When the unthinkable had to be embraced ….. invasion 1940

I don’t know how I would have conducted myself had I been alive in 1940, after the Fall of France, and the imminent threat of a German invasion.

Firing postions, 1940

If like now I was 75, I might just have been able to fall back on my own military knowledge gained perhaps from a spell in the Volunteer reserve, and may be during the Great War.

Of course, if I was younger, I suspect that knowledge would have been quite limited.

Either way I guess I would have been apprehensive and if I am honest a bit scared.

But I hope I would have joined the Local Defence Volunteers which everyone knows as the Home Guard.

It was an armed civilian militia and was active from 1940 till it was stood down in 1944, by which time 1.5 million local volunteers had joined its ranks.

Most people today are familiar with the force and may veer towards the comic portrayal of them through Dad’s Army.  Young men and old men, as well as those unfit for military service, who trained with broom sticks and homemade bombs and created their own armoured cars.

But that is not to ignore the commitment and determination of citizens who fully lived up to that line “cometh the hour, cometh the man”, which of course is not to dismiss those women who served in the forces, drove ambulances, and other “first response” groups.

The degree to which the Home Guard made itself ready is witnessed by the many handbooks, most produced by ex- soldiers which were practical guides to warfare for the civilian.

Home Guard Drill, 1940

Rifle Training for War, a textbook for Local Defence Volunteers by Captain Ernest H. Robinson, ran to four editions during July 1940, while Home Guard Drill and Battle Drill by John Brophy was reprinted eleven times between November1940 and August 1943.

They were cheap and small enough to fit into a pocket to be read in the lunch hour or in the evenings.

I have a copy of each, along with the more interesting, New Ways of War, by Tom Wintringham, who in in the forward to his book argued “that war is not a difficult mystery” to be left to soldiers.  Today it is the duty of all citizens of a democracy to understand the business of fighting for a People’s War [which] is the only effective answer to Totalitarian War”.*

He had fought in the Great War, gone to Spain at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, later joining and commanding the British Battalion of the International Brigade.

After Spain with the outbreak of the Second World War he volunteered for the British army who rejected him because he was a Communist.

A new way for the Home Guard

Not daunted he opened a private Home Guard training school at Osterley Park, London which taught the skills of guerrilla warfare, but again because of his political views he was side-lined by the army, and he resigned from the Home Guard in 1941.

How to do it, 1940

There is much more including his founding of the Common Wealth Party, received 48 percent of the vote at the Midlothian and Peebles Northern by-election in February 1943, previously a safe Tory seat.

In the 1945 general election he stood in the Aldershot constituency, the Labour Party candidate standing down to give him a clear race against the incumbent Conservative MP His wife Kitty stood in the same Midlothian constituency that he had come so close to winning two years earlier, but neither was elected.

After the war Wintringham and many of the founders of Common Wealth left and joined the Labour Party, suggesting the dissolving of Commonwealth.**

Leaving me just to set myself the task of reading his short book New Ways of War, and perhaps comparing it with the other two handbooks.

Pictures; from Rifle Training for War, a textbook for Local Defence Volunteers by Captain Ernest H. Robinson, 140, and New Ways of War, Penguin Special, 1940

* Tom Wintringham,  New Ways of War, Tom Wintringham, Penguin Special, 1940

** Tom Wintringham, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Wintringham

Travels with my ironing board …. in two countries over six decades

When the history of domestic ironing is written due consideration should be given not only to the historic location, and source of power but also to that abomination which was the drip-dry shirt.

Where ever I put my ironing board, 2023

I can speak with authority, given that I am old enough to remember grandmother using that pre-electrical iron, which was heavy, required at least two so that as one was being used the other sat heating up. 

Hoovermatic poster, circa mid 1960s

I know that very early on some irons were designed to take hot coal or charcoal, and that tailors and in large homes there were specially designed ironing stoves which would take a number or irons in racks.

The hidden trick was to make sure these irons stayed clean given their proximity to dirty fuel.

Go back further in time and there were paddles, presses, box mangles and rolling pins all designed to take away the wrinkles.

By the time I was growing up in the 1950s some of that drudgery had been banished in our house, with mum acquiring a range of different washing machines from the simple hot tub powered by electricity, to the “Service” rotating machine with powered mangle.

Iron power from the ceiling, circa 1950s

This later device was the bees’ knees of washing day but still required mum to hand fill it with water and empty it.  Only in the mid-1960s did we get the Hoovermatic programmed washing machine.  

