Beech Road 1980

Now I always think that some of the most fascinating pictures of Chorlton are not those of a hundred years ago but the more recent.

Often these we remember because they are our past and yet in a strange way they can seem as remote as a photograph of Beech Road taken at the start of the last century.

So it is with this one taken by my old friend Tony Walker in 1980. Richardson’s still bears its name of the Beech Tree Bakery with its pine panelling.

The Police Station is still an office for the City Council and away in the distance we still had a Post Office.

Looking more closely I am struck at how in 1980 Beech Road was still a conventional parade of shops. Next to Richardson’s was the fabric shop Marcele Materials and further down the Wool Shop as well as one of the two butcher’s while the boarded premises had been a grocery store.

 Completing the row was the Chinese takeaway of Mr Chan and the furniture place, where you could get anything from a three piece suite to a 1950 rotating ash tray.

And facing them was another butcher’s shop, a hardware place a grocers and further down Muriel and Richard’s veg shop. Within two decades many of them had gone.

Picture; Beech Road circa 1980 from the collection of Tony Walker

One hundred years of one house in Well Hall part 9........... bold new designs and a bit of Formica

This is the continuing story of one house in Well Hall Road and of the people who lived there including our family.*

I often wonder what  those who lived in our house in the 1950swould have made of the new household designs which were featured in Woman’s Own for January 12 1956.

Of course they may never have taken the magazine but they would not have escaped the exciting new ideas for transforming their early 20th century house into one which fitted with the 1950s.

Looking at them today they seem quite ordinary and just a little old fashioned but back then they were at the cutting edge of all that was new and innovative.

The basic designs were all there two decades earlier but were way out of reach of most working people.

But by the mid 50s that was changing.

It was partly as a result of the growing prosperity, along with new mass produced materials like plastic and Formica and the ever present offer of hire purchase, which meant for a “few pounds down and the rest over easy instalments” bits of the new life could be pretty much within the reach of every one.

All of which marks the 1950s off as more of a mould breaker than perhaps “the swinging 60s.”

Here were bold new colours, exciting fabrics and designs which relegated the old heavy furniture many peoples’ dreams to a place in a museum along with the odd dinosaur and other ancient relics.

And along with all these were those sheets of hardboard, which were cheap and could be applied to everything from period doors to the space in front of ripped out fireplaces.

For a few bob you could obliterate the beautiful features around doors create flat level spaces and add wonders to the fitted kitchens.

In 294 the master bedroom had lost its fire place and in its place a gigantic headboard with drop down drawers and a reddish swirly affect which I thought was the pinnacle of modern design.

But then I was only 14.

Sadly the DIYers responsible had also managed to take out the other upstairs fire places leaving just one small fine cast iron one downstairs.

Now it is pointless to rail against this vandalism.

At the time it seemed new and different and after six years of a bitter and hard war along with the preceding period of grim austerity all this was what we deserved.

And I have to admit I mounted similar attacks in the 1970s on good taste pulling out old features which gave the house its authentic feel and covering the walls with wood chip.

All of which means that I would have been no better in 1956, but just maybe now I might have cherished what was already there and just added the odd new idea.

Location;Well Hall, Eltham, London

Pictures; from Woman's Own, January 12 1956

*One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/One%20hundred%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall

The forgotten story ………. a little bit of squatter history in Alexandra Park

Now the story of how the military buildings in Alexandra Park were taken over by squatters in 1946 has faded from memory.

The squatter movement was a direct response to the shortage of accommodation after the war much of which was because of war damage but also because some properties had been deliberately left unoccupied by their owners.

The campaign was nationwide and in London was co-ordinated by the Communist Party.

Here in Manchester the first successful squat was at “the gun site near Alexandra Park which housed one family at 8 p.m., but by the following day contained a community of over 20 families and all available huts were occupied.  

Among the first to arrive was Mr. E. Brent, a Dunkirk veteran and survivor of the sinking of the Lancastrian.  

Like Mr Herbert Pendleton, who was first on the field he had brought his wife and child from lodgings and was delighted to be in a place of his own.”*

Within a day the occupants "were visited by a butcher and a milkman and while conditions were primitive and the buildings lacked electricity” two huts have running water, one even boasts a bath and for the others there is a tap in the grounds.”

By the following week the occupants had elected a committee to look after the interests of community and collect money against future demands for rates and other charges, preparation were being made to bring in electricity and just eleven days after the squat began the residents were paying the Corporation rent.

For Mrs S. Middleton this amounted “to eight shillings a week for the hut where she lives with her husband now a clerk and their six year-old daughter, Jean.”**

In the great sweep of the park’s history the story of Mr and Mrs Middleton, and the Brent and Pendleton families may not amount to much, but they remain a forgotten episode which may now provoke a series of memories about that event.

