PUBLIC SERVICES.
A fire-brigade, formed in
1855, (fn. 21) was refounded as Hendon volunteer fire
brigade in 1866 and kept a manual engine in a
building, later used as a garage, opposite St. Mary's
church. (fn. 22) Subsidiary fire stations were opened at
Mill Hill in 1889 and at Childs Hill in 1895. In
1899 the brigade was taken over by Hendon
U.D.C., which opened sub-stations at Burnt Oak,
West Hendon, and Golders Green in 1900. The
engine-house opposite the church was replaced by
a fire station in the Burroughs in 1914 and the substations at West Hendon and Golders Green were
closed in 1922 and 1927 respectively. (fn. 23)
The parish of Hendon was added to the Metropolitan Police District in 1840. (fn. 24) In 1863 the police
station was in Brent Street, opposite the junction
with Bell Lane. (fn. 25) It was replaced in 1884 by a
building north of the junction of Brent Street with
Brampton Grove. (fn. 26)
Until 1866, when the West Middlesex Waterworks Co. was empowered to provide piped water, (fn. 27)
the southern part of Hendon was supplied from the
parish pump at the junction of Brent Street and
Bell Lane (fn. 28) and, at Childs Hill, from a stream and a
spring at the Leg of Mutton pond on Hampstead
Heath. (fn. 29) In 1873 the Colne Valley Water Co.
obtained powers to supply Mill Hill, which previously had relied on wells. (fn. 30)
Gas street-lighting was introduced to parts of
Hendon, including Childs Hill, in 1871. (fn. 31) In 1890
gas was provided by the Gas Light and Coke Co.
and from works of the North Middlesex Gas Co., (fn. 32)
opened near the later Mill Hill East railway station
between 1862 and 1866, (fn. 33) although Mill Hill itself
was still lit by oil lamps in the early 20th century. (fn. 34)
An electric lighting order for Hendon U.D. was
granted to a private company in 1899 but powers
were transferred to the U.D.C. in the same year. (fn. 35)
In the 1860s sewage from Childs Hill ran through
open ditches to the Brent reservoir, causing complaints which led to the formation of Childs Hill
special drainage district. (fn. 36) An outfall works to serve
the whole parish was built near Renters farm in 1886
and a main drainage works, visited by W. E.
Gladstone, was built in 1887. (fn. 37) Parts of Childs Hill
were still without drains in 1894, when offence was
caused by cesspools and over-flowing ditches, (fn. 38) and
areas in the Hyde and Mill Hill had no drains until
the end of the 19th century. (fn. 39) In 1895, however,
80 per cent of Hendon's houses drained into sewers
and by 1900 the figure had risen to 98 per cent. (fn. 40)
Hendon U.D.C. bought 13 a. of Clitterhouse farm
for extensions to the sewage farm in 1905, (fn. 41) and a
new sewage disposal works was being built in 1914. (fn. 42)
Hendon became part of the West Middlesex
Drainage Scheme in 1931, four years before its
sewage farm was superseded by the new works at
Mogden. (fn. 43)
There was a private lunatic asylum for ladies run
by Miss Dence at Hendon House, Brent Street,
in 1861. (fn. 44) The Metropolitan Convalescent Institution accommodated 40 young girls at Burroughs
House c. 1874 (fn. 45) and Dr. Henry Hicks had an
asylum at Grove House in the Burroughs from
1879 to 1899. (fn. 46) A small isolation hospital was built
south of Kingsbury Road in 1890 (fn. 47) and was controlled by Hendon U.D.C. in 1901, when there
were five patients. (fn. 48) The last of several additions
was made in 1922 and the building was replaced
in 1929 by the new Hendon isolation hospital in
Goldsmith Avenue, with 86 beds. Two ward blocks
were built between 1929 and 1940 but by 1970,
when there were 103 beds, the institution had
become a geriatric hospital. Its grounds contained
the Northgate clinic, opened in 1968 by the North
West Metropolitan regional hospital board for the
treatment of 25 psychopaths. Colindale hospital
was opened in 1912, on land given by Sir Audley
Neeld, (fn. 49) and had 50 beds in 1925. Additions included
an operating theatre in 1923, a new wing with 20
beds in 1934, and a physiotherapy department in
1966. Hendon cottage hospital was opened in 1913
near the later junction of Hendon Way and Elliot
Road; it was extended in 1925 and again in 1933. (fn. 50)
Manor House hospital was founded in 1917 by the
Allied Hospital Benevolent Society to care for war
victims; (fn. 51) its administrative block occupied John
Bond's manor-house at Golders Hill, while patients
were treated in temporary huts. The hospital was
transferred to the Industrial Orthopaedic Society in
1919 and thereafter catered largely for victims of
industrial accidents. Two permanent wards were
opened in 1931 and further extensions were made
in 1938 and after the Second World War. A fourstoreyed wing was opened in 1969, containing 52
beds and a twin operating theatre. Redhill hospital
was opened by Hendon board of guardians in 1927
in a new building to replace the former workhouse
infirmary which had been built in 1865. (fn. 52) It was
occupied in 1970 by Edgware general hospital,
which, like the former isolation hospital and
Colindale hospital, was administered by Hendon
group hospital management committee.