As for the ironing, mum was also up there with technology and had an electric iron, but this was the 1950s, and we lived in a house which was already eighty years old and built before domestic electricity with just a handful of power points.

So, like most homes, mum powered the iron and other devices with an adapter which fitted into a light fitting in the ceiling.

Simple, effective and maybe by today’s standards a tad scarry.

An iron with a view, 2022

But it all worked.

And with that same pragmatism, I adopted the practice of ironing in the garden during the summer months, which was not only pleasant but had the added bonus of giving me a suntan without ever having to buy travellers cheques or jet off to somewhere hot.

A little earlier in the mid 1960s I had flirted with the bri nylon drip dry shirts.

They dried quickly, needed no ironing and hung from the drying rack suspended from the ceiling in the kitchen.  It was the perfect solution, which involved a quick rinse in the washing up bowl, and then was left to drip happily dry all night into the sink.

The downside was that sometimes they smelt of the cooking, quickly stained under the arm pits and got warm in hot weather, added to which they were a butt of classroom humour.

I have to confess I now no longer do the ironing in the sun, and have long since given up “doing underwear”, and as l plough through a pile of  stuff gazing out of the window listening to Radio 4, I am reminded of at least one ironing holiday in Sardinia, accompanied by wild boar but that’s for another time.

Silhouette with ironing board, 2017

Suffice to say we did import our wooden ironing board from Italy where half the family live and who would never entertain a metal one.

Such is one-upmanship in the world of ironing.

Location. a time and place before now

Pictures; Six decades of ironing, 1955-2022, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

 

Of grand pictures, the 1893 Cup Final and the jubilee of the 1832 Moorcock murders....... more from the camera of Mr Banks

Inside the Ryalands, circa 1900

Now Mr Banks can never be said to have missed an opportunity.

He was one of those self made Victorians who rose from humble beginnings to become a celebrated photographer capping his career with that seal of official approval which comes from the title “By Royal Appointment.”

He has caught my interest ever since my friend Sally began posting his photographs of Manchester in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

From 1873 and into the next century he recorded the great events of the city, along with the everyday life on the streets and portraits of the good and worthy of Manchester.

And ever mindful that all this was a job he was quick to turn his pictures into books.

Added to this he had a range of studios across the city and beyond including his first in Uppermill and one in Blackpool.

Much of his work like those of the newly opened Town Hall and later the Ship Canal captured that mix of civic pride and entrepreneurial drive which was the age.

Watching the 1893 Cup Final

But he was in touch with what people wanted and in the collections there are plenty of pictures of well known Manchester Streets and popular events, like this one at the Manchester Athletic Ground in Fallowfield.

“The Stadium opened in 1892 and I believe this photo is taken at the cup final match between Wolves and Everton in 1893 which according to one report had an attendance of 45,000 which was quite something given that he stadium had a capacity of 15,000. Fallowfield stadium was demolished in 1994 and is now Richmond Park Halls of Residence.”*

Mrs Simpson, circa 1882

Not that these were all.  In the early years he advertised a range of Valentine cards and continued to do the real commercial business of the individual and group portrait.

And by one of those wonderful coincidences I have two of the Simpson family who lived in Hulme, and ran a dairy business spanning the century from 1850 to the 1940s.

They are typical of the work Mr Banks produced and all of them come with his trade card on the reverse allowing you to clock the addresses of all his studios with a handy reference number should you wish to reorder your picture.

Here they are the grand and not so grand, striking the classic pose and using the studio props to celebrate a moment in their life.

The identities of many are lost with time but a few have survived with some details written on the back

Moorcock Inn, 1882

But as much as I find these fascinating it is the public pictures which draw you into his work and for me this one from 1882 near where he set up his first studio.

It is of the ‘Moorcock Inn‘, Bills o’ Jacks, Greenfield and was taken during the jubilee of the Moorcock Murders, which had happened on April 2nd 1832 when a landlord and his gamekeeper son were violently murdered at a remote pub on the edge of the bleak moorland above Greenfield near Saddleworth.**

But that of course is another story for another time.

But ever mindful of its commercial possibilities Mr Banks was there to exploit that Victorian passion for a gruesome murder and no doubt hoped that the jubilee of that event would add to his professional and financial standing.

Next; a little bit more on his life and some of his early adventures.

