Turning up bits of Chorlton’s history in the most unexpected places .... the T shirt

Now here is a bit of history, and like lots of good history it is something that takes us directly to one person’s story.

It belongs to Francesca who wrote “I helped Bob, my uncle in Buonissiomo during the holidays and it was always busy. 

Still have the black T shirts with the logo on the sleeve we were given as uniform.”

Francesca had left the comment as part of a series of posts following a story I did on Buonissiomo which was the Italian deli on Beech Road.

So there you have it a little bit of Chorlton’s history along with a big bit of Francesca’s.

Location; Chorlton

Picture; Buonissiomo T shirt, courtesy of Francesca

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester nu 46 ...... the one with the canal

I am on Camp Street just off Deansgate

Camps Street, 1938

And if I wanted to be more accurate we are standing in the Manchester and Salford Junction Canal Tunnel in 1938.

It is one of series of pictures which were taken by the City Engineers just under a hundred years after the canal opened to traffic in the October of 1839.

Forty years earlier the first proposals for a canal link from the river Irwell to the Rochdale Canal were floated in an effort to overcome the difficulties of off loading goods at the river and transporting them along the congested city streets.

The route of the canal across the city involved constructing a tunnel from Charles Street to Watson Street from which the waterway then ran in the open east as far as Lower Mosley Street before twisting south and running parallel with Chepstow Street before joining the Rochdale Canal just beyond Great Bridgewater Street.

Camp Street, 1947 showing what might be a shaft down to the canal

Much of the street pattern and many of the industrial buildings from that period have long since gone and I guess most people are not even aware that there was this cross city canal.

I first came across it when researching Camp Street a few years back and then discovered more of its story in Underground Manchester.*

This is a fascinating book and feeds that interest many of us have in mysterious and long forgotten tunnels.  Manchester has plenty of them and the book allows you to explore them through a collection of photographs, memories and documents.

It is a book I have long pondered on buying, but which in the end was passed onto me by David who often contributes to the blog.  He was born here in Chorlton and has vivid memories of the place in the 1950s and 60s.

Now this fascination with our lost tunnels is an interesting one and stems I suppose from a mix of genuine historical curiosity and that preoccupation with the slightly mysterious.

After all most of them were built so long ago that in some cases there are no official plans of where they are and certainly no real idea of their original purpose.

Added to this they pop up as tantalizing half clues which might be a bricked up entrance in a city cellar, or a faded newspaper clipping of a chance discovery by workman at the beginning of the last century.

Camps Street 2012

In the case of our waterway it was a letter in the Manchester City News of 1882 which described seeing both the “the canal tunnel with a towing path [which] came out near the Black Horse Hotel, Alport, where now stands Central Station.”**

Now sometimes they border on the conspiratorial and many of us will be have been told the story from the friend of a friend who came across an underground communication centre built in the 1950s during the Cold War.

Most of which make perfect sense given the heightened conflict of the period.

But sometimes I have to say they just feed the imagination like the myth that a passageway runs under the green from the old parish church to the Horse & Jockey.

It is one of those fanciful ideas born of half remembered school history involving religious persecution, priest holes and a walloping big dose of wishful thinking.

We certainly did have our own martyr to the old religion but I doubt that the Barlow family would have constructed a tunnel across the green.  And even had they done so I rather think it would have come to light during the last 400 years, either from one of the frequent burials that took place in the graveyard or the archaeological dig of the late 1970s and early 80s.

Camps Street, 1849 and the route of the canal in 1849

That said there is no doubt that many things lurk below our city streets which takes me back to Mr Warrender’s book and more particularly the Manchester and Salford Junction Canal Tunnel.

It was probably built as a cutting and then roofed over.  Just at the entrance to the tunnel hard by Charles Street was a gasometer which supplied “power of the lamps every thirty yards.”

Charles Street disappeared as the Liverpool Road warehouse complex expanded, along with Ashton Street, New Street and Dumbar Street and Garden Court.

But Camp Street is still there although the houses in this 1944 picture have long gone.

They were there during the construction of the canal which must have been irksome to the residents.

Not that I suspect either the owners of the land, or the houses or even the canal company were over bothered for the wishes of the occupants of the houses facing the work.

Camps Street, 1944

These were mostly families who earned a living from the work of skilled craftsmen, labourers and those engaged in work in the cotton mills.

Not I suspect that these people gave much thought to the men who were labouring in the tunnel just a few feet from their front doors which brings me back to that picture of the underground canal in 1938.

I have to say that there is something a little uncomfortable at about the picture which I suppose stems from my own dislike of enclosed places which are both dark and full of water.

But then by the time this picture was taken the canal had been closed to commercial traffic for two years and was on the way to becoming a forgotten place.  Already the section from Watson Street to the Rochdale Canal had been closed for sixty three years and been backfilled in preparation for the construction of Central Station.

