In memory of the Four Banks and Bank Corner

 I can’t be exactly sure of the date of the picture, but I know it must be sometime around the late 1990s.

Now I can be pretty sure of that because what was the National Provincial Building Society with its distinctive yellow lettering on a green background became the Abbey Building Society in 1996 which in turn became part of the Santander Group thirteen years later.


Added to which the Midland Bank which had moved into its present building in 1978, adopted the HSBC logo in 1997, having been acquired by The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation in 1992.

Those who want will look carefully through the picture and identify other lost shops and offer up stories.

What I like about the image is that in some ways it looks more dated than one of those black and white photographs from the 1900s which we know show a very different Chorlton.

But this one is close enough to us today to look very familiar ……. But just not quite.

And for those about to mutter about the name, Four Banks, our building societies had begun to become banks in 1989, and so by the time this picture was taken there were indeed four banks on each corner, hence the accurate title, which harps back to references from the late 19th century on picture postcards when people referred to the spot as “Bank Square”.

That said, as many will know the corner of Barlow Moor Road and Wilbraham Road, now occupied by the HSBC was popularly known as “Kemps Corner”, after Harry Kemp’s chemist which stood there.

As so often happens, remained the accepted name for the corner well into the 1960s, long after it ceased being a chemist.

All of which points to that simple observation that names for locations arise from popular usage, which I suspect will mean that the official name for the junction which is Chorlton Cross, will never catch on.

Location; Chorlton







Picture; Barlow Moor and Wilbraham Roads, circa 1995, courtesy of Steve