Pictures; picture of the inside of the Ryland’s Library, circa 1900 and  Manchester Athletic Ground, 1893,  courtesy of Sally Dervan, Ms Simpson from the collection of Ann Love date unknown, and the ‘Moorcock Inn‘, Bills o’ Jacks, Greenfield, 1882, courtesy of Saddleworth Museum, http://www.saddleworthmuseum.co.uk/

*Sally Dervan

**The Bill o' Jacks Murders, Mysterious Britain & Ireland,
http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/england/greater-manchester/folklore/the-bill-o-jacks-murders.html

New people new ideas, Chorlton in 1895

“The influx of a new population of lower middle class city workers who have to find room to live in the new houses erected on open spaces where a few years ago there were green pastures and golden corn fields.  These people have brought with them a new political outlook consistent with the great advance of Labour in recent years.”*

It was of course one of the outcomes of the expansion of housing across south Manchester at the end of the 19th century  that new political ideas would follow the new people settling here.

Now I have no doubt that radical politics had long been discussed in the township.

For a while the radical politician Thomas Walker had lived at Barlow Hall at the end of the 18th century and there would have been plenty of people who travelled into Manchester who would have been aware of the torrent of ideas circulating during the years after the French Revolution and well into the middle of the 1800s and at the very least would have discussed them in their homes and the pubs and beer shops.

The radical journalist Alexander Somerville walked through the lanes of Chorlton in 1847 talking to our farmers and in the decade before had been charged by the Anti Corn Law League with the task of arguing for an end to trade protectionism and may have made other visits.

Thirty years before his visit there is evidence that people had walked from Urmston and Stretford to Peterloo in 1819** and I am sure they would have been joined by weavers and labourers from Chorlton, Withington and the other townships on the southern edge of the city.

But at present all that is conjecture, although we do know that in the 1835 General Election the Whigs got 27% of the vote against the Tories here in Chorlton.  Of course the total male population was only 26 men and neither of the Whig candidates were radicals, but on the other hand they were the “progressive party” and faced an onslaught of voter intimidation from the Tories during the campaign and on the day of the election.

Sixty years later and the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Socialist Society was active.  In 1895 they had complained bitterly to the Manchester Guardian that they had been prevented from holding a meeting in the Public Hall which was a “hall built for the public, consecrated to the common good, free from the trammels of faction, open for the use of all” and following this had met the same response from “every other room belonging to a public body.”***

And so were forced to meet “on certain nights around lamp posts”**** to spread their political message.

By 1906 they at least they were afforded the same rights as other political groups and had been given permission to hold two meetings on the village green.

But it was not till 1928 that the Labour Party contested its first local election here in Chorlton achieving 1,457 votes with 14% of the total vote, and still managed 12% a month later when a second election was run.

Now this is about it.  There will be election material, more reports and stories out there which will help throw a light on how the township developed politically in the early years of the last century.

Picture; Solidarity, Walter Crane, 1887, and Percentage  of the total vote in the Chorlton Local Election November 1928

.
*Davies, Rhys. J., Socialism in Surburbia, 1930
** On an August day in 1819, anything between 60,000 and 80,000 men, women and children had assembled in St Peter’s Field to listen to the case for reforming the representation of Parliament.  Just before 2 in the afternoon a unit of Cavalry charged into the crowd with their sabres.  The deaths resulting from that charge have never been exactly established but sources claimed between 11 and 15 people were killed and up to 700 injured.
*** C. Fletcher, Chorlton-cum- Hardy Socialist Society, Manchester Guardian, October 23 1895
****, Davies, p7

How we shopped on Beech Road in 1969 and thirty years later

First the apology, which is simply I have lost the names of the authors of this shopping survey, but I hope they won’t mind me reproducing.

It was passed to be my Bernard Leech a few years ago, who I hope can supply their names.

But for now, here it is ……… how we shopped on Beech Road in 1969, and 1999.

And today of course a new survey would reveal the massive changes which have seen retailing outlets retreat to be replaced by a mix of bars, cafes, and restaurants with some gift shops and just the odd traditional shop.

Not rocket science, perhaps or even a remarkable set of observations, but still a bit of history.

Location; Chorlton











Picture; shopping survey, Beech Road, 1969 & 1999

Mr. Frank Beverley ……. Chorlton-cum-Hardy .... 1937

This is Frank Beverley, and in 1937 he stood as the Labour Party candidate in the Municipal Elections.

Vote for Frank Beverley, 1937

And to date there is little more I can find about him.