And that would be something given that to date all we have are four newspaper reports and three pictures of a family and their home.


Pictures; outside one of the homes, 1946, Walters, m07247, inside the home, 1946, Walters, m07249 and m07248, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*A Sergeant Major ‘scares’ Salford Squatters, Manchester Guardian, August 17, 1946

** Another Squatters ‘ Victory', Manchester Guardian, August 28, 1946

Getting prepared ………… Decimal Day ………. 1971

Now for anyone who has forgotten, and for all those who never knew, Decimal Day was February 15th, 1971, and it ushered in the decimalization of our currency.

Out went £sd, or again for those who don’t know, pounds, shillings and pennies and in came the simplified £ and new pence.

Hence forth a £ consisted of 100 new pence, which did away with the historic and wee bit confusing arrangement where a £ was made of 20 shillings, and a shilling was made up of twelve pennies.

In the process coins which went back into the long and distant past ceased to exist.

These included the shilling,  and the happenny, joining the half crown, threepenny bit and the farthing.

Now most of my generation and all those that went before me, we had no problem with counting pennies, shillings and Pounds, but I concede that in creating a decimal system was more logical.

Looking back at old news programmes, there were some who struggled with the change and mindful that it could be confusing, the Government ran a huge publicity campaign.

And out of that came New Money Snap, a game to be played at home by people of all ages.

I had completely forgotten it, but in turning out some old family stuff, I came across our copy.

The instructions point out that “The rules for ‘New Money Snap’ are the same as for ordinary snap with the additional rule that snap can be called where the money value is the same”.

Our pack is still in pristine condition, which rather makes me think that no one was at all confused, or worried about the changeover.

Location; the UK











Pictures; playing cards from New Money Snap, 1971, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

And the lights go back on in Manchester ………. August 17th, 1945*

The caption in the Manchester Guardian on that day in the August of 1945 simply reported “’Manchester Town Hall flood lit for V.J. Day’ A firework has just been sent up from the great crowd in Albert Square.”

Now for those who don’t know V.J. Day’ signalled the end of the war against Japan and followed on a few months after the defeat of Nazi Germany and the close of the European war.

Of course, to be strictly accurate the lights had gone back on ending the blackout on April 30th.* 

But as the Manchester Guardian reported elsewhere in that edition “The floodlit spectacle of London is naturally much grander this time than on V.E. nights”, which I suspect reflected the greater time to organise an event.

Victory in Europe Day had been almost a spontaneous outburst of joy after six long and bitter years of war.

Sadly, there was much more to the original photograph, but the passage of 80 years and the poor storage left the picture much battered.

Location; Albert Square, Manchester

Picture; Victory High Lights In Manchester, The Manchester Guardian, August 17th, 1945 

One hundred years of one house in Well Hall part 6 ........... winter in 294

This is the continuing story  of one house in Well Hall Road and of the people who lived there including our family.*

Now I can’t remember which wintry scene this will have been but I am guessing it will be in the 1970s and because I don’t remember it being taken it might be after 1973.

I did  trawl through the “Monthly Weather Report of the Meteorological Office”** for evidence of snow in London which offered up the news that it had snowed on Christmas day 1970.

But there are a lot of years on either side of 1970 so I shall just leave it.

Instead the picture took me back to living in the house before dad put in central heating.

It was a cold house, that is to say while the gas fire in the back room and the oil stove in the front kept the downstairs warm there was no heating upstairs.

Not that I guess that was any different from many homes at the time and like countless generations before me, going to bed was a quick affair of stripping off and jumping under the covers followed by that frantic effort to heat the bed up by  thrashing around.

Now Dad did go round with hot water bottles but sometimes I missed out and was doomed to the fate of cold bedclothes.

And all the hot water bottles would not prevent the slow but inevitable spread of ice on the inside of the windows which in the really cold winters rarely seemed to budge during the day.

Of course back then that was what you came to expect and pretty much took it for granted.

A few decades earlier and the occupants of our house might just have lit coal fires in the upstairs rooms in the most severe of winters but by the time we moved in the hapless DIYers had taken them out or blocked them up a move which today seems the height of vandalism but back in the 1950s and 60s was the “cool thing” to do.

I doubt that dad would have had truck with the ideas that bedroom fires should only be lit when someone was ill, keeping warm was for him always very important.

So in the fullness of time we got central heating by which time I had gone, moving from one very cold student bed sit to another in the more shabby parts of Manchester where icy windows were but one of the problems.

