How Harringay Happened

By John Hinshelwood

Harringay, in the Borough of Haringey, as we know it today developed between 1880 and 1900 for a variety of reasons. A decline in local agricultural activity, in the face of produce brought quickly and cheaply to London on the railways, meant that former agricultural land was relatively cheap compared with land in the suburbs closer in to London. The conditions in London were also becoming overcrowded and the clearances for railway and other developments within the city exacerbated the problems. For many landowners on the fringes of London, it became financially attractive to sell land for building to accommodate the many people needing places to live. Speculative developers saw the possibility of exploiting the demand for new housing outside the metropolitan districts and were keen to promote new developments around the new transport connections to the city.

Fig 1 Map of the area before 1880 (Taken from HHS map of Hornsey in 1870)

Harringay before 1880 was largely open fields and parkland with a road called Green Lanes across it. (Fig 1) This road is the path of an ancient route from Newington Green through Beans Green, past West Green, on to Wood Green, and then out to Palmers Green. Not surprisingly, the road connecting all these greens should have come to be called Green Lanes in the eighteenth century . Before 1880 there were virtually no buildings along Green Lanes, north of the Seven Sisters Road, which was bordered by a narrow strip of common, or waste land, known as Beans Green. The road and the wasteland lay between the fields of St John’s Farm, in Tottenham, on the east, and the parkland and fields of the Harringay [Haringey] House, in Hornsey, on the west.

The Manor House public house was built in 1832 at the junction of Green Lanes and the newly constructed Seven Sisters Road. It took the name because it became the meeting place for the Vestry of Stoke Newington; it was never a manor house. Close by was Northumberland House, built in 1822 and converted into a Lunatic Asylum under the Mad House Act of 1929. Vivienne Eliot, the first wife of T.S. Eliot, was committed to Northumberland House in July 1938, where she died in 1947; the building was demolished in 1955. The New River, built by Hugh Myddelton and opened in 1613, was the longest aqueduct supplying fresh water to London. The aqueduct followed the contours of the landscape and meandered through the parkland of Harringay House to cross Green Lanes just below Northumberland House by the Bowling Green that stood on its banks.

Finsbury Park, opened in 1869, was designed by Alexander McKenzie, who also laid out Alexandra Park. The park largely covered the old Hornsey Wood, a favourite London recreation ground since the eighteenth century, and swept away the Hornsey Wood Tavern that stood at the crest of the hill. Endymion Road was made across the north side of the park in 1875. Opposite the end of Endymion Road, Williamson’s Tile and Brickworks had developed into quite a large site with fourteen workmen’s cottages and buildings. The Tottenham & Hampstead Junction Railway which opened in 1868, and from 1870 was run by the Midland Railway Company, also crossed Green Lanes; the station, originally Harringay Park, opened in 1880 in anticipation of serving the new district of Harringay. Beans Green stretched from the Tile Kilns to Hangar Lane, or what is today known as St Ann’s Road. Beyond Hangar Lane, the Woodlands Park Estate, in West Green, developed in the 1880s, but only a few villas appeared on Green Lanes.

In the twenty years up until 1900 the whole area either side of Green Lanes was converted from open land to a densely built up suburban district. (Fig 2) Harringay as a district first appeared in Kelly's street directories around 1890. The name Harringay and its relation to the present day Borough of Haringey causes much confusion. It is very probable that the name Harringay derived from Heringes-hege, which in Old English means the enclosure of "Hering". The earliest written form of the name was recorded as Harenhg’ in the twelfth-century and subsequent forms included at least 162 recorded variations, one of which was Hornsey. By the seventeenth century, Harringay and Haringey were both used interchangeably as names for both the village and the parish of Hornsey. By the late nineteenth-century Harringay had became the popular form for the name of the district around Harringay House, which stood on the west side of Green Lanes. Haringey, on the other hand, was used for official purposes and in 1965, the three Boroughs of Hornsey, Tottenham and Wood Green were amalgamated into one London Borough named Haringey.

The centre of Harringay is today focused on the stretch of Green Lanes between Finsbury Park and St Ann’s Road. The whole area was developed as three separate estates. The Finsbury Park Estate, opposite the Tile Kilns, was a small estate of houses with shops fronting Green Lanes, including the Beaconsfield Public House. The Harringay Park Estate, the southern end of which came to be known as the Harringay Ladder. On the other side of Green Lanes the Provident Park Estate developed on the land of St John’s Farm to become what is now known as Harringay Gardens. The shopping centre of Harringay on Green Lanes itself was developed in two ways; on the Tottenham side a single development resulted in Grand Parade, and on the Hornsey side as a series of uncoordinated, separate developments resulted in a variety of parades of shops.

Fig 2 Map of the area after 1900 (Taken from HHS map of Hornsey in 1920)

John Hinshelwood’s book How Harringay Happened is available to buy @ 523 Green Lanes priced £3

If you enjoy local history, there is another publication called Tottenham Walks by Mareeni Raymond…

Info: Follow the four walks in this book to discover things about the Tottenham you thought you knew, including important history, architectural surprises and incredible people, that shaped Tottenham then and now.

With simplified maps and colour photographs to guide you, explore Tottenham's many green spaces, changing streets and some of the great places to eat and drink along the way.

Walks cover: 1. Parks and Marshes: A pretty walk which takes you to Markfield Park’s beam engine and the urban garden of the Lea Valley. 2. Hidden Tottenham: From Northumberland Park to Bruce Grove, a short walk for those curious about the history of the High Road. 3. Bruce Grove to Seven Sisters: A walk through the beautiful village-esque Bruce Castle area to the Broadwater farm estate, with stops along Tottenham’s historical High Rd and Bruce Grove. 4. Seven Sisters to St. Ann's: A short stroll exploring some of the main historical sites of Tottenham High Road and the residential West Green area.

The book URL links to Amazon for anyone who is interested.