Your invite to a new way of telling the stories of Greater Manchester …. today

 So, today at Chorlton Library  you have the opportunity to roam over the history of Greater Manchester in a new and unique way.

Peter Topping and Andrew Simpson have come up with a different approach to exploring Greater Manchester’s past.

It is The History of Greater Manchester by Tram …. TheStories At the Stops in which the authors take all 99 Metro tram stops on all the eight routes picking out the interesting, the serious and the bizarre as well as the humours events and people at each destination which build to become a comprehensive account of the region’s past.*

At present there are four books in the series with a fifth due out later this year. 

They cover the journey into the centre from the south, crossing the city centre down to Victoria Railway Station and then east out to New Islington.

The fifth will travel from Old Trafford to Altrincham, with further books on Salford, and all the remaining towns on the network.

The talk is part of Chorlton Book Festival is free and begins at 2pm**

Location; Chorlton Library Manchester Road

Pictures; a selection from the Power Point presentation, 2026

*Chorlton Book Festival September 17th - 26th, https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/cc/chorlton-book-festival-2026-4861494/

*A History of Greater Manchester By Tram, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20the%20History%20of%20Greater%20Manchester%20by%20Tram 

**Chorlton Book Festival September 17th - 26th, https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/cc/chorlton-book-festival-2026-4861494/

Bell Water Gate, 1977 a little bit of that lost Woolwich

Bell Water Gate, 1977

Its official I have joined that legion of grumpy old people who lament the passing of the places I knew as a youngster.

Now I could blame my friend Jean who has dug out and sent me a shed load of photographs of Eltham, Woolwich Blackheath and Shooters Hill from the 1970s.

But that would be unfair as she did what I asked.

The fault lies not with Jean but with me and that lingering sense of nostalgia that hangs about me from time to time.

Some of the pictures reveal changes that can only be for the best but others; well I am not so sure.

Take for Instance Bell Water Gate in Woolwich beside the Leisure Centre.

It sweeps off towards the car park and is neat and clean and allows a panoramic view across the river.

But I rather like it as it was, a little shabby and run down and a reminder of an older Woolwich.

That said I know Jean will smile indulgently and point out that I don’t have to live there, and I have to admit that we used to enjoy going to the Leisure Centre when my lads were younger and then gazing across the Thames.

So perhaps it’s best that I just accept my elevation to that grey, crinkly band of old fogies and reflect that all things change.

Picture; Bell Water Gate, 1977, Jean Gammons

Walking a bit of our city’s history ……the Rates Hall

For countless thousands of Mancunians over the decades, the Rates Hall, in the Town Hall Extension was just where you went to pay your Council bills.

The Rate Hall, 1959

But I bet a fair few of them took time out to admire the design of the place.

I know I always did, although in my case it was not to settle a bill, just as a short cut from St Peter’s Square, to Mount Street.

It was that mix of wooden counters, period lamp shades and all that gold that I liked so much.

So here, for those who remember it, is a picture from 1959, while for the rest of you there is this photograph of the restored place from the camera of Daniel Hallen, taken in 2013.

The Rate Hall, 2013

The restoration was part of that bigger project to restore and refurbish both the Town Hall Extension and Central Ref during 2010-15 and included the creation of a public service hub, as well as somewhere to sit and admire the beauty of the building.

Picture; the Rates Hall, 1959, Courtesy of Manchester Archives+ Town Hall Photographers' Collection,
https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/albums/72157684413651581?fbclid=IwAR35NR9v6lzJfkiSsHgHdQyL2CCuQUHuCuVr8xnd403q534MNgY5g1nAZfY and in 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson and the Hall in 2013, Daniel Hallen, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

Miss. Mary Jane Weeks ……… domestic servant and shareholder in the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Conservative Club

Now history is messy and doesn’t always conform to rigid rules of historical development.

The Conservative Club and Public Hall, 1908

And nowhere is this more the case than in the individuals who came forward to buy shares in the new Conservative Club which opened for business, in 1892.

This was after all the party of class which represented the people of plenty.

But as we all know amongst their ranks no less than their loyal voters were people drawn from all classes.

And here it is easy to be dismissive and sniffy about those who consistently voted Tory despite coming from humble beginnings.

My father was a working class Tory.  He drove coaches all his life, and yet he voted for the party which on the surface was least likely to look after him.  That said mother was Labour and she always maintained that her vote cancelled out Dad’s which was a start on the way to a Labour Government.

The political side, 1980s

Here in Chorlton throughout the late 19th century and into the first two decades of the next the Liberals and Conservatives fought it out, and at a local level this often resulted in the electorate returning candidates from both parties on alternative years  to the Town Hall.

