Sketty Park Road, then back along Gower Road to Killay, before a quick U-Turn and returning to Wimmerfield Crescent via Wimmerfield Drive and Wimmerfield Avenue.

Points of Interest, and A Few Random Memories

There are a few things which on re-watching have sparked off memories that were long buried under more recent experiences, and I’m sure others who lived in the area at the time will also be reminded of other forgotten memories. The things I noticed were:

11 seconds: The lack of mini roundabout next to Siloam Baptist Church, which I remember being put in. Before then, turning around to head back into Killay was an altogether more haphazard event.

14 seconds: The phonebox. There was only one phonebox, and just as Tom Jones has purchased the phonebox that used to stand in his village, this was the one that used to stand in mine. To this day, subconsciously, when I think of an old red phone box, it’s this one.

14 seconds: Above the phonebox is a private road, with iron railings. When houses in the private road were put up for sale it was common for these railings to be used so as to affix the ubiquitous “Henry, Jones and Hobbs” sign. About 10 years after this film I was standing on the wooden frame of one such sign so as to see over the railings, when it gave way, and came insanely close to impaling me on the spikey railing. I had a two inch scar just above my solar plexus for several months.

15 seconds: No Pelican crossing. I remember that going in too, because before then, there were no local pelican crossings so although we’d seen them, most of us had never used one. We spent many happy hours crossing, and re-crossing the road, and thanking the stopped drivers profusely; or just having competitions to see who could stop the most traffic with a single button press.

15 seconds: the old sign to the Black Boy public house, which features the face of a black boy prince. I think it’s now a more faux-politically-correct coal-smeared child.

16 seconds: The sign’s not legible, but I distinctly recognize the Lloyds Bank Killay branch. I recall it was possible to park on the curb in front of the building.

17 seconds: Killay precinct before echelon parking became compulsory, and before the central reservation was extended all the way to the Co-Op. It took people a while to get the hang of the parking, and I remember mum’s car (with me in the back of it) being hit by a woman who reversed into us because she hadn’t worked out which way she should be looking. Happily there were witnesses who could explain to her that she had reversed into the side of our car so we could not “move our car” as she was requesting until she pulled forward and released us.

19 seconds: The edge of the old Killay House NCH buildings, now sadly razed, where Martin Shaw lived. Martin’s dad (Gerry Shaw) always carried about a million keys for going his job there. We spent a lot of time in the Killay house grounds, especially (a) down by the pond on the edge of the woods, because of the huge rope swing and (b) on the private interal roadways, because it had really smooth concrete so it was great for bikes and skateboards. See the article on Killay House for more detail.

20 seconds: The Armine Garage, when it was a National garage. I think this was when the tills were still situated between the pumps in a small wood & glass kiosk. Around this time, they started to offer Smurfs. I believe my first bag of Lego came from a small advert left in that kiosk, and a life of interest in how stuff works followed.

22 seconds: No road markings, how did people cope? Was there not mayhem? Given that I was at Olchfa School for five years I must have walked down this road thousands of times.

23 seconds: The end of Dunvant Road joining Gower road. This was a handy way to avoid the traffic exiting Wimmerfield on a busy morning, in the days before the traffic lights.

24 seconds: The road into the “student village” which was being constructed. On the right, trees and heavy foliage where the Olchfa House pub has now opened up the old garden. That pavement on the right was the last bit of uphill slog that we had to run when the school declared that it was too wet to play rugby, so we’d have to go on a cross country run, “through the woods”. Today there’s roundabout here.

24 seconds: The old bus stop, where after spending 10p in Killay, we’d alight from the bus and arrive in school in time for a game of fives round the back of the south block.

30 seconds: Red “London” busses! Wow. In the days before the green coloured Citi-Mini buses.

33 seconds: the sign for the Acorns Guest house, which was shaped like an Acorn. When I was very little, this seemed like it was a long way from home. The guest house cemented this for me (even if it was only a couple of doors along from where my friend from nursery school (James Morris) lived.

34 seconds: You just don’t see this today. The car’s having trouble getting up the hill, so stop, open the bonnet, fix it, and in the mean time let people drive around you.

35 seconds: A sign of the times; Esso selling petrol for 67p per imperial gallon (that’s 14p per litre)

45 seconds: The Sketty Park Road chicane has long since been removed and the road widened, but in 1975 to a small boy, watching a sped up film, this was the closest you could get to real James Hunt F1 racing.

47 seconds: Signposts and street-lamps are nowhere near as ornamental these days; it’s a shame.

60 seconds: Overtaking on Gower Road, far less common today.

64 seconds: Ah, the old shops; the Chippie, Clarks, Susan Sander (?), Derwen, The Flower Shop, and (in the days before the brick built flower beds) the three-sided advertising hoardings.

72 seconds: Iron Curb Ramps. Something I’ve not seen in a long time. We used to borrow these and ride our bikes over them; they made a hell of a racket. The piece of curb on the left just after the ramps is what Ali Kellerher once landed his kidneys on after riding from the top of Heol Glasnant on a skateboard. He got speed wobbles near the bottom, lost control and ended up in hospital. On the right is the Mob/Hide and Seek tree, where the person who was it used to count, whilst the local kids trashed the local hedge borders in an attempt to create the best hiding place possible.

73 seconds: Home for some lemonade (which in those days was delivered by “the lemonade man” in a big beige truck, I think the company was Alpine).