Of course back then it was all an adventure and which pushed 294 well into the background and it has taken this picture to bring it all back.

It was taken from the small back bedroom which was where dad decided to locate the boiler and which gave a magnificent view of the woods.

But that is for another time.

Pictures; looking out to the woods, circa 1970, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Location;Well Hall, Eltham, London

*One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/One%20hundred%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall   

**“Monthly Weather Report of the Metrological Office”http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/5/3/Dec1970.pdf

Bert Woodcock ………….. Chorlton artist ………….part 1

Now I like the way that stories come back, and so it is with one I did on the local artist, Bert Woodcock which I wrote back in 2016.*

I knew Bert and Doris Woodcock but only to nod to and pass the odd comment.

They lived on Beaumont Road directly behind us.

I must confess to my shame I made little effort to get to know them, but these were the years when the children were growing up and with a busy day job lots rather passed me by.

And so, it was a chance conversation with Alan which made me think of them again and the revelation that Bert was an artist who exhibited locally.

I went looking for a reference to his work but drew a blank but given that he was also a commercial artist I suspected in time I would find at least one picture.

And this week Robert Fleming got in touch, with, “Hi Andrew. I recently came across your blog and noticed you had written one about my late 'uncle Bert'.

He was my mother’s uncle (my grandmothers’ brother) but he was always known to myself and sister as uncle Bert and we would visit regularly in Chorlton. 

I have numerous pieces of his artwork and knowledge of his life passed on by my Mother and grandmother.

Happy to chat if you want to do a follow up as well as share his artwork.... a lot of which is owned by me, but none of it local.

He led an interesting life and would be nice to see him memorialized as I have such fond memories of him.

His real name was J H Woodcock by the way but known as Bert. As you said in your blog, he was a commercial artist and painted for catalogues and such in the days when it was cheaper to pay illustrators than it was to take photos. 

He was a soldier, a diehard City fan, very deeply religious and a freemason. He led an interesting life and I would await his illustrated cards every birthday as a child”.

All of which means that I am sure there will be follow up stories from Robert on Bert.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; paintings by Bert Woodcock, date unknown, courtesy of Robert Fleming


*Looking for lost forgotten local Chorlton artists ................ Mr. Bert Woodcock and J Montgomery, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=bert+woodcock

When history repeats itself ……. and art imitates art

 "Never work with children or animals" is that famous one liner attributed to W.C.Fields and to this can be added never take a famous artist and assume he never came to where you live.

At the Lowry home to his paintings, 2006

Which brings me to L.S Lowry which my Wikipedia tells me that “Laurence Stephen Lowry was an English artist. His drawings and paintings mainly depict Pendlebury, Lancashire (where he lived and worked for more than 40 years) as well as Salford and its vicinity [often depicting] scenes of life in the industrial districts of North West England in the mid-20th century.

He developed a distinctive style of painting and is best known for his urban landscapes peopled with human figures, often referred to as "matchstick men". He also painted mysterious unpopulated landscapes, brooding portraits and the unpublished "marionette" works, which were only found after his death. He was fascinated by the sea, and painted pure seascapes, depicting only sea and sky, from the early 1940s”. *

At which point I have to say he don’t do anything for me, heretical as that is and I await abuse from Mrs. Treliss of Broughton his industrial landscapes and people don’t do it.

And all this despite heaps of discussions with my chum Peter Topping who over the years has patiently set time aside to explain Lowry and show me examples of his non matchstick work.

Lowry's friends at the Lych Gate in Chorlton

Peter who is also an artist long ago took Lowry to his heart and has celebrated the painter by producing pictures of Chorlton in the style of the man.

These over the years have found their way onto the blog under the banner of “When Lowry came to Chorlton”, and now it seems he may have done.

Last night Peter emailed over his discovery that "I uncovered an Instagram post that someone posted with a B&W drawing with Lowry’s signature and date 1960.

 And someone on ebay selling a print of it.

 On further research I found that he had indeed come to Chorlton and sketched The Lych Gate and called it Chorltonville.

 

In the Library, 2026

Somehow the title had got miss read, or miss printed and catalogued as Charltonville see attached copy below

 There is a known Lowry drawing titled something like 'At Charltonville / The Old Cemetery', dated 1960, and it has appeared in auction listings.

One such listing describes it as 'L S LOWRY AT CHARLTONVILLE THE OLD CEMETRY 1960 PENCIL DRAWING' .

Perhaps Lowry visited our Library

This confirms that Lowry produced a drawing connected with Charltonville (note the spelling) and a cemetery scene around that time.