I think he was born in the January of 1911, and his parents were George and Ada who were living on Chester Road.  George Beverley was a cabinet maker and Frank was one of six children, and in the March of 1911, he was baptised in St Mathew’s Church.

After that a Frank Beverley is recorded in the 1939 Register as living in lodgings in Southport working as a tool maker.

There will be more but at present that is it.

Election material, 1980

Which brings me back to the 1937 election and his candidacy.  

According to the Manchester Guardian “Sixty-eight candidates – 31 Labour, 26 Conservatives, seven Liberals and four Independents were nominated for the elections, but as eight of them, four Labour, three Conservatives and one Liberal were returned unopposed there were contests in only 28 of the 36 wards into which the city is divided,”*

The results showed little change with the Tories gaining one extra seat, and Labour losing one with losses by the Liberals to both Conservative and Independent candidates.  

At the end of the night the new balance of power favoured the Tories, with 64 Conservative Councillors, 52 Labour, 22 Liberal and 6 Independents. 

I have yet to find Mr. Beverley’s election address, but the Manchester Guardian reported that “no single major issue is at stake and the campaign has largely resolved around the question of rates, and social services generally, although traffic congestion and exorbitant price demanded for land for rehousing on cleared sites near the centre of the city have had a good deal of attention from Liberal and Labour candidates.”**

The agreement between the Conservative and Liberals not to put up candidates against each other which had been a feature of the last all out Council elections in 1931 in an effort to maximize an anti Labour vote had broken down, but this did not impact on Labour’s result.

The result, 1937

As for Frank in Chorlton-cum-Hardy, he lost.  

The Tories polled 5,776 votes and Labour 2,052.

Undeterred he accepted the nomination to stand again in 1939 but withdrew in the October “owing to a change in his employment [and so] would be unable to contest the forthcoming election”***

It is unclear whether he was a member of the Chorlton branch, but the Party conveyed their best “thanks for past services and best wishes for his future success.” 

All of which suggests he was the Frank Beverley working in Southport.

Mr. Beverley, 1937

But that like so much about him remains to be discovered, including just who left the leaflet at the Town Hall for Cllr Mathew Benham who is one of the three elected Labour Councillors for Chorlton who as elected a full 85 years after Mr. Beverley contested the seat. 

Location; Chorlton-cum-Hardy

Pictures; Election leaflet, courtesy of Cllr Mathew Benham and election material from 1980, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Independents Gain Most in Manchester, Manchester Guardian, November 2nd, 1937

**Today’s Municipal Elections, Manchester Guardian, November 1st, 1937

***Minutes of the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Labour Party, October 11th, 1939.

The Lost Chorlton pictures ......... no 15. .........

 Now I am pretty confident that this one will bring up a rich collection of memories.

It continued trading into the 1980s and was a wonderful place where the chesses were piled high and there was pretty much any cheese you wanted.

And l have been corrected by John Paul Moran who tells me it continued trading well in to the 1990s. Thanks John.

Location; Wilbraham Road










Picture; the bacon and cheese shop, 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Of paddling pools and vanished pastimes in Chorlton Park

Now if you are of a certain age you will remember the paddling pool in Chorlton Park.

Now this is not to be confused with the big open air swimming pool which was a feature of the park when it first opened, and was 50 yards long, 21 yards wide running from 5 feet 3 inches at the deep end to 2 feet and 6 inches at the shallow end.

It is a story for the blog for another time but does appear in that book I wrote with Mr Topping and entitled
The Quirks of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, which came out last year.

So back to the paddling pool.  Until yesterday I only had the one picture of the paddling pool which dates from the 1930s, but yesterday Roger Shelly sent over this one, which he took in the 1960s or 70s.

Leaving me just to include the map from 1933showing all the features of the newly built park.

Location; Chorlton Park

Picture; the paddling pool, circa 1960s/70s from the collection of Roger Shelly, and detail from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1933-34

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 10 Four Yards

Now I was never much good at maths or for that matter being able to make judgments about distance.

So I can’t say whether the distance between John Dalton Street and King Street is Four Yards.

To be fair the Laurent’s map  of 1793 suggests that it might have only run from John Dalton Street to South Kings Street and our little stretch might have not actually been part of the original.

Look closely at its alignment now and back 223 years ago and it doesn’t quite match up.

All of which just leaves someone to go and measure the distance or better still unearth some dusty document which gives a definitive answer.

So for now I will continue to use it as a alternative to a very busy Cross Street.

