Now there are still trees along Plymouth Grove but I doubt that they have the same presence as those a century and a bit ago and even less than those back in 1844 when this was an elegant through fare of fine houses set in large landscaped gardens.
All that is left of those fine houses is number 84 Plymouth Grove once the home of Mrs Gaskell and which has recently been restored.
So it is hard to really get a sense of what it had been.
That said the clearances of the last half century put away much of the buildings which filled the open land around those big houses.
So that today the Plymouth Grove Hotel and the Methodist chapel on the corner of Hyde Place and Hyde Grove are about all you will get of what the area had been like in the 1890s as number 84 is of the 1840s.
But there are ways of finding out more.
The easy way of course is to look at the pictures in the digital archive* but for Andy Robertson the challenge was go out with his camera.
Now as then the Plymouth Grove Hotel dominates the corner and maybe soon will be restored to some of its former glory.
And then there is that Methodist Chapel which as Andy’s picture reveals has lost some of its imposing past.
The clue is in that line on the gable end that shows a ghost building.
This was the Sunday school and it was as big as the chapel itself. Not that we should be surprised because great importance was placed on the role of the Sunday School and many were impressive buildings in their own right.
The Sunday school on Manchester Road in Chorlton is a big building and although it is no longer a school its size bears witness to the efforts the Methodists gave to sound religious education for the young.
Now I don’t know any more about it but I will in time go looking in the digital collection and I am confident there will be some records of the place.
For now it is just another confirmation that if you go looking you will find little bits of the past in the least promising of places.
Pictures; Plymouth Grove, 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson
* Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass
So it is hard to really get a sense of what it had been.
That said the clearances of the last half century put away much of the buildings which filled the open land around those big houses.
So that today the Plymouth Grove Hotel and the Methodist chapel on the corner of Hyde Place and Hyde Grove are about all you will get of what the area had been like in the 1890s as number 84 is of the 1840s.
But there are ways of finding out more.
The easy way of course is to look at the pictures in the digital archive* but for Andy Robertson the challenge was go out with his camera.
And then there is that Methodist Chapel which as Andy’s picture reveals has lost some of its imposing past.
The clue is in that line on the gable end that shows a ghost building.
This was the Sunday school and it was as big as the chapel itself. Not that we should be surprised because great importance was placed on the role of the Sunday School and many were impressive buildings in their own right.
The Sunday school on Manchester Road in Chorlton is a big building and although it is no longer a school its size bears witness to the efforts the Methodists gave to sound religious education for the young.
For now it is just another confirmation that if you go looking you will find little bits of the past in the least promising of places.
Pictures; Plymouth Grove, 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson
* Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass
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