 L S LOWRY AT CHARLTONVILLE THE OLD CEMETRY 1960 PENCIL DRAWING” does indeed appear online — but only as the title of an eBay listing, not as an authenticated catalogue entry or museum‑verified work. The listing shows a hardback print being sold, not an original drawing, and the spelling ('Charltonville', 'Cemetry') is the seller’s own wording, not Lowry’s, https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/187509554804?msockid=3df35e1922496e41178348a6230a6f34”

So with that in mind Chorlton Library have asked Peter to put on a Pop Up exhibition of some of his pieces in the series “When Lowry came to Chorlton” .

Alas all of Mr. Lowry's paintings including his 'At Charltonville / The Old Cemetery' remain copyright and for all the right reasons I ain't putting them up on here.

So its just down to Chorlton Library to walk where  history repeats itself ……. and art imitates art.

Picture; At the Lowry home to his paintings, 2006, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Painting; If Mr Lowry came to Chorlton, © 2017 Peter Topping, and new paintings from the Lowry series, by Peter, 2026 Peter Topping, Paintings from Pictures www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

*L.S.Lowry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L._S._Lowry

Of horses, an RAF Band and a night at the Cheetham Assembly Rooms in November 1944

Now I wonder just how packed the Cheetham Assembly Rooms were, when the “Full RAF Rhythm Band” played on the Saturday of November 25 1944.

1944

Or for that matter whether the audience knew that part of their 10 shilling ticket entry was going to the Little Horses Charity Fund.

And that set me thinking about the charity and its need for money, particularly when the world was engulfed in a war that would ultimately see the death and displacement of millions, when members of the armed forces were at that moment fighting on mainland Europe and in the Far East and when the surrounding streets bore the scars of nights of German bombing.

I had never come across the Little Horses Charity but a search showed that there were quite a few charities devoted to the welfare of horses as well as other animals, one of which had opened a hospital for animals injured in air raids during the war.

At which point there will be a few who offer up detailed accounts of those welfare organizations particularly
those given over to horses which had a wretched time during the 19th and early 20th centuries when so much of our transport relied on horse drawn vehicles.

1959

I suspect there will also be a few with stories of the Assembly Rooms which opened in 1857 and lasted almost a century before it closed because if declining numbers, and according to one site was bought in 1960 with the intention of turning into a tyre warehouse.*

Now that was an ignominious ending for such a grand place, but its final chapter was perhaps even sadder, for after that century which saw concerts, soirees and late night suppers, it was demolished, with the site becoming first a petrol station and now a car wash business.

1965

All, a long way from the night when “Miss Stitt came as the White Cat and Miss Goldie as the owl in the ivy bush, ....... and Mr Bradshaw as a time-traveller, dressed as ‘a gentleman of the early twentieth century’” during the event arranged by "twenty bachelors of Manchester for 450 ladies and gentlemen on January 19th 1870".*

Leaving me just to thank David Harrop who provided the advert, and comment on the two pictures of the Rooms just before the end.

"Removed to Waterloo Road" 1965

Look very closely and on the second can be made out the notice announcing that “Fitzsimons Tyres Removed to Waterloo Road” and on the first the old telephone kiosk from which members of the band may well have phoned loved ones in the interval.

I doubt that there will be anyone who can offer up a memory of that November night, but I bet there will be quite a few who have other stories of the Assembly Rooms in equally magic nights.

Well I hope so.

Location; Cheetham Hill Road

Pictures; poster advertising the dance, 1944from the collection of David Harrop and the Assembly Rooms in 1959, R. Mirza, m16437, and 1965, W. Kay, m16303, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

Epic of Gilgamesh: myths and heroes in ancient Mesopotamia .... on the wireless

Now this is one I enjoyed today.

Hero mastering a lion, 8th century BC

It comes from the Radio 4 BBC series, You're Dead to Me*

"Greg Jenner is joined in the ancient world by Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid and comedian Marjolein Robertson to learn all about the famous Mesopotamian poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh. Sumerian poems about a legendary king called Gilgamesh began to be composed sometime in the third millennium, and were told and retold throughout Mesopotamia until a Babylonian scholar named Sîn-leqi-unninni wrote down what has become the standard version. 

The tale he recorded tells of a tyrannical king of Uruk, Gilgamesh, and the transformative journey he takes with his enemy-turned-friend (and possibly more), Enkidu. In the 3100 lines of the poem, they fight forest guardians and celestial bulls, anger the gods, and even challenge death itself. In this episode, we retell the story of Gilgamesh, exploring the history of the epic’s composition, what it tells us about ancient Mesopotamian storytelling and beliefs, and how it was rediscovered in the nineteenth century, written in cuneiform on clay tablets housed in the Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh. 

