09/07/2013
From Michael Ghirelli, Pool Manager:
I worked at the Deer Leap in the early/mid 60's, initially as an attendant, later as the manager. At that time, the local bloke in charge of the water was a fellow called Halsey (George?), a veteran of WW2; he'd worked for the water company since being demobbed I think, and he told me a lot about the early history of the Deer Leap pool. What he said (how accurate this is I cannot say) was that it had been built before the war about 1936, and was much the same then as it was right through to the time it was finally closed downn recently - same changing cubicles, same colour tiles etc, same syystem of storing away clothes in a sort of large cardboard box. During the war, it lay empty for 6 or so years, and was used as a store for ammo(?) and other things by a unit of the Canadian army. (There was a military hospital in the grounds of Ashridge, the buildings still there in 1968, opposite the college, which I think had been requisitioned by the military.) Being empty and used as a store did the pool no good. I do know that when I was manager, there was a leakage problem - we regularly used to have to top up the pool - more than should have been needed if the pool had been sound. I remember the first time as manager, when I did a backwash - running water through the filtration to clear out the gunge - I opened the stopcocks too much and ran the whole village of Little Gaddesden dry for the best part of a day: the water came from an underground reservoir across the road at Ringshall. I was not the most popular person in the village as a result.
Does anyone remember John Lupton Constantine? He was the owner, lived in a large house by the Little Gaddesden village green. He, along with his brother Harry from Berko, had purchased the pool when he retired, and he really ran it as a hobby. I don't think it made much money. Three shillings and sixpence entrance for adults, one and six for children. It was almost empty for much of the week, except for legions of poor shivering schoolkids who came to learn to swim in the freezing unheated open air water in the English pre global warming climate April - June. Only if there was a heatwave did the pool start to fill up with people - and then the water turned to a grey biological soup, because the filtration system struggled to cope. Constantine had been a builder who made his pile from fat contracts building the new town at Hemel in the early 50's. I'm not sure, but he sold the place in the early seventies, or he might have died and his offsring sold the place. Don't know who had it after that. I hadn't been to the Deer Leap ever after leaving about 1967, though very occasionally I havedriven past. Very sad to see the photographs of the place in its abandoned and forlorn state.
Anyone know of Jack Reid from Hemel (former manager before me), Chris Parker of Aldbury, also a manager, Mike and Sue Macey from Leighton Buzzard way who ran the cafeteria, Shirley Mogg of Cromer Cottages in Lit. Gaddesden, who also worked in the cafeteria?
The temperature of the pool reported over the phone was always 10 degrees warmer than what a thermometer dipped in the water would show. My job as manager was to pack in the customers so I used to boost the temperature if anyone rang up to ask how warm the water was. Not that we very often took the temperature anyway. If it was really cold. the temperature was described as "bracing". Otherwise, it was inevitably warm to tropical. Mostly, it was bracing - more especially in the April to June period on weekdays when school groups came for swimming lessons. I had always assumed most "white" English people were actually a sort of pink colour until I worked at the Deer Leap. In fact I learned they are all a pale blue.......and shiver a lot. But in spite of these bracing temperatures in April and May, a lot of boys and girls acquired a valuable skill at the Deer Leap- the ability to swim. Quite a lot also got their life saving certificates at the pool. Quite a few lives have been saved down the years as a result of those lessons at the Deer Leap. There were no other local pools so popular with the local authorities - we got schools from Dunstable, Tring, Berko, Hemel, and even Leighton B and Aylesbury. And the boys and girls loved coming to the pool - it was such a nice environment out there in the Chiltern countryside - they would persuade their mums and dads to go there of a weekend when it was sunny. The water would warm up very quickly if the sun shone.
As for car parking - usually there was enough in the grounds. People sometimes parked on the road to Little Gaddesden, but never were they allowed to park on the Ringshall road - the Hertforshire Constabulary would discourage that and we would have an attendant who would go out to persuade folk not to park along there. The police were regular visitors to the pool. A patrol car often came and had a cuppa in the box office with me - and mighty glad I was to see them. Weekdays, sometimes, the place weas deserted and I was entirely alone. One afternoon, fairly late in the day, a couple of somewhat less than friendly male persons came visiting, perhaps with the hope of relieving me of the burden of the day's (somewhat meagre) takings - until they looked in and saw a couple of gents in blue uniforms sitting with me and a squad car parked around the corner. This must have been in 1966. I know, because that year there was one day John Constantine the owner let me shut up shop early and leg it off home to watch the telly. Absolutely no customers. England were playing Germany in the World Cup.......
