Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)

That's right @Katherine Hyde. The name 'Mill Bank' and 'Mill Bank road' appear on many late 19thc and early 20thc maps but I don't think I have ever stumbled across anyone explaining exactly what the Mill Bank area was about (to me). The council houses, Millbank Place, were built (just like half of the council estates in Bedlington) after WW2. Our family moved into our council house, Coquetdale Place, in 1949 whilst they were still building the estate. I had a look at the old maps that are available for 1921. Two show the area where Haig and Beatty road are as clear :- The 1896 map also has Mill Bank named :- But then a 'Revised' 1921 map shows Alfred Road, Rosalind Avenue, Haig Road and Beatty Road but is does show them as blank sections suggesting they are under construction :- Then the 1937 map shows as the semi-detached houses :- This is the two 1921 maps joined together :-

Welcome to the group @Terry Dixon The housing area around Bolam Place won't have changed since 1977. Although I haven't lived in Bedlington since the mid 1970's i can remember some names from Bolam place as they were the lads I knocked around with in the 1960's - Dixon - Lightley - Trench & Thompson. Those families all lived in the houses that faced the green looking towards Waverley Avenue :-

@Katherine Hyde - welcome to the group. I don't know the exact year that Haig & Beatty road were built but I don know my granny Henderson and family, my mam's parents, lived in both. Our family has a written record, in the back of the family bible, that records my mam, born 1920 and her brother Martin, born 1921, were born in Carrs Buildings on the Glebe bank and the next 7 children were born in Haig Road and the first one recorded in Haig Road is Jane Anne (known as Jean) in 1923. The last sibling was born in Haig Road in 1937. The whole family had then moved to Beaty Road, a slightly bigger house, not longer after 1937.

Would that have been Gerry Dixon who joined the Merchant Navy, along with Robin Hills, in the mid to late 1960's? We always referred to Mary Miller as 'Little Mary' and I though she lived in Waverley Avenue - about No 20/21 across the road from Bolam Place.

Surely only when you are very young. Once you get near retirement age then surely draws are just there to hold (for years) belongings you no longer use or require.