We also look at the themes of companionship, community and environmental protection that are still relevant today, and ask the question: is Gilgamesh just a legend, or was he based on a real king?

If you’re a fan of captivating myths and legends from the ancient world, heroic kings and impossible quests, and historians decoding ancient texts, you’ll love our episode on the Epic of Gilgamesh.

If you want more ancient history with Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid, listen to our episodes on the Babylonians and Cuneiform. And for more from Marjolein Robertson, check out our episode on Robert Bruce.

You’re Dead To Me is the comedy podcast that takes history seriously. Every episode, Greg Jenner brings together the best names in history and comedy to learn and laugh about the past.

Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet 11: Story of the Flood

Hosted by: Greg Jenner

Research by: Katharine Russell

Written by: Katharine Russell, Dr Emmie Rose Price-Goodfellow, Dr Emma Nagouse, and Greg Jenner

Produced by: Dr Emmie Rose Price-Goodfellow and Greg Jenner

Audio Producer: Steve Hankey

Production Coordinator: Gill Huggett

Senior Producer: Dr Emma Nagouse

Executive Editor: Philip Sellars"

Picture; Hero mastering a lion, 8th century BC, palace of the Assyrian king Sargon II in Dur-Sharrukin, current Khorsabad in Iraq at the Louvre Museum, photo by Urban, This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. and Neo-Assyrian clay tablet. Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet 11: Story of the Flood. Known as the "Flood Tablet" From the Library of Ashurbanipal, 7th century BC.Author of picture, BabelStone (Own work)This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

*Epic of Gilgamesh: myths and heroes in ancient Mesopotamia, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002rd8y, 

Uncovering one of our local photographers, A H Clarke .............where local history met family history

Now I have been fascinated by Harold Clarke who was one of our local commercial photographers.*

Barlow Moor Road, circa 1926

During the 1920s and 30s he recorded many scenes of Chorlton and they are a priceless snap shot of the area.

This one was taken by Harold Clarke of 83 Clarence Road Chorlton, and may have been part of a series issued by Lilywhite Ltd, of Brighouse, in Yorkshire.

There are 21 of his photographs in the Greater Manchester County Records collection dating from 1926 through to 1934 and some from 1926 carry a serial number close to the one in the picture.

All of which is an introduction to a story written by Tony Goulding, who has contributed to the blog before.

“Your posts using postcards produced by A H Clarke re-kindled in me an interest in my family history. A  H Clarke was my maternal grandfather. 

Miss Clarke's ration book, 1939

I had previously searched in vain for 83, Clarence Road where my mother was raised, as her ration book shows. 

I had not noticed the name change to Claridge Roadd. 

On a recent walk past the house I realised how close it was to the old brickworks and remembered how my mother had told me how she used to get into trouble for playing around them and the clay pits.

My grandfather was born in Reddith, Worcestershire in 1889, the son of William who owned tobacconist/photographers on the High St. 

His mother Bessie was a member of the Woodfield family prominent in the town both as needle factory owners and in local politics. 

Arthur Harold became a professional photographer. 

In the 1911 census he is recorded as working as a photographer’s assistant in Hitchin, Herts. He later moved back to Redditch, then after the break-up of his first marriage in the early 1920's lived for a little while in Toxteth, Liverpool, where my mother was born in 1927 before settling in  Chorlton in about 1930.

Book marks Central Ref, 1934

He was obviously quite enterprising at this time as can be seen by these bookmarks he produced of the newly opened Central Library.

Sometime in the early 1940's he both re-located the family home and ceased making his living solely from photography as a 1944 wedding certificate shows him as an Inland Revenue clerk residing at 5, Keppel Rd. 

It must remain a matter of conjecture whether this change was for personal reasons or was due to economic pressure on the photographic trade by the advance in camera ownership and the decline in postcard usage as a result of the increased availability of telephones. 

Of course any such difficulties would be exacerbated by war time shortages, rationing, and restrictions.

Finally it is ironic that I haven't got any photos of my grandfather, who died  in 1952; two years before I was born ------a man who must have taken 10's of 1,000's of them in his lifetime.”

And so there you have it a little bit more of the history of those who recorded our history.

© Tony Goulding May 2015

Pictures; from the collection of Harold Clark, Barlow Moor Road, circa 1926, from the Lloyd Collection, and the ration book and book mark courtesy of Tony Clarke.

*Harold Clarke, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/travelling-around-chorlton-in-1930s-in.html

One hundred years of one house in Well Hall part 5 living through the Great War

Our house in 2014

The centenary of the Progress Estate has long passed.

Now we can lay claim to about thirty of those 100 years having moved in to 294 Well Hall Road in the middle of 1964 but I gave seldom thought to the history of the house or to the people who occupied it before us.