But like elsewhere after the last world war, the Liberals were eclipsed and the Tories came out on top, dominating local elections until 1986 and continuing to return an MP until Keith Bradley’s victory in 1987.

And I have long been fascinated by what makes people from the working class vote Conservative.  There will be many explanations and the idea that they were all just class traitors is not good enough.

So that has led me to the big book of subscribers for the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Conservative Club.  The land had been handed over by the Egerton’s in 1891, and the subscription fund opened that year.

As you would expect here can be found the very wealthy, including Samuel Gratrix of West Point in Whalley Range who bought £200 worth of shares, and a collection of our farmers, merchants and businessmen.

The club up for sale, 2013

Here too was Charles Ireland who owned a string of photographic shops, as well as estate agents, civil engineers down to shop keepers and warehousemen.

Some may have been drawn by the politics, while others by the social attractions of the club

And along with all these was Miss. Mary Jane Weeks, who held shares amounting to £2.

What makes her interesting is that she was domestic servant, working for the Adams family from at least 1891 through to 1911 and possibly beyond.

She had been born in 1849, in the small market town of Hathereigh in Devon, and was working as a servant by 1871.

I would like to know more about Miss. Mary Jane, but so far there are only the census returns to go on, but something more will turn up.

 And in the same way in the fullness of time, all the subscribers will be plotted and their lives revealed.

All of which will help get a better understanding of who voted Conservative in Chorlton  in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as well as offering up an insight into Chorlton-cum-Hardy, just as the township was evolving from an agricultural community into a suburb of Manchester.

Location; Chorlton-cum-Hardy

Pictures; The Conservative Club, 1908, from the Lloyd Collection,  in 1980, from the collection of Tony Walker, and in 2013 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Register of Members Chorlton-cum-Hardy Conservative Club Limited 1892-96

That lost picture of the Royal Oak in 1902 with young Thomas Kelsey

This is a picture of the old Royal Oak I have never seen before.

The caption gives a date of 1902 and refers to “the boy Thomas Kelsey, son of the landlord of the inn at the time.”

Now it is very unusual to be able to name a person in a Chorlton photograph from the early 20th century.

Usually we are just presented with a sea of faces whose identities are lost in time.

But this is different.

Thomas was born in 1893 in Salford and his parents ran the Duke of York pub at 186 Regent Road, before moving in 1895 to the Royal Oak here in Chorlton.

The pub trade ran deep in the family, Thomas’s father was working in the Glass House on Regent Road by 1881 when he was 18 years old and his parents had run a beer shop just off Regent Road.

But what makes this picture all the more interesting is the detail which it reveals about the pub.

The Royal Oak was originally a beer shop which dated back to the early 1830s and consisted of little more than four rooms.

But what intrigues me is the building behind which seems to have been added on by the 1890s.

The OS map for 1894 and 1907 show that pub had been enlarged and the 1911 census return records that there were eight rooms.

Nor is that all because George Kelsey appears to have been more than just a publican because the sign to our right announces that he was also in the business of “CABS, HANSOMS” and offered a LIVERY STATION.”

By 1921 the secondary business had morphed in "Kelsey Brothers" with Thomas describing himself as a "motor mechanic", a job he was still doing in 1939, by which time he was living with his wife Muriel and daughter at 6 Rippenden Avenue.

And  the premise had relocated to  what had been Renshaw's Buildings which had once been entirely residential but at some time the front had been converted into a garage.

This building was demolished sometime in the late 1920s or early 1930s and replaced by the present Royal Oak Pub, but in one picture the name Kelsey Brothers appears over the garage.

His father and family were still in the old Royal Oak serving up beer and cheer in 1921.

And like so much of the early 20th century the Kelsey family have progressed with the times, so while George Kelsey had run a beer shop his son had moved into the "motor trade" and his granddaughter was a clerk dealing with W

That said there is that finger print just below the sign, now that would be a real detective story.

Picture, the Royal Oak, 1902, m50447, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and Barlow Moor Road circa 1920s from the collection of Rita Bishop

Walking Chorlton's past .... that popular history talk with Andrew Simpson .... Sunday

 This Sunday you can walk our past with Andrew Simpson and discover just who you might have to be polite to.

Ploughing beside Beech Road, circa 1892

Now that is not so daft a question if you lived in a small rural community on the edge of Manchester in the summer of 1848.

For a start, most people earned their living from the land, and many of these would be agricultural labourers, who worked for local farmers and in some cases rented their homes from those same farmers.

