Derrick Lea …… the Manchester artist comes out of the shadows

 For nearly two decades I have tried to discover the life story of Mr. Derrick Lea who painted and drew some fine pictures of Manchester, including Chorlton.

Greetings from Manchester, undated

And for most of those two decades I was unsuccessful. 

The search had turned up a conversation with some one who vaguely remembered him and an address of a property on Ryebank Road in Chorlton and because Chorlton featured in many of the pictures he produced I reasoned that he may have lived here, but that was it.

So, I used the images gave full credit to Mr. Lea and hoped that in the fulness of time I would discover more.

And that more came in the form of a series of messages from his son and daughter in law which in turn led to a meeting.

In the course of an hour and half Jon Lea shared three folders full of his dad’s work and gave me an insight into his dad’s life.

Derrick and Dorothy Lea, undated

This he followed up with a heap of scanned images of Mr. Lea’s work and this short biography.

“Derrick was an accomplished artist born in Manchester 1920 on Guy Fawkes night. His career began in the Second World War where he served n the RAF as a wireless operator in Africa. 

RAF Tabora circa 1944-46

There, having his camera stolen, he resorted to illustrating his journey across the continent where he then developed a skill for capturing landscapes and people. 

On returning, Derrick married his true love and embarked on illustration for advertising. 

Unfortunately, Derrick suffered from a brain tumour which thanks to brilliant neurosurgery, he survived and found his passion for recording his convalescence by illustrating the staff and patients at Barnes hospital and the Christie hospital.

Although ill health persisted, Derrick homed in on his commercial illustration skills and produced many fine pen and ink works mainly in the Chorlton area, these were often produced as Christmas cards as well as sold in card shops and travel outlets. 

Troops, undated

I hope to produce a web site to include all his work”. 

Young patient at the MRI, date unknown

And so, I now know so much more about Mr. Lea, and that is important because it offers up a context to his work.

All too often you come across images posted on social media, which offer no date, no location and no indication of the source.  The images are often accompanied by some vacuous comment along the lines of “Chorlton in the olden days” or “When we lived here it was different” and most banal of all, observations about how few cars there were back then.

None of which helps with understanding the image in front of you, but with the help of Jon and his wife Hazel I can now view the pictures of the Horse and Jockey, the Lloyds and the Rylands Library on Deansgate with a greater understanding of when and why the images were made.

Added to which I now have a record of Mr. Lea'a travels across Africa, his time in hospitals in the 1950s and some fine illustrations of people he encountered. 

Abdul, Billet Boy, Madagascar, 1945

Added to which I now have a greater knowledge of the man who produced them.

St Peter's Square and Cenotaph, Manchester, undated

And that can’t be bad.

Location, Manchester, Africa, 

Pictures; the work of Derrick Lea, 1943-1959, courtesy of Jon and Hazel Lea

Gasholders I have known and loved ........... no 3 inside the Rochdale Gas works

Now I am well aware this is a cheat ............. less a gasholder and more the inside of the Rochale Road Gas works.

But I have included it the series Gasholders.

The picture is entitled Gas Works Drawing Coke Rochdale Road and dates from 1894.

This was the time when “town gas” was manufactured on site and didn’t come down a pipe from the North Sea or in a container ship from somewhere on the other side of the world.

Back in 1894 Henry Tidmarsh recorded this one along with over 300 other  illustrations for the book Manchester Old and New which  was published in 1894 by Cassell with a text by William Arthur Shaw.

In three big volumes it told the history of the city but the real value of the book was in Tidmarsh's vivid depictions of Manchester, with streets and buildings animated with people.

Pictures; Gas Works Drawing Coke Rochdale Road, 1894, Henry Tidmarsh, from Manchester Old and New, William Arthur Shaw, 1894

*Gasholders,https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Gasholders

When we still had a furniture shop and a free car park .... down by the Lloyds in 1990

Now I am on a roll again with pictures from our most recent past.

And so here is another of Andy Robertson’s taken I think in the early 1990s.

I will leave you to identify the shops which have gone, along with that little piece of history which was Chorlton’s lost car par, which I think was free, contained also a set of public lavatories, and once a very very long time ago had been a set of tennis courts beside the Lloyds.

Picture;  looking out towards Wilbraham Road, circa 1990, from the collection of Andy Robertson

"Back in your arms again"............ reunions in Belleville in the autumn of 1945

I am back in Belleville in the autumn of 1945 with the home coming of the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment.

The photographs came into the collection from Mike Dufresne who lives in Kingston, Ontario and kindly allowed me to use them.