But now I am drawn to that past and have begun to explore something of what our home would have been like a century ago.*

And because I am deep into researching for a new book on the Great War the events of that year when the Arsenal workers and their families began new lives in Well Hall has special signifigance.

The popular story of how we coped during the four years tends to fasten on the participation of women on the shop floor and in the fields; the impact of Zeppelin raids and the blackout but all too often skips over the huge hike in the cost of living.

As Henry Hyndman the leading socialist pointed out “since the war had begun prices had gone up 22%, so that now the purchasing power of a sovereign was from 13s. 6d to 13s.9d.”**

And this was the context behind the industrial conflicts which rumbled on and which some at the time and since have sought to characterise as greedy workers exploiting a country at war.

The reality was very different as Sam Hague who spoke at a meeting in Manchester was quick to point out, “there never had been a time in the nation’s history when the working classes had so solidly backed the Government.”***

The aims of the committee, 1915

Working hours increased, and under the Defence of the Realm Act 1914 and The Munitions War Act 1915 workers were being prosecuted for absenteeism and striking over wages and conditions.

In Manchester the first prosecutions under the Munitions War Act were held at the Town Hall on Friday July 30 when thirty-two men employed at Craven Bros Ltd Reddish were brought before the Recorder charged with going on strike over wages and working conditions without first submitting the matter to the Board of Trade.

And in response to the rising cost of living the Labour movement set up local emergency war committees and food vigilance committees, which reported to the War Emergency Workers National Committee in London which had come into being on the day war broke out.

The idea of a food vigilance committee seems oddly old fashioned but back in 1915 it was seen by many as an essential way of preventing the  growing practice of adulterating food and the rise in the cost of living.

The London Food Vigilance Committee was a joint body made of the London Joint Committee of Co-operative Societies, the London Trades Council and the London Labour Party.

And cooperating with the Royal Arsenal Co-op in our part of London was Councillor William Barefoot of the Woolwich Labour Party.

These committees set out clear policies on how to manage shortages by insisting that “the Government purchase all essential imported food stuffs, commandeer or control all home grown food products and make effective use of ships and the control of transport facilities” thereby securing both a fair share of what was available and at a controlled price.”****

And a key part of this would be local authorities who should be “power to deal with the distribution of food stuffs and coal, and to establish Municipal Kitchens.”

There will be some who see in this a creeping form of state control but the reality was that war time legislation had already given the authorities sweeping powers but there was a woeful lack of action over the rise in rents, coal and food prices and the lowering of the quality of what was on offer to eat.

The Committees were fully aware that at some point rationing would have to be introduced and it followed therefore that the Co-op and Labour movements should be represented on official committees given that they "had an understanding of the food requirements of the workers.”

All of which brings me back to the Arsenal workers who were beginning to take up residence in their new homes and some of whom will have been actively involved in that committee.

Pictures; our house on Well Hall Road, 2014, courtesy of Chrissie Rose, extracts from documents from The London Food Vigilance Committee, 1915, courtesy of the Labour History Archives & Study Centre,  at the People’s History Museum, Manchester,http://www.phm.org.uk/

*One hundred years of one house in Well Hall,
http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/One%20100%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall   

**Manchester Guardian February 19 1915

*** Free Trade Hall, Manchester February 14, 1915

**** The London Food Vigilance Committee, 1915

One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, part 4, a bit of idle speculation on what might have been

Gas fitting 1911

This is the continuing story of one house in Well Hall Road and of the people who lived there including our family.*

We moved into 294 Well Hall Road in March 1964 and while us kids slowly moved out over the years it remained my dad’s home till 1994.

Now I pretty much took the place for granted and only recently began to wonder on what t would have been like when it was brand new back in 1915.

Sadly none of the original features had survived by the time we arrived in the house most of the records of the Estate were destroyed in the last war.

All of which led me recently to ponder on what might have been and also to make an appeal for anyone who could supply me with pictures of fireplaces, light fittings and anything else that might still be in their house on the Estate.

And Chrissie has been the first to come forward with a picture of a fireplace similar to one she remembered in her house.

It is not unlike the bedroom fireplaces in our house which date to just five years after the Progress was built and I guess were pretty standard.

According to one history “all the timber and supplied Baths, fireplaces and many other fittings were kept in a large store on the site.”**

Bedroom fireplace, 1915

And this would have included the light fittings which I thought may have been gas.

Ours had long ago disappeared but upstairs there were still the circular wooden blocks in one of the bedroom.

I suspect they were not unlike the one above which was fitted in a house built just four years before 294.

