Crammed up alongside dockside developments where many of those financiers lived in neat designer pods, Canning Town exhaled poverty and deprivation.
The Cuckoo’s Calling, Robert Galbraith
Strike meets Lula Landry’s birthmother, Marlene Hinson in the grimy concrete backyard of the Ordnance Arms. Strike dislikes her intensely at first sight, and finds the whole area squalid and depressing. He won’t give Marlene money, but for a couple of pints and a fag, he finds out all she can tell him about Lula’s birth father as well as what she thinks about Lula’s adoptive family and friends – though it’s clear to Strike she wasn’t allowed to meet many of them.
Canning Town was built where the river Lea meets the Thames on marshland. The Victoria Docks and shipbuilding industry grew rapidly in the area during the 19th century, and that explosion of work attracted speculators who built houses for the large number of workers employed. Much of this housing was destroyed by slum clearances then intensive bombing of the area during World War II. The industries declined then closed, and for a long time the area’s story was one of neglect and poverty. The Ordnance Arms was built after the war, opposite the old public library. The pub has now been demolished, and though Canning Town, right next to the glittering skyscrapers of Canary Wharf, is still one of the poorest areas of London, its prospects have improved since Strike’s visit thanks to a £3 billion regeneration package.
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