When I first came across them I mistakenly assumed that he had taken them which may well have added something like 30 years to his age and so an apology is in order.

Mike was quick to point out that “I want you to know I am not the photographer of these photos and I am informing you of this so that you will not credit me as the photographer as I am the owner only.”

Of all the images this is one of my favourites.

Countless photographers have captured that moment of reunion which more than anything marks the transition from soldier back to civilian, from fighter to father, husband or sweet heart.

And this one does it in an unsentimental matter of fact way.   Under the gaze of the officials who look back at the camera with detached expressions one couple embrace while in the foreground a father catches a few fond words with his daughter.

He is totally absorbed by the conversation with just a slight smile at the pleasure of the reunion, and as if to emphasise the moment his hands settle gently on both his daughter and his wife.

Like all good pictures you want to know more.

According to Mike, “the Reg’t arrived home to Belleville Ontario by train and then the same day moved on to the armories at Belleville.”

But what then happened to the returning soldiers and their families?  Did they return to the routines of a quiet Belleville, make good lives and help build the peace?

These are questions which a historian and indeed any one looking at such photographs should ask.

And in time maybe I will have some answers.

Only yesterday one of new facebook friends told me she came from Bellevile and that here her “older brother and sister have talked about the end of the war and the excitement it caused in town.”

So maybe just maybe as more of these pictures are seen again through the blog and the facebook site Vintage Belleville, Trenton & Quinte Region* something of the stories of the day the regiment came home and of the years afterwards will resurface.  I hope so.

Picture; from the collection of Mike Dufresne.

* Vintage Belleville, Trenton & Quinte Region https://www.facebook.com/pages/Vintage-Belleville-Trenton-Quinte-Region/395830067158776

When a pint of Eltham Ale cost 2½d and came from our own brewery ......... Eltham in 1874

I often wonder just what a pint of Eltham Ale would have tasted like.

It was brewed buy our own Eltham Brewery and would have cost 2½d  back in 1874.

According to their advert published in the October of that year they offered  twelve different ales stouts and porter and delivered across south east London and beyond which included Woolwich Charlton and out to Belvedere and Erith, and up to Peckham, New Cross and Brixton.

The old brewery had been up the High Street behind the Carpenters Arms and later moved to a spot just down from St John’s Church.

Eltham Brewery, 1917

Now I might be wrong but there seems to be little written about the brewery.

There is a reference to the old one in Mr Gregory’s book and another in Eltham in the Making and just two pictures which appear in other books.*

All of which is a bit odd given that it must have employed quite a few of our residents and supplied a decent number of pubs.

Of course Greenwich Heritage Centre is bound to to have something on it and in due course I shall go looking in their archives.

That said there will be someone who can put me right on the exact date it moved and more importantly when it ceased business.

It was still there in 1920 and six years earlier had been owned by the Kenward Brothers all of which promises a rich field of research.

Well we shall see.

Pictures, advert Eltham Brewery, 1874, from Grace’s Guide to British Industrial History, http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Eltham_Brewery, and the brewery in 1917, GRW 215, http://boroughphotos.org/greenwich/ courtesy of Greenwich Heritage Centre, http://www.greenwichheritage.org/site/index.php

*The Story of Royal Eltham, RR C Gregory, 1909, Eltham in the Making, 1990, Eltham, A PIctoral History, John Kennet, Eltham Through Time, Kristian Bedford, 2013 

The Toast Rack ….. places I remember with affection

I remember vividly the first time I saw the Hollings Building in Fallowfield.*

Early morning Toast Rack, 2026

I was on one of the 40s from Withington heading towards the Oxford Road Corridor and in my case on to the city centre.

"Toast Rack" and "Fried Egg", 1959

The building was just nine years old back then and I pondered on its likeness to a toast rack.  

But then I wasn’t alone because the nickname the "Toast Rack" was pretty much what everyone called it. 

And by extension the low roundish former restaurant block on its the west side was known as the "Poached or Fried Egg” a name that I only discovered recently.

It opened in 1960 as the Domestic Trades College, became part of Manchester Polytechnic in 1977 and then part of Manchester Metropolitan University until the MMU vacated the site thirty-six years later.

Along the way it picked up a Grade II listed status and was mentioned favourably by  Nikolaus Pevsner.

I did visit it once but alas can’t now say why.  I might have been calling on a friend or attending a meeting, but I do remember marvelling at its design and in particular the differing size teaching area which were dictated by the design, but which offered up flexibility in the provision rooms for different class sizes.