Location; Manchester

Pictures; Camp Street canal, City Engineers, 1938, m77571, Camp Street, T. Braddeley, m00701, Camp Street, City Engineers, 1944, m78767, Camp Street, C.Holt, 1938, m00700, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass map of Camp Street showing underground route of the canal from the Manchester and Salford OS 1842-49, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ and Camp Street, 2012 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Underground Manchester, Keith Warrender, Willow Press 2007, and also Below Manchester by the same author and publisher.

**ibid, Underground Manchester, page 23

The Welcome Inn ................... the early days

Now some stories just have a habit of not wanting to go away.

They stay hanging around challenging you to go off and discover something new to add to what has already been said.

And so it is with the Welcome Inn which every time I feature the pub strikes a chord with many people usually about my age.

In particular it is tales of Sunday nights which continue to bubble up enriched by the memories of meeting future husbands or lasting friends.

And I should know because while I was just that bit too young to drink I would listen to the happy crowds coming back down Well Hall Road past our house in the mid 60s a little after closing time.

More recently I began looking for the history of the place, and while a few people were able to offer up names of past landlords the very early history of the pub proved illusory.

And then my old friend, fellow researcher and local historian Tricia Leslie told me about The Woolwich Story by E.F. E. Jefferson.

It is as she promised me a wonderful account of the Borough from the earliest of times up to its merger with Greenwich.

I have already used the book and know I shall go on plundering it for some time to come.

So in the chapter on the 1920s I came across this “On the brow of the hill stood a large wooden building used as a workmen’s club but demolished about 1927 when the Welcome Inn was built.  

This modern hostelry set new standards in both furnishing and service.  Seated in comfort, one had to preserve patience until the waiter came to take the order, for customers were not permitted to get their own drinks at the bar. 

But this arrangement proved too leisurely, annoyed those who only had time for a quick one and tended generally toward the restraint of trade. A wise host discontinued the practice.”

Now I have no idea when that service was discontinued but I well remember the practice was still in use in some of the big Manchester pubs in the late 1960s, with the waiters in white jackets and in some rooms a bell push to summon assistance.

Sadly there are few photographs of the waiters or indeed the interiors and it would be nice if any could be shared of the Welcome in its heyday.

So that is it.  I now know when the pub was open which was clearly aimed at the Progress Estate and the new build going up behind the pub and the appeal is out for pictures.

We shall see what we get.

But in the meantime I shall go looking at the electoral registers which will give us the names of the landlords or landladies from when it opened through to the 1960s.

Location, Eltham

Picture; the site of the Welcome courtesy of Jean and the cover of The Woolwich Story

Uncertain times ……… when nasty bits of history don’t go away

I suppose every generation at some point comes to terms that with uncertain times, threats become real and the unthinkable becomes a prospect to be prepared for.

Poland, 2026

This is a Polish guide which today slipped through the letterbox of our kid who lives in Warsaw.

The title is "Poradnik bezpieczeństwa", subtitled "Przeczytal;przecwicz! zachowaj!" which translates as "Safety Guide Read it! Practice it! Keep it!"

And given that Poland neighbours Ukraine which continues to defend itself from Russian aggression the message is clear.

For my generation it was the Cold War and the very real threat that the superpowers would plunge the world into a nuclear war.

It was a very real threat that never really subsided from the 1950s onwards and had a second visitation in the 1980s.

I can remember the Civil Defence Drills, the short public information messages on the telly showing how RAF bombers could be in the air in under 4 minutes and the sheer horror of the Cuban Missile Crisis.  

All of which resurfaced in the 1980s when with growing tensions between the USA and the Soviet Union a new set of nuclear warheads were developed on a new set of delivery systems.

Britain, 1957

That second Cold War resulted in the little booklet "Protect and Survive" which was delivered to every household across the country and was accompanied by television adverts.

Britain, 1940

So grim were the outcomes of a nuclear exchange of weapons and so helpless it seemed were the prospects of survival when you lived in a city that most of didn’t even open the booklet.

That said the preparations made during the run up to the Second World War did save heaps of lives.

My parents and grandparents will have worked their way round those preperations and regulations, carrying gasmasks, observing the blackout and in the case of dad leaving his job as a coach driver and to take up eseential war work in the north east. 

As far as I know Dad never joined the Home Guard, but others in the family will have done.

In time I will get to know what is inside the Polish document.

But history suggests it will make grim reading.

Pictures; Poradnik bezpieczeństwa, Polish Ministry of Defence, a civil defence poster produced in 1957 by the Central Office of Information (INF 2/122)Civil Defence is Common Sense, National Archives, https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/fifties-britain/civil-defence-common-sense/ Rifle Training for War, a textbook for Local Defence Volunteers by Captain Ernest H. Robinson, 1940

Mrs McMinn’s beer shop ... the Fustian man.... and the music printer ….. lost and forgotten streets of Manchester no. 98 ….. Short Street

 Short Street is very short.

