Osibisa, the old Till & Kenendy Building and a memory

Now for no particular reason I played Woyaya by Osibisa.

Osibisa and Mr. Righton

The LP has sat on the shelf with a shed load of other vinyl which I treasure but seldom play.

And within the time it takes for the music to roll around the room I was back in the 1970s.

It was one of those records that we played late in the night, usually accompanied by the all pervading smell of joss sticks and was pretty much the sound track to a very happy time.

We knew we had grown up a bit, not because we were living in our first house but by the purchase of the sound system which of course following the times was a mix of different bits and pieces.  The speakers were Wharfdales, the record deck was a Pioneer and the tuner was that odd shaped model from Sony with a large dial which took up all of the wooden cabinet.

I have often wondered what our neighbour made of us and the music, but she was always pleasant and made us mince pies at Christmas and so perhaps she too was a fan, despite the fact that she had been born 1900 and had never moved more than half a mile from Raynham Street off Whiteacre Road in Ashton.

And here is the thing, I am still trying to work out whether we heard Osibisa live.  If we did it would have been in the old Till & Kennedy building which by then had become the student’s union of the Manchester Polytechnic.

But even by 1971/2 I think they were successful enough to have regarded a student’s union as small beer.

That said we all know the story of Paul and Linda McCartney with the rest of Wings turning up on a Saturday afternoon offering to play at a student’s bar.

And just a few years earlier the College of Commerce on Aytoun Street had hosted a impressive line up of musicians from Fleetwood Mac, Pink Floyd, the Moody Blues and Barclay James harvest, along with Roy Harper, the Edgar Broughton Band and Canned Heat.

So you never know. It maybe I was right and if so I would love the memory confirmed.

Pictures; the Righton Building, 2015, from the collection of Andy Robertson 

Travelling on LCC tram number 1622 with memories of the Old Kent Road and Well Hall

Now I missed travelling on a tram by just a matter of years, but had I been born a little earlier I might well have been on this one that rattled its way up from the Old Kent Road to Westminster.

And just possibly also taken the 44 and 46 which connected Eltham with Woolwich.

According to family legend I was actually there at New Cross when the last London tram took its last journey in the summer of 1952 but until yesterday I never thought I would come close to one.

Now I know I could visit the London Transport Museum where there is a fine 1910 tram from West Ham Tramways Corporation, but my number 40 which was the one my dad would have used is even closer to home.

It is in the collection of CRICH TRAMWAY VILLAGE just south of Matlock which is no distance for me but I accept is a long way from south east London.

But your loss is our gain and I have planned my visit.

In the meantime I have settled for a picture of LCC number 1622 which plied route 40 from New Cross.

It comes from my old friend Andy Robertson who has been recording the changes to the twin cities of Manchester and Salford and decided to take an afternoon off and visit the museum.

And there is plenty else to see from a Blackpool tram complete with its destination board announcing a Tour of the Illuminations to the Red Lion Hotel which was once in Stoke on Trent and facing demolition was rescued by the museum rebuilt and happily once again serves up a pint.

In his collection of pictures from the day is the sign on a Leeds tram informing passengers that “Spitting is Forbidden” which made sense in an age before antibiotics and the dangers from a range of infectious diseases was all too common.

It is I think Andy's favourite  while for me it will always be the number 40

Which just leaves me to mention Trams in Eltham by John Kennett** and The Campaign To Save The London Trams by Ann Watkins which includes a chapter on that last tram at New Cross.

Picture; trams at the Crich Tramway Village, 2015, from the collection of Andy Robertson, 

* Crich Tramway Village, http://www.tramway.co.uk/

** Trams in Eltham  by John Kennett, Eltham Society, http://www.theelthamsociety.org.uk/publications.php

*** The Campaign To Save The London Trams by Ann Watkins, http://www.kentarchaeology.ac/authors/019.pdf

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester ................ nu 53 Silver Street, a bus station and some nasty history

Now this is Chorlton Street Bus Station in the 1960s and the image presents a bit of mystery, but more of that later.

Chorlton Street Bus Station, 1964

For now it is that gap between the office block and the ramp to the right of the picture and Chorlton Street which gave its name to the bus station which interests me.

That gap was the continuation of Silver Street.

You can still walk down Silver Street from Aytoun Street which ran on to David Street but my bit has vanished.

Back in the 1850s Silver Street and its neighbours were a warren of small closed courts leading off narrow alleys and filled with small back to back houses.

They were not perhaps the worst the city had to offer but they were neither the best.  In his case notes during the cholera outbreak of 1832, Dr Gaultier offers up a a vivid picture of the area. Chorlton Street he wrote “was tolerably clean and open but the vicinity crowded and populous.”*

Silver Street, 1849

But the home of the Bullock family was dire.

Mr and Mrs Bullock lived in one room with their two children and Mr Bullock’s mother.

The room was on the upper storey of a “filthy and crowded house” and was equally as “filthy.”

Even before they contracted cholera none were seen to be in good health and baby Martha aged eight months was “ricketty, and emaciated.”

In the course of just one week all of them died of cholera.

A month later our doctor was back in Silver Street attending Jane White who lived in a cellar and who died just days after contracting the disease.