That said I know already I will have fallen into a trap and featured a type of gas fitting which was not used in the south east.  It will be one of those errors that someone will pick up on and quote the exact specification and date.

To which all I can do is invite both the correction and ask for a picture.

But they did have gas lighting which has been confirmed by Chrissie who told me, “we even still have the old gas light pipe up stairs in the bedrooms, where it had been cut off which made a good hook.”

Now in the great sweep of history this is very small beer, but it helps recreate something of that lost house and takes me closer to what it would have been like when the key was handed over to its first resident, just 49 years before we crossed the doorstep.

Picture; of the gas fitting courtesy of Lawrence Beedle and the fire place from Chrissie Rose

*One 100 years of one house in Well Hall,http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/one-hundred-years-of-one-house-on-well_30.html

** Well Hall Estate, Eltham, S.L.G. Beaufoy, The Town Planning Review Vol. 23, No , July 1952, Liverpool University Press

Who knew Derrick A. Lea of Illustrations & Design?

I am looking at one of eight illustrations produced by Derrick A. Lea.  

My eight are all greetings cards, some of which have a Christmas message and others with a more general inscription.

Of the eight, five are of Chorlton, one of Longford Hall and another of the Old Parsonage in Didsbury.

Now this does not surprise me over much because Mr Lea gave his address as Rybebank Road, and earlier in the 1950s he had been living on Dalmorton Road which is in between Egerton Road South and Kings Road.

But that is about all I do know of the chap.  So far I have discovered he was born in Bucklow in Cheshire in 1920, got married in 1949 and produced these fine pictures of south Manchester.

My eight belong to Margaret who bought a job lot some years ago using them as cards for friends and relatives.

Luckily for me she retained these last eight.

And the one I have in front of me is one of the lost buildings which only went in the last decade of the last century.

This is Longford Hall “the residence of the late John Rylands, was bought by him in 1855 and acquired by the Stretford Council in 1911.  The park and playing fields were extended by the purchase of additional land from Manchester Corporation and is much used for sport and other social gatherings.”*

Like many people I let this building go by with little thought about what was lost when it was demolished.

So I shall come back to Mr Lea’s Longford Hall in due course, but in the meantime I am still at a loss to know more about the man.

It was drawn in 1957 and some of the others of the eight date from the years around that time. Others have no date but I guess will be contemporary.

What makes them fascinating is that they cover a period when Chorlton was continuing to change.

I can not however date when they were made into cards but some at least have a telephone number containing the old mix of letters and numbers.

Now the switch to all figure dialing began in 1966 and was completed four years later and Manchester was one of the first cities to make the change.

All of which places the cards no later than 1970 and possibly earlier.

Margaret had seen the cards advertised sometime in the mid 1970s by Mrs Lea and went round to the house on Ryebank and bought a selection.  I would like to know more but that at present is all there is

But at least we his pictures.

Picture; Longford Hall, by Derrick A. Lea

*text by Derrick A. Lea

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

The Code of Hammurabi ...... on the wireless today

Now, this is one I am looking forward to listening to.

Stele of Hammurabi, circa 1751 BC

It is 40 minutes of wonderful discussion on the laws of the  Babylon King of Hammurabi from the In Our Time series.*

"Misha Glenny and guests discuss the laws that Hammurabi (c1810 - c1750 BC), King of Babylon, had carved into a black basalt pillar in present day Iraq and which, since its rediscovery in 1901 in present day Iran, has affirmed Hammurabi's reputation as one of the first great lawmakers. 

Visitors to the Louvre in Paris can see it on display with almost 300 rules in cuneiform, covering anything from ‘an eye for an eye’ to how to handle murder, divorce, witchcraft, false accusations and more. 

The Code of Hammurabi, as it became known, made such an impression in Mesopotamia that it was copied and shared for a millennium after his death and, since its reemergence, Hammurabi and his Code have been commemorated in the US Capitol and the International Court of Justice.

With Martin Worthington, Professor in Middle Eastern Studies at Trinity College Dublin, Frances Reynolds, Shillito Fellow and Associate Professor of Assyriology at the University of Oxford and Senior Research Fellow at The Queen’s College and, Selena Wisnom, Lecturer in the Heritage of the Middle East at the University of Leicester

Producer: Simon Tillotson"

Picture; Stele of Hammurabi, circa 1751 BC, Department of Near Eastern Antiquities of the Louvre Museum, Photo created by Mbzt, I the copyright holder of this work, hereby publish it under the following licenses:

GNU head Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 

*The Code of Hammurabi, In Our Time, BBC Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002r4v1

One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, part 3, looking for the first residents

Our house today

This is where we lived  in for thirty years.