Short Street, 2024

And you might be excused if you failed to notice it, which is what I guess happens with most people walking up Tib Street on their way to Afleck’s Palace.

If I am honest, I am one of them.  But on Friday on another of those wet drizzly days I stopped to take a picture, and as you do wondered about its history.

Today it is sandwiched between the side of two tall buildings and finishes at the rear of the 33 Club.

Short Street, 1850

And in the last few years it has had its moments, so in the July of 2022, part of it was occupied by a tent for Crazy Pedro’s, while a little further back in time it was home to a big green container and in 2012 the door with its steps led down a narrow dark passage directly out on Oldham Street.

Look back at the old maps of the area and it’s the same street .... short by nature and short by name.

Although at one time it was joined by a slightly longer street called Garden Street, which ran  parallel to Tib and Oldham Streets.

It’s gone now and so have the tiny houses which in the 1850s were home to Sarah McMinn a widow who ran a beer shop, George Heap a fustian manufacturer, and Mr. Woodward who described himself as a “reed manufacturer employing “two men and a woman”.

Along with these there was a waste dealer, an agent, a music printer, and a waiter.

They lived with their families in the seven houses fronting Short Street and in total amounted to twenty-five souls.

Within a few decades the houses had been demolished, and the site occupied by industrial properties.

Now in time I will work back to see when Short Street was cut and explore the stories of 1850 residence but for now that is it.

Being young and silly, 2024

Leaving me just to thank the two young people who caught my attention in the bar of the corner of Tib and Short Street.  They asked me to take their picture and as a result I lingered a little longer than planned on Short Street

Location; Short Street

Pictures; Short Street, 2024 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and in 1850 from Adshead’s Map of Manchester, 1850, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

Down at the Savoy Cinema in 1937 on Manchester Road watching Road to Glory

Now back in the summer of 1937 I could have had three cinemas to choose from here in Chorlton and of these the most impressive was the Savoy on Manchester Road which had opened in 1920 as the Picture House before being renamed the Savoy when it was leased to the Savoy Cinemas and later became the Gaumont.

And in the summer of 1937 for three days I could have gone and seen Road to Glory made the year before by Howard Hawks which told the story of trench life during the Great War through the lives of a French regiment and included as you would expect a tangled “love interest” between a nurse and two officers.

I am not sure it would have appealed but at least I know what was on offer and that is thanks to Peter McLoughlin who shared this film bill with me.

I doubt that there are many of these still knocking around.  After all they are the sort of thing which you pick and then discard but this one has survived it is a wonderful insight into a night at the “flicks.”

The obvious starting point are the films themselves and in time I will look them all up and in the process get something of an idea of what the cinema going public were being offered back then.

For modern audiences the frequency of the shows will also be a revelation.  

When I was growing up in the 1950s you got I think a week of the same show, but two decades earlier and programmes changed more regularly which I guess is both a recognition of the number of films being churned out but also that people went to the pictures more than once a week.

Not that this should be much of a surprise.  In an age before the telly the pictures offered a nights entertainment which included the film and a newsreel and was all done with style.

The old flea pits still existed but the big purpose built cinemas of the 1920s and more especially the 30’s gave you a sense of luxury which started with the uniformed doorman and continued with that plush auditorium which was light and bright and had a distinctive smell which I guess was a mix of those thick carpets and the floor polish and much later there was the smell of the hot dogs slowly cooking in a corner beyond the box office.

And the picture houses were warm which on a cold winter’s night was another attraction and on one of those dark nights they would be one of the only buildings which were lit up and acted a beacon as well as a promise of a good night ahead.

All of which brings me back to that film bill and the simple observation that you should always be careful about what you are going to throw away.

Pictures; film bill for the Savoy ABC, 1937 courtesy of Peter McLoughlin, and the Picture House later the Savoy, 1922, from the Lloyd Collection.

Travelling the Broads with a camera ….. part 2

I am a great fan of other people’s pictures.

It’s a mix of reasons from experiencing new places to seeing those places through the lens of another’s camera.

And that leads me neatly to the photographs of our Jill, who like me would never claim to be a professional photographer, never studied photography and has never had an exhibition of her work.

But to quote that old throwaway comment she knows what she likes and manages to capture some fine scenes.

These were from a boating holiday a few summers ago and perfectly offer up days and nights on the water.

With that added recognition that not everything on the tourist trail is picturesque.

Location; the Norfolk Broads

Pictures; summer days and nights on the Broads, undated, from the collection of Jill Goldsmith