Golda Hayes (nee Steinberg) describes the notorious Slade Buildings
- GVHeritage Groups
- Dec 5, 2024
- 2 min read
by the West Street Heritage Group for Futures Past
East St end of West St: now demolished
“Slade’s Buildings”, by legend our crime spot, situated very near to us but on the opposite side of the road. It was rumoured to contain at least two murderers and no policeman would venture there alone; they always went in pairs or threesomes. Our parents forbade us to enter it and we never did. But its children came regularly and received a good word and a handful of sweets from my mother. They were all scrawny and undernourished and ready to dodge a blow.
The sequel came many years later, when all traces of Slade’s Buildings had disappeared and been replaced by a gas and petrol station. One day a tall, handsome man came into our shop in Australian Army uniform. He stood looking about him, but with a faraway expression, as if seeing something back in time. He asked for my mother, and when she came into the shop he stood looking at her silently for a moment. You don’t know he said, but as a child I lived in Slade’s Buildings and you were the first and only person to ever say a good word to me. My first taste of sweets were the ones that you gave me. You made me feel I was a human being and not a blot on the landscape. He put his arms around her and kissed her. He said, “I live in Australia and I made this journey to see you and to tell you that the memory of you has kept me as an honest and solid citizen. “
Golda Hayes (nee Steinberg)