We moved into 294 Well Hall Road in March 1964 and while us kids slowly moved out over the years it remained my dad’s home till 1994.

And so I have decided to explore its history.

I can’t say I have ever thought of the people who lived their lives in our house but now I think it is time to start.

After all we accounted for just under a third of its existence and so I have begun to look for the people who were there before us.

Now  most of the spade work is being done by my friend Jean who has already been down to the Heritage Centre at Greenwich and trawled the street directories from when the estate was built.

And Jean will be back there looking for connections between the first occupants and the personnel records of the Royal Arsenal during the Great War.

The first of those residents was Basil Nunn who lived in our house until 1919 and was followed by Alfred W Rendle who stayed there until 1928.

I have great hopes that much more will be revealed for of course once you have a name then lots follow.  I have already started looking at the electoral registers for the period, and in time there may be the odd newspaper story, baptismal and marriage record and perhaps even someone who remembers them.

Added to this I will be able to conjure up the family who occupied our house and give a different context to the rooms we took for granted including how those rooms looked originally and how they might have been used.

The Bullet Factory, the Arsenal, circa 1916

And not for the first time during the search I have lapsed into a bit of idle speculation, pondering on which part of the Royal Arsenal Mr Nunn and perhaps Mr Randel worked in and whether they took the tram or cycled to Woolwich.

In turn I have thought about what they did to the garden and whether Mrs Nunn or Mrs Randel complained about the steep staircase which runs up the centre of the house, and how many times in a day they had to use them.

But all of that is a flight of fancy and rather stops me from the serious business of finding out more about the house and the first families who lived there.

So while Jean beavers away I shall go digging for any evidence of what the house might have been like when brand new and Mr Nunn moved in.

Research by Jean Gammons

Location; Well Hall, Eltham, London

Pictures; 294 Well Hall Road in 2014 courtesy of Chrissie Rose and inside the Royal Arsenal from the collection of Mark Flynn, The Bullet Factory, W H Kingsway, http://www.markfynn.com/

*One hundred years of one house in Well Hall, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/One%20100%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall

Back with Derrick A. Lea in the Chorlton of 1955

It’s one of those odd things that we have few pictures of Chorlton in the 1950s. 

Now there are a few fine collections in the Local History archive* but nothing compared with the huge range and number from the beginning of both the 20th century and the last decades of the 19th.

So when examples come up it is as well to include them in the story of Chorlton.

And so here we have another from the pen of Derrick A. Lea who drew pictures of the area in the 50s.  As I have said before along with J Montgomery Mr Lea is a bit of a mystery.

I know a little about him including where he lived in Chorlton and that some of his pictures were turned into greetings cards and that is about it.

Now given that pictures as opposed to photographs of where we live do not turn us as regularly his collection are quite unique.

This one is of Wilbraham Road sometime in 1955 and it appears to be a warm day in perhaps March or early April because despite the absence of any leaves on the trees people are walking around without those heavy overcoats everyone seemed to wear during the period.

Of course there may be a bit of poetic license here but there is much that is just as it should.

And it is a scene that has changed.  The Conservative Club and Public Hall was still solid reminder of the fact that Chorlton elected Conservative politicians to the Town Hall  and would do so until 1986.

In much the same way the Lloyd's Hotel has not changed overmuch since it was built in 1870

But with the benefit of hindsight we know that Mr Lea’s picture captured a Chorlton that has now gone forever.  The Conservative Club and Public Hall closed earlier in the year after the Conservative Association had wound itself up and currently the plans are to convert the building into flats.

The Lloyd’s may appear superficially the same, but internally much has been altered.  The small rooms have been knocked through, and the staircase taken down.

I can’t say the changes are for the worse.  I remember it from the late 1970s and early 80s as a place waiting for something to happen.

All of which would have pleased its landlady back in the 1880s.  This was a Mrs Crabtree who by all accounts “improved the place considerably in various particulars” and it may have been her who encouraged the bowling green members to build their own club house which was open on Wednesdays during the season.

She was an enterprising woman with an eye for business and also laid out a lawn tennis court on the open land along side Whitelow Road.

By the time I had washed up in Chorlton the tennis courts had become a drab car park while going inside the pub was like stepping back into the 1950s.

Nor did much seem to improve during the course of the next decade, and sadly the place became somewhere you went to only for a quick during before eating on Wilbraham Road.

But the place has undergone a series of makeovers in the course of the last few years, and is really a fun place to drop into for a drink, a meal and soon the launch of our new book, nothing to do in chorlton, Martledge Lost and Found.

Which brings me back to Wilbraham Road in 1955.

Picture;  Wilbraham Road in 1955, Derrick A. Lea


*http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass