Looking for pubs in Gorton .......... the Haxby Hotel

The Haxby Hotel in Gorton had a short life.

The Haxby Hotel, 2021

It was opened in 1933, closed in 2007 and was converted in “to a single residential dwelling” three years later*

It was part of that move to open large new pubs, which as well as catering for the new estates which were being built across the city were designed with the car in mind.

Along with the Haxby Hotel, licenses were granted at the same meeting for "The Princess Hotel at the junction of Princess Road, and the Seymour Hotel, in Upper Chorlton Road”.**

The stone inscription, 2021

The first licensee was a John Robert Fenton who had held the license of the Moulder’s Arms on Great Ancoats Street and made it clear that the new Haxby Hotel was “to be constructed at his home in Gorton”.

The Haxby Hotel, 1965

Interestingly “the Rev.R.H. Royle, rector of Our Lady and St Thomas’s Church, Gorton, supported the application [because] 'it would give his people a chance of getting refreshment at a decent place.  

At present there were 10,00 people in his parish and one fully licensed hotel.  He was convinced, he said that it was better on the whole to drink in public than to drink in private at home'”.**

A position which some representatives of the church establishment were less happy with a year later following “a postcard vote on the question of a fully licensed hotel for the Gorton estate. The poll had been taken at the direction of the Housing Committee with a majority of 524 in favour out of a total poll of 968”.***

And in 2021

Almost ninety years later those opponents might feel a little vindicated given that all three new hotels have since gone, and while the Princess and Seymour were demolished to make way for new build, at least the Haxby Hotel has survived.

Mr. Fenton meanwhile had moved on and in 1939 it was a Bryan Stanley who was calling orders.

Pictures, the Haxby Hotel, 2021, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and the hotel in 1965, T Brooks, m49750, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*Manchester City Council Planning Portal, 088847/FO/2009/N2

**Three new hotel licenses, Manchester Guardian, February 5th, 1932

***Hotel for Gorton Estate, Manchester Guardian, February 3rd, 1933