Celebrating Haywards Heath

With railroad plans for Haywards Heath came concern for stagecoach horses put out to grass as in this Victorian cartoon displayed in Cuckfield Museum. The smell of horse dung gave way to the smoke smell and sound across the adjacent Heath when our railway opened 12 July 1841. Conway Gabe and Wyn Ford’s ‘The Metropolis of Mid Sussex - A History of Haywards Heath’ was published 1981. It’s no light read as ‘magnum opus’ on our town despite its bright cover, section of the colourful 1638 ‘survae of the land belonging unto Nicholas Hardham’. There’s an invaluable tracing of the 1638 map over the 1981 map with 19 stars denoting where part or all of the original buildings still exist - or did in 1981! Wishing you good luck from Haywards Heath! It’s not as green nowadays in Bents Wood where Anne and I live. I’m grateful to my friend Charles Tucker for this copy from his postcard collection which covers the town’s evolution over a century or more. Who can date this picture? The car...