Location; Manchester



Picture; Four Yards, 2016, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Shirley Collins .... Desert Island Discs .... one to do on the wireless today

 I first heard the folk singer Shirley Collins on Desert Island Discs last year and caught it again today.*

And what a wonderful programme it is.

"Shirley Collins first enjoyed success as one of the leading figures in the British folk revival of the 1960s. She initially performed with her sister, Dolly Collins, and also collaborated with other folk luminaries to create some of the era’s most beloved albums. In the past decade she has made an acclaimed return to the concert stage and the recording studio.

Shirley was born in Sussex in 1935. She can still recall how her grandfather used to sing folk songs to comfort her while they were sheltering during German air raids in the early 1940s.

Alongside her career as a singer, in the 1950s she travelled to the American South with Alan Lomax, where they made field recordings of blues and folk musicians, helping to create a significant archive.

Later in her performing career, Shirley found that she could no longer sing, following a distressing betrayal in her private life. She stepped away from music and was silent for many years, taking on other work, including a stint in a job centre Then, in her 80s, she found her voice again. In 2016 she released her first new album after a gap of almost four decades, and she has since released two more albums.

Presenter Lauren Laverne"

Now you either like folk music, or sit in a corner pouring derision on it.

Me, I have been a fan for sixty years, having made the transition from the protest songs of Bob Dylan, Phil Orchs and Tom Paxton to Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie and Ewan MacColl and back into traditional English music.

And when you go back to those songs in the words of Shirley Collins you are experiencing "The archaeology of music [and of songs that] tell you about the time it happened"

Which for someone who loves history is a perfect way to go back into the past

Location; Radio 4

Picture; cover album of Archangel Hill, Shirley Colllins, 2023

*Shirely Collins, folk singer, Desert Island Discs, Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001pf7y

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 8 the one with the umbrellas

It's that short cut through that takes you from King Street to South King Street and of course it is the one with the umbrella's half way along and some delightful stone motifs.

I can't remember when the umbrella's appeared but they are one of the fun things I liked to show visitors.

I have to confess I didn't know it had a name, but according to Goad's Fire Insurance maps of the late 19th and early 20th centuries it is listed as St Ann's Passage.

In time I will track its history but it was there by 1849 as a covered passageway and back in 1793 was an open lane connecting King Street to what was then Back King Street.

So who would have thought that this cut through had a history?

All of which just leaves me to ask if anyone remembers the umbrella's being installed.

I rather think it was the mid 1970s but I can't remember.

I am guessing some of the motifs were made at the same time.

And that is it other than to say the umbrellas have now gone, which l think diminishes it's charm.



Location; Manchester









Pictures; between King Street and South King Street, 2016, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

In Well Hall in the April of 1851

History is messy and rarely fits with that neat simplistic model we were taught at school. 

So take for example that idea that people rarely travelled and that most of us would have lived our life in the same village amongst the same people in communities that pretty much stayed the same.

Well even before the 19th century I doubt that this was completely accurate, and certainly by the middle decades of that century people were on the move and Well Hall was no exception.

Had you walked Well Hall Lane in the spring of 1851 you would have heard accents from all over the south and east of England mixed with some from the far west and north as well as Ireland.

Look closely at the 1851 census and there is evidence that while a parent might have been born in Eltham the children were born elsewhere and only later did the family return.

One such couple were George and Francis Cooper.  In 1851 he was 42 and she was 36 and they had been in New York.

I don’t suppose we will get to know why they went to America or why they returned.  But the fact that they did is evidenced by their children two of whom were born in New York in 1839 and 1842.

Perhaps the clue is in the fact that George described himself as a servant so perhaps they crossed the Atlantic with an employer.  Either way they were back here in Greenwich by 1844 for the birth of their third child and there they still were in 1849.

They were both from Surrey and were part of the 30% of Well Hall residents who had not been born in Eltham.  Now most of this 30% were from Kent, but that still left others who were from as far away as Yorkshire and Ireland.

Part of the explanation was that those who employed domestic servants preferred not to use locals for no one wanted the secrets of the household to become the gossip of the neighbourhood which explains why none of the vicar’s six servants were from Eltham.

But in other ways Well Hall was typical of a small rural community.  Most of the workforce was engaged in agriculture either as labourers or in trades related to farming and these included four blacksmiths and two bailiffs.

And there is much more but that as they say is for another time.

