Corner of the Kingdom

More Tales from the Coast

“Askaroff continues to charm us with his stories.”

Not so long ago, doctors made house calls, and fresh milk was delivered daily to our doors. People such as these are gone forever from our modern world—or are they? Alex Askaroff, a Sussex lad, left a thriving family business in specialty textiles to become a travelling sewing machine repairman, carrying on a disappearing trade that he had known since childhood.

But, along with his tool kit, this master craftsman brought with him the enthusiasm of a poet and a pure love of story-telling. As Alex brings classic sewing machines back to life, he also picks up local stories, history and gossip. And what stories they are! They range from the lady who was presented, by Alex, with a long lost family heirloom hidden in her sewing machine, to an encounter with the ghost of Arthur Conan Doyle. There’s Vic the gardener who practices the old ways of determining when to plant his crops—with his bum; and cross-dressing "Peacehaven Pansies" and their flamboyant friends. From kings to conkers this book brings to life the often eccentric—but always genuine—people who make up Sussex.

Alex has spent over 20 years slowly collecting priceless anecdotes of the lives, hilarity, wisdom and history of his Corner of the Kingdom.

Here are his stories, photographs, and poems, reprinted for the first time from his three original Random Threads volumes.