The first public park in Hendon was Golders Hill
park, formerly the grounds of Golders Hill House,
which were bought by the L.C.C. in 1899. (fn. 53) The
L.C.C. also took over the upkeep of the Hampstead
Heath Extension after its purchase by trustees from
Eton College in 1907. (fn. 54) Hendon public park, 30 a.
between Queens Road (formerly Butchers Lane) and
Shire Hall Lane, was opened by Hendon U.D.C. in
1903 (fn. 55) and other parks were opened by the council
after the First World War, including Sunny Hill
park (50 a.) c. 1922 (fn. 56) and Mill Hill park (39 a.) in
1924. (fn. 57) In 1932 Hendon B.C. owned 793½ a. of
open spaces in Hendon and Edgware, (fn. 58) including
Moat Mount open space (67 a.), (fn. 59) Arrandene park
(57 a.), Watling park (46 a.), Montrose playing
fields (30 a.), Copthall park (146 a.), West Hendon
playing fields (62 a.), Woodfield park (40 a.), and
Clitterhouse playing fields (50 a.).
The U.D.C.'s first housing estate, consisting of
50 houses, was laid out at Childs Hill in 1914. (fn. 60)
By 1932 Hendon had erected 1,012 council houses,
including a large estate at the Hyde, (fn. 61) but none was
as big as the L.C.C.'s Watling estate, on which
work began in 1927. (fn. 62) By 1961 there were about
4,500 houses owned by the borough of Hendon. (fn. 63)
An open-air swimming pool was built at the Hyde
in 1922, and another in Daws Lane, Mill Hill, in
1935. Slipper baths were opened at Childs Hill and
West Hendon in 1930. (fn. 64)
Hendon central library was opened in 1929 in a
brick neo-Georgian building with a cupola, designed
by T. M. Wilson, next to the town hall. (fn. 65) Branch
libraries were opened at Golders Green in 1935, in
Hartley Avenue, Mill Hill, in 1937, (fn. 66) and at Childs
Hill in 1962. (fn. 67) At Burnt Oak a temporary building
opened in 1954 was replaced by a permanent library
in 1968. (fn. 68)
Golders Green crematorium, Hoop Lane, was
opened in 1902 by Sir Henry Thompson, founder
of the Cremation Society of England. (fn. 69) It was
designed by Sir Ernest George and A. B. Yeates as
a range of red-brick buildings in a 'Lombardic'
style, dominated by a chapel. A columbarium for the
receipt of ashes was completed in 1911, the cloister
in 1914, and a second columbarium in 1916. (fn. 70) A
second chapel, to the designs of Mitchell and
Bridgewater, was added in 1938. (fn. 71) Paddington B.C.
opened a large cemetery east of Milespit Hill before
1937. (fn. 72)
Land opposite the site of the crematorium was
bought for a cemetery by Sephardi Jews and the
West London Reform synagogue. They erected a
building of red brick with stone dressings, containing two halls for their respective burial services,
and in 1897 the first interment took place. (fn. 73) In
1974 the north-eastern part of the cemetery was
still reserved for Sephardi burials, marked by
prostrate slabs, and the south-western for members
of the West London synagogue, who were commemorated by erect monuments. (fn. 74)