Along with these there was a sizable group of small market gardeners, growing cash crops for the Manchester markets on one to nine acres of land which they rented from a handful of landowners.

Charles Clarke blacksmith, 1913

Added to these were the tradesmen ranging from the blacksmith and wheelwright to shopkeepers, carpenters and dressmakers all of whom were dependent on both the farmers and the “people of plenty”.

And even some of the more prosperous, who after 1832 commanded a vote in General Elections, might think carefully about voting for an election candidate who was not the preferred and stated choice of the wealthy and powerful Egerton family who owned something like 67% of all the land in Chorlton.

So, the question of who you should be polite to in 1848 was a serious one which might cost your livelihood and your home.

And that will be the theme of this walk through Chorlton’s past which is part of Chorlton Book Festival,. *

Along the way there will be some tales of dark deeds, mixed with the everyday life of farmers, agricultural workers and their families, and a nod to the posh residents who must be treated with upmost politeness.

We were a small rural community of just 761 people, spread out in a number of hamlets. 

On the northern boundary was Martledge, south of Chorlton Brook was Hardy and at the centre was Chorlton itself.

St Clements by the green circa 1870s

Smaller communities in some cases just a few houses were scattered in between.  And as if to underline a dependence on the land, each of these small communities were separated by fields and orchards.

And so today we will take a walk down Chorlton Row, from Barlow Moore Lane, stopping to look at the big house, several cottages, some interesting fields and of course the smithy, the Wesleyan chapel and a beer house.

Along the way we may encounter a few people it would be prudent to be polite too, and plenty who are too busy to pass the time of day.

Having reached Chorlton Green there will be a brief stop to survey the old church, the two pubs, and three farmhouses, along with assorted wattle and daub cottages, and the village school.

Mr. Higginbotham bringing in  the harvest from the Meadows, undated

After which we will head north, visiting another 18th century farm cottage before crossing the Rough Leech Gutter at High Lane, hard by Scotch Corner and that local beauty point known as Pits Brow,  finishing at the site of the ancient Ash Tree “at the foot of which a certain man engaged in prayer each day".**

So, there will be plenty to see, and much that will tell us about what it was like to live in a small rural community, just 3½ miles from the smoke, noise and enterprise of Manchester.

Assemble at the corner of Beech Road and Barlow Moor Road at 2pm on Sunday September 20th.***

The walk will conclude after much history and a degree of fun at the Edge for refreshments.

Pictures; ploughing on Beech Road, circa 1890, and harvesting on the meadows, courtesy of Mr. Higginbotham, from the Lloyd collection, and detail from the 1854 OS map for Lancashire by kind permission of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ old St Clement’s Church circa 1870s from the collection of Tony Walker

*Chorlton Book Festival, September 17th to the September 26th

  https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/cc/chorlton-book-festival-2026-4861494/

**Ellwood, Thomas Chapter 4, History of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, South Manchester Gazette, November 28, 1885

*** Walking Chorlton’s Past, Sunday September 20th. 

Tickets are £11  include refreshments at the Edge Theatre cafe afterwards.

Tickets available from https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/walking-down-beech-road-in-the-summer-of-1848-tickets-1996447382865?aff=odcleoeventsincollection

That theatre in Woolwich I wished I could have visited ...... the Royal Artillery Theatre

Now I must confess I did not know of the Royal Artillery Theatre which was opposite the Royal Artillery Barracks.

Cinderella, 1949

But as it closed eight years before I began visiting Woolwich I am not surprised that its existence passed me by.

It opened in 1863 as the Royal Artillery Recreation Rooms and was a conversion from a multipurpose hall which underwent further alterations and a name change, and reopened in 1905 after a fire which had destroyed the interior.

It was my old friend Tricia who told me about the theatre and introduced me to its history via that wonderful theatre site, Arthur Lloyd.co.uk which I had completely forgotten about.

The site tells the story of our theatres and music halls over the last few centuries and is well worth a visit.

I consulted it over some of the other theatres in Woolwich and also in Manchester and If memory serves me supplied some information about one of our local play houses.

How to get there, 1949

Now never being one to just reproduce another’s research I will just direct you to the site, leaving you to wander over the old programmes, and marvel at the pictures, and draw your attention to the map from 1949 showing the streets around the theatre and the tram routes.

And that map for me has to be a bonus, given as I was born in that year and have never lost my love of the stately trams.

So thank you Tricia.

Location; Woolwich

Pictures; from for Arthur Lloyd.co.uk

* Arthur Lloyd.co.uk, http://www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/RoyalArtilleryTheatreWoolwich.htm