Location;Well Hall, London

Pictures; Tudor Barn, Well Hall courtesy of Scott MacDonald, and data from the 1851 census, Enu 1b, Eltham Kent

To binge watch or not …….. random thoughts in the company of the Radio Times

 By binge watching I mean that self-indulgent act of sitting down with a boxed set of DVDs or calling up a streamed series on a TV platform.

It is of course a relatively new practice, because before streaming, DVD’s and that ancient technology, which was VHS, watching an episode of a drama, sit com or documentary was confined to once a week and then for only as long as the series lasted.

And if you missed it, you could only hope it was repeated later in the year or wait for someone at work or in the pub to tell you what happened.

The same was true of the wireless.

There is a lot of merit in rationing the programm to once a week. For starters it brings back memories of sitting in front of the radio listening to Hancock’s Half Hour, the Goons or Round the Horn, and later gathering by the telly to watch something.

It started with the anticipation of what was to come, discussions on the previous show and the fun or suspense of sharing the programme.

And that was followed up with the conversations the following day at school or work in which catch phrases were exchanged, with one prompting another.  

In my case aged 16 it was the banter that accompanied the Angus Prune tune from I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, Zebedee’s authoritarian command in The Magic Round About or the outrageous suggestions made by Kenneth Williams in Round the Horn.

All of which made the weekly fall out from that single programme a big social event.

But now we have the boxed set, and there is little time to swop anecdotes, or bounce possible plot or joke scenarios, because one episode follows another in a continuous flow.

Less single stand alone and more a six hour film, only broken by the credits, cast list and opening images as one instalment follows another.

The upside is that you get to immerse yourself in the drama, the downside is that what starts at 6 in the evening finishes sometime around 2pm with the added drawback that there is nothing left to watch for the next few weeks.

Currently there are three series making their weekly way across the television channels, all of which will not finish for a month, and we have binge watched the entire set of episodes.

So perhaps there is merit in rationing your viewing.

Leaving me just to reflect that the “history” of this story is that simple observation.

This was how we did  it in the olden days and to misappropriate  President Kennedy's speech in the September of 1962 on deciding to commit the United States to a space programme which would end with a landing on the Moon, we choose to binge watch because its fun and we can.

I could quote the speech in full to further cement the history but I wont.

Location; our front room

Pictures; boxed sets I have in the collection

A map .....some ponds .... and a bit of the Longford Brook ……..

I am looking at one of my favourite maps of Chorlton-cum-Hardy.

It was produced for the Withington Local Board of Health in 1881, and I have Ricard Bond to thank for copying this section.

The Withington Local Board of Health was established following the Public Health Act of 1876, and covered the four townships of Burnage, Chorlton, Didsbury and Withington, and along with building the sewage works commissioned the map.

It is a beautifully detailed map and I have chosen the section which covers the area to the west of what is now the library stretching almost as far as the Longford Estate.

There is much to take in including the 27 properties that made up Fielden Terrace which was a community in itself, along with the Longford Brook, the Canal Feeder and the set of ponds some of which will have been the result of excavating marl and clay, a practice which went back to the 17th century.

These I have written about over the years and came back to recently.*

What I had never noticed before was the footbridge across the Longford Brook, which I guess vanished when this stretch went underground, leaving just a small section through Longford Park open to the sky. There are those who can remember when it was still there to see.  Equally another short bit in front of Copley Road was still exposed as late as 1934.

Just when most of it went underground is as yet unclear.  It was there in 1907 but had vanished by 1933.

And that is it.

"Although I copied the map, I also did not notice the footbridge until much later. As you say, this is a bridge over Longford Brook, not the canal feeder - the canal feeder is the watercourse running parallel to the Longford Brook, a little to the south, so OS have mis-labelled it. The section with the footbridge was culverted by the time OS surveyed a new map in 1892, see https://maps.nls.uk/view/126523724#zoom=5&lat=7759&lon=9124&layers=BT 

Note that the trees shown at top left are roughly where the present tree line of the eastern boundary of the disc golf course is located. The trees marked the then eastern boundary of the Longford estate but between 1876 and 1881, John Rylands and the Lloyd family exchanged lands, the result being the artificially straight boundary line running roughly N-S, to the east of the foot bridge. By 1892, Enriqueta Rylands had planted the present line of poplars, next to the boundary with Ryebank Fields, to mark the new boundary of her estate".