That soaring shape, 1973

Not surprisingly the building has many fans as well as a few detractors and often crops up in articles of modern architecture, iconic Manchester buildings and has its own Wikipedia entry.*

From a far, 1959

So mindful of all those that have gone before me and not wanting to crib their research I will leave it at that, other than to say it was bought in 2014 for a pile of money and as of 2023 has planning permission for a mixed development and if I am right now sports a gym.

There will be those that mutter "Oh not another person discovering the Toast Rack" to which I will just say I discovered it 57 years ago but only just got round to writing about it.

And that is a shame because it is one of my favourite  buildings, playful but full of bold design.

Location; Fallowfield

Picture, Early morning Toast Rack, at 7 am courtesy of BJS, 2026 and the Toast Rack, 1959, M63957, and M63959 1959 and in 1973 M63959, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*The Toast Rack (Building), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toast_Rack_(building)

Looking for "June" The Ladies hairdresser and Busy Bee Stores, sometime in 1930

Looking "June" the Hairdressers on Wilbraham Road

I never underestimate the power of a collection of old local adverts to offer up fascinating stories and pretty much take you all over the place.

So here in front of me are a set of those adverts which appeared on the dust jacket of a book lent out by Mr R. Greig Wilson who owned a newsagents on Sandy Lane and also ran one of our Circulating libraries.

Now circulating libraries were private affairs and existed alongside the local public library, and such was the demand for novels and lighter factual material that many of our newsagents went into business renting books out.

Busy Bee

At home in London mother was a regular at the local bookshop who also traded in lending copies and across Chorlton there were quite a few, from the one that operated on Beech Road, to Mr Lloyd’s on
Upper Chorlton Road and of course R. Greig Wilson’s on Sandy Lane.

It is a topic I have visited quite a few times over the years and no doubt will return to.

But for today my attention has been drawn to Busy Bee Stores  (W. Wellard, Proprietor) at 264 Upper Chorlton Road, and “June” The Ladies’ Hairdresser and Beauty Specialist on Broadwalk Wilbraham Road.

It will take some time to date the collection of adverts and that will involve trawling the directories but I think they will be from the 1930s.

Not that Mr Grieg has been much of a help for he was selling his “Stationary, Tobacco and Picture postcards” along with delivering his newspapers from at least 1911.

That said it will be after 1911 because down on Upper Chorlton Road at 264 was a Mr John Joseph Taylor who was a tailor.

Now Mr Wellard was trading as an iron monger at the shop by 1929 and Charles Slightman who also advertised on the dust cover was selling his newspapers and lending out his collection of over 1,000 books from his lending library on Manchester Road from 1923 through to 1935 so we are in the right decade and a bit.

"June"

And until those directories yield up a definite date I am settling for sometime in the 1930s for it was around then that “June” at the Broadwalk began Permanent Waving by the Nestlé System which was the "Radione" system in which the hair was wound dry and inserted into hollow cellophane tubes sealed at both ends, but contained moistened paper”*

Long along Wilbraham Road circa 1930s

She was in her saloon at 523 Wilbraham Road by 1929 but Karl Nessler who had perfected his alternative method of curling hair in 1905 using a mixture of cow urine and water did not come up with the improvement which he called the Nestlé System until the 30’s.

“June” charged 20/- for the process and also offered "Tinting, Manicure, Face Massage , [and] all kinds of hair work carried out by experts.”

I have often wondered whether her customers were aware that Mr Nessler had arrived in Britain from Germany in 1901 and facing being interned when the Great War broke out fled to America, or that during his first experiments on his wife he managed to burn her hair off and cause some scalp burns.

That advert for an early perm, circa 1905

All of which is a complete digression but is one of the fascinating little journeys behind which there is a serious point because together the eleven adverts will reveal a little bit more about the Chorlton of just eighty or so years ago.

And in one of those nice little twist of coincidences, 264 Upper Chorlton Road is again a hardware store specialising in much the same stuff as Busy Bee which along with offering “Glass and China [as] a speciality offered “Electric Vacuum cleaners for Hire.”

But there the coincidences stop for now where “June" permed and manicured the present proprietor offers sweets and newspapers which I suppose has almost brought us full circle.

Pictures, adverts from the dust cover of a book courtesy of Margaret Connelly, Wilbraham Road in 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson and an  early 20th century advertisement for Nessler's permanent wave machine, transferred by SreeBot, Wikipedia

*Perm (hairstyle), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perm_(hairstyle)