The Sound Barrier

Childhood Memories

I can remember back in the mid 1950s, I was on my way with my friend Robert, to his house in South Hanningfield Way, Runwell. We had collected 24 panes of greenhouse glass from Mr Heathfield who lived in Linfords Drive and were delivering it to Robert’s dad. All the glass was balanced on our go-cart and we were struggling to manoeuvre it along a grass track which was part of the “bridleway” from Churchend to The Chase. We were about halfway down the hill near Mr Gilltrap’s place in Warren Road (now Meadow Lane) when “BANG!  BANG!” a jet had just flown overhead and gone through the sound barrier. We were sure we felt the shock waves and stopped to check that they had not broken the glass. All was well. We had heard adults talking about the possibility of a jet breaking the sound barrier, but being children had thought no more about it. At last we were at Robert’s house and his dad helped us unload the glass. He then treated us to a glass of orange juice and a slice of bread and butter pudding with strawberry jam on it. Lovely. We asked him if he had heard the bang but he hadn’t.
This was sometime in 1954-1956, as far as I can remember. Did you hear it? If so can you remember what you were doing and where you were?

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