I was fortunate enough to have spent my teenage years on Tilling Green.Very few of us youngsters who lived on the new estate through the 1950’s have anything but good memories of a place where growing up was such fun and where parental control was so effective yet barely noticed.
The reasons for this are fairly simple to understand. Most of the families who occupied these brand new houses built by Rye Borough Council were Rye people being moved out of old damp properties around the town. Many had never known a bathroom with running water and upstairs toilet, it had been a tin bath, once a week in front of the fire. It was a very close community where everyone helped one another. Parents kept their eye out for the children, they knew every child, so though we were not aware of it we were being watched over most of the time we were out and about. Its good to know that now the Tilling Green School has been turned into a Community Centre the old spirit of the area, which lay dormant for many years, has returned. In the 1950’s Eric Turner was at the forefront of local sport and involved with Tilling Green United Youth Football team – Now another Turner, Carl, heads up another great youth movement and has been one of the inspirations in the new Rye Boxing Club. He tells me they have just had a great success at Tenterden. “We had two of our lads take part in Tenterden Boxing Clubs Home Show at Tenterden Leisure Centre. Alex Howes one of our junior boxers took part in his first skills bout. He boxed superbly against a tough opponent and gave a great account of himself and our club (There is no win or loss in this kind of bout but he would have won if there was) Roman Orlowski stepped up to the plate as a light Heavy weight Boxer and took on a formidable opponent from North London’s Dale Youth Boxing Club which is renowned as being one of the best in Britain and hosting many top calibre fighters such as a 2012 Olympic Champion and also the likes of James Degale and George Grooves. Roman, 2.6kg lighter than his opponent, boxed amazingly against the super hard hitting, unbeaten rival and through true grit and a lot of spirit won on a majority decision”.
A wonderful, proud day for Rye Town Amateur Boxing Club.
From “Rye’s Own” May 2013 Issue
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