CHILDREN played in the middle of the road with the full blessing of their parents and police on a recent Sunday afternoon.

As well as the youngsters enjoying the freedom, there were tables laden with food and drink at the Eaton Road, St Albans, street party.

Once the road had been officially closed for the day by the council, bunting, flags and balloons went up, tables and chairs were put out and old photographs were put up.

The party for residents and some friends from nearby Burnham Road brought together around 80 friends and neighbours against a background of live music and convivial conversation.

Although there was no particular reason for the party one resident, Sally Routledge, realised recently that her house was a hundred years old and she, together with friend and neighbour Frances Boak, thought it was a good reason to celebrate.

In fact Sally’s house was one of the last to be occupied in Eaton Road, one of a pair of short roads carved out of a small field at the end of Tess Road, now part of Woodstock Road South, 10 years earlier.

Two enterprising men, Edward Hansell and Thomas Tomlinson, had bought the field and laid out the roads and plots just as they had in the Castle Road and Cambridge Road areas.

Sally can still remember being decked out in her brand-new Fleetville School uniform in the 1950s, heading off from her house which was previously occupied by her parents and prior to them, her grandparents.