CHURCH ROAD / SUSSEX PLACE

Thank you Laurie, this view would be where Sussex Place was, which is now the Health Centre Car Park.

Turn left at the end of Sussex Place down the lane to get to Bridge Street and catch the bus to Brighton!

I used to walk down here every day on my way to the station to catch the train to the grammar school. The shoe shop used to have mechanical man in the window tapping away at a boot repair. Just opposite was a sweet shop, where we used to rush to at the end of a day at the infants school to spend our pocket money in the 50s and early sixties.

My brother and I used to get bubble gum which contained football cards from the sweet shop and some sort of round thing called a shrimp.

I remember going into that sweet-shop and buying small blocks of something that was meant to be put into water to make fizzy drinks. We used to put them into our mouths so that they would froth up and come down our noses. You could also get miniature wax, Roman-style vases containing a red or green sugary liquid. You had to bite the top off to suck it out. I've never met anyone from anywhere else who's ever heard of either of these; were they made locally?

Yes Doug I remember all those things and people say we used to eat healthier back then. Its a wonder we have survived this long after eating that stuff, mind you some of the things my grandchildren get from the sweet shop look pretty revolting.

About that little sweetie shop: I think the owner may have been Mr Vant. Amongst everything else, he used to sell "Vant Ices", which were little conical water-lollipops on a short stick, in different colours, costing just one old penny! Like Alan Terrill, I used to walk this way, through the Twitten, to catch the train to school in Lewes (the boys caught the 8.44am, and the girls had the earlier 8.33.)