When taking a risk was all part of playtime fun From 90 years ago, the slide that would fail every elf ’n’ safety test
WITH their rickety ladders leading to a steep descent with little or nothing to hold on to, these 1922 slides would have today’s health and safety zealots scrambling for their clipboards.
But the children, in their school ties, caps and shorts, seem perfectly happy to ride down the polished wooden planks.
The scene was captured shortly after Britain’s first slide was constructed – and is a world away from the far smaller metal slide with side rails found in the same playground today.
There were three slides, the steepest one for boys and the other two for girls (though in the picture here, boys are using all three).
For the tallest slide, boys climbed a 13ft ladder before sitting on the wooden plank angled at 45 degrees.
For the first few feet there were planks at the side to hold on to, but after that they had
‘We have never had an accident’
to rely on their sense of balance to stop them falling off. And if they did take a tumble, there was just plain hard ground to land on.
At the same park today the modern metal structure has a 9ft ladder with rails, safety barriers at the top, and is curved off at the bottom to slow your descent.
There is also a rubberised surface to cushion anyone who falls.
The 1922 slide was designed by Charles Wicksteed, who went on to manufacture the slide for playgrounds around the world after building these in Wicksteed Park, the public space he created in Kettering, Northamptonshire.
The photo was found by child play historian Linden Groves, who was researching playgrounds for the slide’s 90th anniversary today.
‘The health and safety brigade would have a fit if a slide like this was put in a playground,’ she said. ‘But in those days people took responsibility for themselves. If you fell off a slide and tore your trousers you would get a clip round the ear from your dad, not a six-figure payout.’
A Wicksteed company catalogue from 1924 says: ‘The supposed wear and tear of the children’s clothes does not take place.
‘It was at first thought that children would hesitate about climbing so high a ladder; this has proved to be quite a mistake, they go up without fear or trembling, and we have never had an accident of any sort, although tens of thousands of sliders use them.’
Initially Wicksteed made separate slides for the boys and girls, but this soon changed. ‘At that time I had a quaint idea that the boys and girls ought to be separated,’ he said later.
By 1929, Wicksteed’s slide had become his most popular piece of play equipment.
He developed the design so that it was made from steel and wood with a flat length at the end so that children could slow down.
It can be seen in use in the 1935 photo here, and Wicksteed wrote: ‘It will accommodate children at the rate of 20 a minute, which is a great feature. Parents enjoy seeing the sport, even when they don’t join in it.’