What was lost ….. is found

“We have just found a box of old photos at 515-521 Barlow Moor Road; I haven’t had a good look at them yet .... but I immediately thought you would find them interesting”.*

It’s the stuff that makes for stories, and with some luck and a heap of research the photos may do just that

Or they may lead nowhere but the fun will be in the looking.

515-521 Barlow Moor Road is currently being redeveloped by Armistead Property who have a track record in renovating and restoring old properties and giving them a new lease of life.**

And with all old buildings you can never be sure what secrets have lain undisturbed for generations.

I still remember the story of the  parcel discovered under the floorboards of a house and the momentary excitement of the crew who found it, leading to wild speculation of buried treasure.  

So sure, were the team of builders that something valuable and perhaps historic was contained in the parcel wrapped in old newspaper that they took the find to the museum only to discover that the discovery was nothing more earth shattering than a cheese sandwich left by a carpenter under a newly laid floor in 1910.  

Just why it was left under the floor space will remain a mystery, but I suspect we are dealing with nothing more than one worker’s lunch left in the house, only to be lost when a fellow builder put down the timber floor.

All of which brings me to the Barlow Moor Road collection.

They consist of fourteen pictures found in a battered wooden box, and range from images of smart cars, and equally smart “young things” on holiday to a group of men in uniform and the Grand Hotel Oceanic.  

At first glance there is little detail which could lead to clues upon which to fasten some research, but I will persevere.

I had high hopes of the Grand Hotel Oceanic but I guess there will have been and indeed will be many hotels that claim the name.  The first I came across was in Paris and is one of those typical Parisian builds which are narrow, with a courtyard and stretch to seven floors with those elegant iron balconies. 

Alas it isn’t ours.  Ours is an ugly undistinguished modernist box.

But a further search may lead somewhere.

I can’t even be sure of a date or dates for the fourteen, but we will narrow that down and in time may come up with more.

We shall see.  

Location; 515-521 Barlow Moor Road

Pictures; Barlow Moor Road collection, undated

*Peter Armistead

**Armistead Property, http://www.armisteadproperty.co.uk/

On the green circa 1898

It’s a picture I have shown before, but is well worth a second look.

The caption suggests a date around 1898, arguing that this “Prince of Wales Horse bus at the Green.  Probably about 1898 before the Corporation took over the Carriage and Tramways Company, but maybe slightly later.”*

The Manchester Carriage and Tramways Company had been formed in 1865 from a merger of the two bus companies serving the city and neighbouring townships.

The larger was owned by the Greenwood Company and brought over 500 horses and 33 omnibuses to the merger, while what had been McEwen’s City Omnibus Company contributed the routes to Bell Vue, Rusholme, Longsight and Didsbury.

And at the end of the 19th was taken over by the City Council.

But what intrigues me is not so much the horse drawn bus but the surrounding buildings.
To the extreme right is the Travellers Rest which had been a beer shop since the 1830s and for most of that century had been run by the Nixon family and next to it the Beech Inn.

To the left is the Horse and Jockey which back then consists just of the middle building.  Beyond the outhouse jutting out towards the green was the tall cottage of Miss Wilton who had died the year before in 1897.

And it was her death which brought our village green back into common usage. From sometime earlier in the century till 1897 this had been the private garden of the Wilton family, surrounded and made secluded by tall hedges, but with her death the land reverted to the Egerton estate who in turn opened it to the public.

And tucked away in the corner was the  little cottage once the home of the Malloy family and later the sweet shop of Miss Gertrude Green.

Location; Chorlton



Picture; from the Lloyd collection

Playing on the Nine Fields, all the way from Well Hall to Kidbrooke

Kidbrook Lane in 1872 with the Nine Fields to the north

Now I know there will be people who know of the existence of the Nine Fields just beyond Well Hall out towards Kidbrooke.

But I think there will not be that many, and certainly now few who will have played on them

Their existence was unknown to me and it was my friend Jean who set me off on a search for them.

She rememberd that “my father told me there were fields stretching from Well Hall Road from the Catholic Church,right across to Kidbrook, before the Kidbrooke estate was built. 

Dad was talking about the 1920s when he was growing up at 47 Lovelace Green.”

And with the power of the internet there almost as soon as I started was a reference to the open land that was called Nine Fields, before the Page Brook estate was built.  Moreover she remembered that they were one vast children’s play area.  At one time small bi-planes were there offering cheap flights.”*

And in turn this led me on to an excellent description of the estates being built in the 1920.**

In the great sweep of world history I grant you that this little discovery is hardly earth shattering, but for people like me who have wandered that bit of Eltham and my sister who lives on Bournbrook Road it remains an interesting insight into what was and what has now gone.

Even more so because when we washed up on Well Hall Road in the 1960s those fields were still within living memory.

Now I am not so sure.

Location, Eltham, London

*Lily Tyrrell (Brown), from Eltham, Mottingham, New Eltham SE9
Royal Borough of Greenwich, http://www.thisiseltham.co.uk/lilyTyrrell.php
**Municipal Dreams, http://municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2013/08/06/page_estate_eltham/

And in turn this led me on to an excellent description of the eststaes being built in the 1920.** http://municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2013/08/06/page_estate_eltham/

Picture; detail from the OS for London 1862-72, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

Catching the bus ……….. 1967

Despite all my efforts, I have no idea where we are, but as the following images in the collection are from Collyhurst, I am guessing that we are on the north side of the city.

