Today I'm trying to picture London. It's now almost 6 months since we left and images are obviously in the process of being moved from short to long-term memory tanks, because I can't see them. To compensate I've been flicking through Wonderful London (Ed. St. John Adcock), a three volume set from 1926. This is the bowling green before it stopped being a bowling green and became an teen alcopops awareness centre. If this picture was taken now there'd be a mad-looking bloke with a bull terrier striding towards the camera shouting obscenities.

The text with the photo says:

"STOKE NEWINGTON IN SUMMER-TIME: THE BOWLING GREEN AT CLISSOLD PARK
A long journey through the dreary Kingsland Road and on through Stoke Newington brings one to Church Street, a curious survival in the surrounding villadom. There are old houses and a small sixteenth-century church, mellow with years, and farther on the fifty-two green acres of Clissold Park, through whose ordered lawns runs the New River. Beyond the bowling green is the spire of the modern parish church, built by Sir Gilbert Scott to replace the old one which was put up when the congregation was that of a country village."

Don't know about the copyright situation with pics like this. The photo was credited to someone called McLeish.