Location; Longford Road

Pictures; west of Martledge close to the Longford Estate, 1881 from the Withington Local Board of Health map, 1881,courtesy of Trafford Local Studies, and copied by Richard Bond

*Of clay pits ...... meandering streams …….. and plenty of ponds …… walking west of Martledge in 1854, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2021/11/of-clay-pits-meandering-streams-and.html

Early morning in Library Walk ........ waiting for Central Ref to open no. 3

Now the light wasn’t so good and I still had 20 minutes to go before Central Ref opened.

So with nothing else to do I started taking pictures.

Location; Library Walk

Picture; Library Walk, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The Chorlton billiard hall …. St Mary’s Hospital …… and that much loved night spot

I am back with that forgotten billiard hall on Wilbraham Road and a series of twisty turney paths that reinforce that old idea that history is messy.

The front of the former billiard hall, 2024

First, the billiard hall which stands behind the two shops, Admiral, and Royal Cod.

I can date the hall back to 1929 and may be able to push that back into the 1920s.

Just when it closed its doors is as yet unclear, but in 1929 it belonged to W.R. Bridgens and Co.

And a William Roy Bridgen and his wife Winnie were living at 163 Barlow Moor Road rom at least 1927 through to 1931, and there are references to him in various newspapers in the early 1830s competing in golf competitions.

Alas so far that is it except for an obituary recording the death of Winnie in 1955.

But it’s early days I am confident he and Winnie will come out of the shadows with more research.

And already I know that in 1931 he was renting and paying rates for rooms at 64 Oxford Street, three doors up from St Mary’s Hospital.

Acropolis Restaurant and the  Palace Snack Bar and Continental Club, 1974

Now by 1964 numbers 66 and 64 were the Acropolis Restaurant and the  Palace Snack Bar and Continental Club.

And the name the Continental Club or “Conti” will immediately chime a chord with anyone of a certain age who liked late night drinking with a bit of dancing and questionable food.

Sadly, I missed going there, because it closed before I arrived in Manchester, but like Lazarus the club rose again in the basement of an old building in Harter Street, taking the name of the “New Conti” and so was born a place I inhabited for a great chunk of the 1970s.

A friend we introduced to the place could only mutter “a bus shelter with beer”, but it was more than that, and a favourite dive of doctors, nurses, teachers and plenty more.

It must be 40 more years since I last went and it has gone, although just when I have no idea.

Acropolis Restaurant, 1974

But there are plenty of stories out there of both clubs and a slight dispute about whether the old closed before the new opened.  I have no idea, but trying to answer that question falls into that comment about the 1960s, “if you can remember the 60s you weren’t there”.

But there will be more, because my friend Antony whose aunt owned the Acropolis Restaurant is digging deeper into the story as I write.

So, there will be more linking one social club in Chorlton those far more memorable venues which were the Old and New Cont.

Location, Chorlton and Town

Pictures, the front of our old billiard Hall, 2024, from the collection of Andrew Simpson  the Old Conti Club, 1974, Acc No. 113181 and a similar shot, 1974,  Acc No. 113181. and the hall in 1959 by A.H. Downes, m17486, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass*

 The Billiard hall in 1959 

*And here there seems a possible hiccup, because both images have the same accession 

An arched gateway on Barlow Moor Road circa 1925

I am looking at a photograph of Barlow Moor Road and the arched gateway to Christ Church Avenue about 1925.

The lodge is to the right and a for sale sign to our left.

Now I have to confess I have been lazy on this one and realize that I will have to do some serious research.

Christ Church Avenue was a wide tree lined avenue which led from Barlow Moor Road down to the Rectory and church which had been built in 1881.  Back then it stood in open farm land and was known as Christ Church in the fields.

In 1932 Princess Parkway was cut south of Barlow Moor Road as the main link to the newly developing estate of Wythenshawe, and it was built over Christ Church Avenue and eleven fine looking houses with gardens were built from the corner of Barlow Moor Road down to the church.

So Christ Church Avenue had a short life, just a matter of 51 years, which means that I will have to do some more digging.

Picture; from the Lloyd Collection, map detail from the OS for south Lancashire, 1888-93, courtesy of
Digital Archives, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

Painting Well Hall and Eltham ....... Nu 4 our house on Well Hall Road

An occasional series featuring buildings and places I like and painted by Peter Topping.

Now there had to come a time when I decided my bit of Well Hall Road should be recorded.

It came out of a conversation with Peter about the house two doors down which had been bombed in the Great War.

