A Local Baker’s 90th Anniversary by Theresa Emmett & Janet Halligan
One of our heritage calendar sponsors, A E Barrow and Sons, at 38a High Street Sittingbourne is in its 90th year this year, so we thought we’d write a little bit about its history.
Although the bakery is named after, Albert Edward Barrow, he and his wife Lily Barrow didn’t bring their family to Sittingbourne in 1932. They had six children; two sons Edward (born 1900) and William (born 1904) and four daughters: Nora (b. 1902), Lilian (b. 1905), Elsie (b. 1910) and Betty (b.1920).
Albert had bought the Coniston Hotel. Lily, was in her time, President of the Milton Bowling Club and even bowled for Kent and England. Their youngest daughter Betty married her Polish Airmen sweetheart in 1941, Stefan Kleczkowski, and ran the hotel after Albert and Lily retired to East Sussex. Many of the family had their weddings and have fond memories of the Coniston Hotel, which was a real family business until 1988, when it was sold.
It was on 1st June 1931 that their son William, (Bill to his friends), and his wife Nora, pictured right, had purchased the lease to 38a High Street, Sittingbourne from a Mr Byner of Carlton at Maidstone. It was then known as the Carlton Café, and the newly married couple lived above the shop. To start with Bill was supplied by the Carlton café at Maidstone, but within six months the bakery built their own ovens at a cost of just over £200, and took six months to build.
During the Second World War Bill Barrow literally worked day and night. At night he would bake the supplies for the next day and then during the day he was out in the van delivering bread to the army camps and other local outlets. This too was very much a family business. In 1935 they opened another family bakers at 99, Watling Street, which was run by Bill’s sister Lilian and part time by her husband Stanley Hall, who was also a Railway Clerk.
When the second world war came, things were a little tough. One night when incendiary bombs were destroying the Wesleyan Methodist church, a couple of doors down at number 34, Bill was out until the dawn with a hosepipe on the bakery roof to prevent the bakery also going up in smoke.
Over the last 90 years, additional premises have opened and closed as family and fortunes have changed….but William’s two daughters Jean and Coral very much played their part in the running of A E Barrow & Sons. Jean took over 38a in 1985, whilst Coral married into another bakery family. She married Darce Wicks in 1958, the eldest son of Theodore Wicks of Tonge mill, who had another Baker’s shop, situated at 90 High Street, near the entrance to the Forum, which is now the O2 shop.
Jean’s son Simon, the great grandson of A E Barrow, and his wife Katrina married in 1991, and took over the business in 2014. In 2015 and 2016 they won the Kent Craft Bakers Association annual competition making them the best craft bakers in Kent! They have a daughter and two sons, so the Barrow’s business, will hopefully be on our High Street for their 100th anniversary!