Now, there will be those who question the significance of the image, given the absence of a location and a pretty mundane set of buildings.

But that is the point.

The workshop, and the terraced houses which were once common, have mostly vanished, along with the bus stop.

Neither of the two posters offer up clues.  One is for British Road Services, and the other advertising the film A Man for All Seasons, might just have listed a local picture house, but instead was showing at the New Oxford in the city centre.

So that is it. Although Geoff reminded me "I found this for you last year. Corner of Rochdale Road and Conran Oh and  I like the picture.

Location; unknown

Picture; catching the bus, 1967, Courtesy of Manchester Archives+ Town Hall Photographers' Collection,  https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/albums/72157684413651581?fbclid=IwAR35NR9v6lzJfkiSsHgHdQyL2CCuQUHuCuVr8xnd403q534MNgY5g1nAZfY

That mystery house on Beech Road ........

Now number 121 Beech Road vanished a long time ago.

Hunts Croft, circa, 1960s

It was one of our more elegant early 19th century properties which was set back from Beech Road, and went sometime in the 1970s.

For a long time after its demolition the land was left an open space, with the occasional suggestion that it could be a car park, a project which came to nought when the Corporation and the local traders couldn’t agree on a funding package.

There will be a few people who remember it, but sadly I am not one of them, which means it had gone before I arrived in 1976 or like so many things I was just not that observant back then.

Either way, there is little to mark its presence, save an entry in the tithe schedule for 1845, the Rate books and official maps.

If I have this right, it was Hunt Croft House and in 1845 was the residence of Thomas White who rented it from the Lloyd Estate.

With a lot of digging it will be possible to track its history through the 19th century till its demolition. I know that in 1969 it was occupied by a Frances. J Casse, and in 1911 by Mr and Mrs Chester, their five children, and a boarder.

Looking into the garden, circa 1970s

The house had nine rooms with a biggish garden at the front, ending in a tallish stone wall which ran along Beech Road.

Back in the mid 19th century it looked at on fields.  From the rear Mr White could look out on a field and orchard, while from his front windows he could gaze across to Row Acre, which stretched up to High Lane.

But by the 20th century the fields had all gone, and on either side of this fine old house were shops.

Beech Road, circa 1970s

And here I must admit my mistake, because for years I had mistaken Croft House for Joel View which stood a little further down the road and had been built in 1859.

Many will remember Joel View as the property owned by J Johnny, which I assumed had been built much later.

I even compounded the mistake by arguing that the stone tablet which carried the  name of Joel View had been salvaged from Mr White’s former home and been added to J. Johnny’s.

Dating the picture

Now, even then I knew that this was pushing it, because our own historian Thomas Ellwood had written that Joel View was one of the new developments in the township at the end of the 1850s.

All of which goes to show that sometimes when it is easy to ignore the obvious and create an elaborate theory which is built on sand and that is really just a lead in to two pictures of Hunt’s Croft sent to me by Roger Shelley who took them sometime in the 1970s and which had lain in his negative box until yesterday.

The two images compliment an earlier one taken by N. Fife for which I don’t have a date for, but maybe from the 1960s.

That said it might be possible to date Roger’s pictures, from the shop which is up for sale.  This had been Mr Westwell’s fruit and greengrocer shop in 1969, but sometime in the next decade became The Village Wholefood Shop.

Hunt's Croft demolished, circa 1979-early 1980s

It was still trading when I took a picture around 1979, showing the shop and the site which had once been Hunts Croft.

So that is it for now, although I am hoping Roger has more pictures.

Location; Chorlton



Pictures; Hunts Croft circa 1960s, courtesy of N Fife, the Lloyd Collection and again circa 1970s from the collection of Roger Shelley, and after it had been demolished circa 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

A Labour candidate ......the Beswick Co-op store ..... and a day in 1967

Now I wonder if Reg, the Labour candidate was successful.

He was the Labour Party candidate in the by-election held on Thursday June 24th, 1965.

I don’t have a surname, but a trawl of the local papers for June 1965 will reveal all.

Given that he was standing for the New Cross Labour Party I suspect he was.

The rest as  they is all in the picture, which is of the Beswick Co-op grocery shop on Aden Street.

The picture dates from 1967, and was one of a collection taken during the decade in advance of the clearance programmes.

Many like me will instantly remember shops like this, with their simple promotional material and range of products which filled our store cupboards, and have pretty much vanished in the face of the supermarkets, convenience stores and online shopping.

Location; Manchester

Pictures; Manchester, 1967, Courtesy of Manchester Archives+ Town Hall Photographers' Collection,
https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/albums/72157684413651581?fbclid=IwAR35NR9v6lzJfkiSsHgHdQyL2CCuQUHuCuVr8xnd403q534MNgY5g1nAZfY,

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 3 the old Brewery 1929

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was during the 1930s our artist in residence and during that time produced a heap of line drawings of Eltham and the surrounding area.

Some were reproduced from old photographs while others  were as he saw them at the time.

This is old Brewery which  which dates from 1928 in a building which according to Mr Roberts "originally a brewery, the upper floor of this building was later converted into the Baptist Meeting Room.  The brewery stood at the entrance of Jubilee Cottages, and the building was pulled down in 1928."


Picture; old brewery drawn 1929, Llwyd Roberts