Tricia Lesley discovered the original war time photograph, Daniel Murphy tracked down its location to the same block where I grew up and with Tricia’s help we uncovered the full story.

All of which I have written about* and with that all done I asked Peter to paint the house knowing that in doing so our house would  get a look in.

But modest as I am I was content that part of it would be obscured behind that small tree.

Back in the 1960s when we moved in to 294 the spot was dominated by a tall oak tree which I guess had been planted when the estate was built.

It pretty much hid our house completely and in the fullness of time will do so again, but for now that's my old bedroom very much as I remember it and that will do for me.

Painting; 294 Well Hall Road, © 2015 Peter Topping 

Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

Facebook: Paintings from Pictures https://www.facebook.com/paintingsfrompictures

*Zeppelins over Well Hall,
http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Zeppelins%20over%20Well%20Hall

Early morning in Library Walk ........ waiting for Central Ref to open no. 2

Now the light wasn’t so good and I still had 20 minutes to go before Central Ref opened.

So with nothing else to do I started taking pictures.

Location; Library Walk

Picture; Library Walk, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Silly etiquette …. random historical thoughts on a tram day

History is full of those old-fashioned ways of behaving in public.

High jacking some one else's picture, 2024

I still walk on the outside of the pavement beside the road when accompanying my wife, or any female friend and on dark nights always cross over if a woman is in front of me.

Sexist maybe, silly maybe and a throwback to another age I agree.

And I still lay the table in a special way and always give up my seat to the elderly and infirm although at 75 with an occasional gammy leg I wonder who will do that for me.

But it springs from that ancient pool of “the right way to do things” which I suppose falls under the broad category of etiquette, which as we all know changes with time and is different in different societies.

So, today while sitting on the tram bound for Manchester, I wondered about the etiquette of looking at the screens of other people’s mobiles.

And there is always a heap to engage my curiosity.

I suspect it is rude, but it does offer up an insight into my fellow passengers which helps pass the time and is a refinement on just trying to guess their occupation, birthplace and favourite colour.

I also wonder about hijacking someone else’s pictures, as they pose for their partner to snap away.

Then and now communication, 2024

Leaving me just reflect on the man using his mobile by the decommissioned telephone box in St Peter’s Square, remembering how this was one of the kiosks I used when flat hunting back in the early 1970s.

The midday edition of the Evening News would hit the streets on “property night” and within minutes all the lines were engaged to the owner of a bed sit in Withington, a flat share in Didsbury or the house in Fallowfield.

Time I suppose to go back to my collection of etiquette handbooks from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Location; St Peter’s Square

Pictures; People looking, 2024, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

It’s the little bits of Chorlton’s history that can be fascinating ……… the other billiard hall

I bet I won’t be the only one who has passed 446 Wilbraham Road and not given it a second glance.

Two shops hiding a secret, 2021

Today 466 is the Admiral Casino and its neighbour the Royal Cod, and slip back a few years and the two properties were occupied by Quick Silver and a Touch of Class.

Beyond that I must confess I can’t remember …. but someone will know.

They may even be able to offer up a detailed history of the building which always struck me as out of keeping with that stretch of the road, especially as the present east side of the closed Precinct had been a row of five Victorian houses.

Years ago I had gone looking for the story, but pretty much had given up after discovering the plot had been a vacant slot of land as late as 1907, and built on by 1933.

The unromantic side of that former billiard hall, 2024

And then as so often happens in the middle of doing some research I came across the information that in 1929 it was a billiard hall owned by W.R. Bridgens & Co Ltd and was fronted by Malley and Adamson, opticians and Simon Beattie, tobacconist.

There does appear to have been a third shop front which shows up on the 1952 OS map but this may have been a later subdivision of the other two.

I have Anthony Petrie to thank for the update as he was trawling his collection of street directories for me and came up with the names associated to the building.

And he also identified that in 1962 the three shops fronts were occupied by a “ladies hairdresser, estate agent and optician”

And like so much research it just begs heaps of further questions.  

Can we push the date of the billiard hall back?  When did it close?  Was it a rival to the Temperance Billiard Hall on Manchester Road?  What more is there to find out about W.R. Bridgens & Co Ltd, and is there any one out there who used the hall more recently.

Hall and shops in the distance, 1959

So many questions.

Location; Wilbraham Road

Pictures, The shop fronts of the former Billiard Hall, 2021, courtesy of Google maps, and down the side of the hall, 2024 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and the hall in 1959 by A.H. Downes, m17486, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass