'If I could only give you a picture that could convey an idea of the brilliant beauty in which Woodlands bathes this morning! The atmosphere is so clear the we see to the Essex Hills, over the terraces of trees, the ivy covered tower of Hornsey, the lines of delicious green fields dotted with white houses - sheep - horses - cattle. In front our own delicious lawn, with its graceful Deodars waving slightly in the crisp yet mild morning breeze, the wartn sun shining over all---'.
Frederick was a successful business man who travelled widely and his wife continued to entertain and meet people in London, so their letters gave a lively picture of life in London, America and Japan. These John Lehmann used later in a delightful book called Ancestors and Friends, well worth reading.
Woodlands was sold for development in 18906. The Key Plan, on page 102, shows the railway with stations at Muswell Hill and Alexandra Palace, but before that the trains ran through open fields mid there was no Cranley Gardens Station. When the railway was built it was built it opened up a huge tract of land to builders and commuters.
Sale Notice
A Mr R. Metherell built typical houses in Woodland Rise, solid substantial Edwardian houses, with two storeys at front and three behind, with the rooms filling the roof space. Unfortunately the front elevation has not survived, so the drawing reproduced on the next page is incomplete.
In 1905 Metherell was advertising houses for sale from £550 or at £50 a year rent. In the same issue an estate agent at Cranley Gardens advertised houses with eight rooms, baths and offices to rent at £38 a year.
W.J.Collins bought part of Lot 3 from the Upton Farm sale from the railway company and built Church Crescent, while the Imperial Property Company built on the other side of Muswell Hill Rise, so that within a few years red brick houses stretched right up to St James's Church.
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Ancestors and Friends, by John Lehmann and Autobiography I, II & III, by John Lehmann, Eyre & Spottiswoode.