Today Chorlton Street and Silver Street look far removed from the mass of courts, alleys and crowded houses of 1832 and that stretch of Silver Street occupied by Jane White is now underneath Chorlton Street Bus Station.

And here is the puzzle with that first picture, because read the histories of the bus station and they all agree that it was opened in 1950, redesigned in 1967 with the addition of the multi story car park and went through a major rebuild in 2002.

Major Street and the lost Silver Street, 1963

Now all of that is fine, but the caption on the picture offers up a date of 1964 which means that somebody is wrong.

I am confident someone will offer an explanation for the date of the rebuilt bus station and while I wait I suggest that those wishing to walk the past can just step back into the past can get a stab at it, because that vanished bit of Silver Street is now the entrance to a small car park between the back of Yates’ and the car park ramp, while the small road that runs along the bus station is the continuation of Major Street, but that is for another time.

Silver Street, 2016

But that is not quite all, because soon after I posted the story Andy Roberston sent me this picture of the corner of Silver Street where it joins Princess Street.

In may haste to complete the story I had failed to go looking for any more of Silver Street.  So the intrepid seeker after lost streets of Manchester can walk along another bit of my street, although it does end in a car park.

Location; Manchester

*The Origin and Progress of the Malignant Cholera in Manchester, Henry Gaulter M.D., 1833case notes no 5-8, page 162 and nu 71, page 178

Pictures; Chorlton Street Bus Station,  W. Higham, 1964, m56893, the ramp under construction 1963, W. Higham, m56982, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass  Silver Street from Andy Robertson  2016, and detail of Silver Street 1849 from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1849, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester nu 34 Mallard Street

It’s one of those little streets which run off Charles Street and which are cut short by the river and the railway viaduct.

For most people Charles Street will be the one that leads to the Lass a Gowrie pub and until its demolition was fronted by the side of the BBC Building which lasted just over 30 years.

Andy Roberston was there in 2012 just after the building which was the The Okasional Cafe had also been demolished.

The spot like so many is now a car park waiting redevelopment, leaving me also to wonder what will become of the old HSBC Bank on the corner of Charles Street and Oxford Road, which closed one day without me even knowing.

Location; Manchester

Picture, Mallard Street, 2012, from the collection of Andy Robertson

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 5 Bow Lane

Now I am not surprised that Bow Lane rarely features in the street directories.

These were the books which were issued annually from the 1780s up to 1969 and listed the streets, the residents and the businesses in the city.

Bow Lane which runs from Cross Street over Clarence Street and then twist on to Princess Street seems unworthy of much of a mention; although to be fair there were two listings for 1911.

And twists it does widening as it travels up from Cross Street but now just a cut through for anyone wanting to avoid the main streets. That said it does offer an opportunity to look into the Town Hall Tavern.

Location; Manchester



Pictures; Bow Lane, 2016 from the collection of Andy Robertson

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 78 Gaythorn Street and a pub

I like the way that a demolition site can reveal a rare glance of a building which has pretty much been hidden for a very long time.

The City Road Inn, 2016

In the case of the City Road Inn it is more that it dispels the idea that this is a very big pub.

Seen from the corner of Whitworth Street West and Albion Street the pub looks to be a big place but looks can be deceptive and as Andy’s photograph shows the building is much smaller.

It was built in the late 19th century but stands on the site of an earlier pub which carried the same name back to 1849 when it was the Hawthorn Tavern.

And for those wanting more on the lost streets of Manchester,  Whitworth Street West was originally Gaythorn Street and predates the Rochdale Canal which runs along its northern side.

Gaythorn Street, 1794

As early as the 1790s part of the southern side beside Knott Mill was already developed and within half a century the area was a densely packed mix of small back to backs, some bigger properties and a few closed courts.

And no sooner had the story gone out when P J Thompson added the comment, "When did the nearby Gaythorn Tavern disappear? 

It was still there around 1980-ish."

The Gaythorn Inn, 1971

Now I had assumed that the Gaythorn had gone a long time ago and had become part of the City Road Inn.
But not so and again I have P J to thank who came up with a picture and the comment,

"Definitely not, it was on the junction of Albion Street. and Hewitt Street."

All of which will send me back off into the wonderful realms of research, and of course offer up a thank you to PJ.

Hewitt Street, 1954

And in turn let me wander back across the Local Image collection , where I found this one of the same pub in 1954.

Now I do like it but then I have always been a sucker for pictures through arches.

But as we have strayed someone what from the original post I shall stop three.

Location; Manchester






Picture; the City Road Inn, 2016, from the collection of Andy Robertson, the Gaythorn Inn, 1971, A Dawson, m49641, Hewitt Street 1954 H Mulligan, m26104, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and the map of the area from Green's map of Manchester, 1794, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

The Limited Stop ………….. the only way to travel

Now I remember the limited stop service that Manchester and SELNEC operated with a mix of fondness and frustration.

They were fine if you were at the start of the service and could sail happily through the city streets and on to your destination in half the time.

The 153 from the top of Penny Meadow in Ashton at 6 in the morning would get me into the heart of the city in a fraction of the time the 218 would take.

And if I was lucky, I might catch one of the limited stop buses onto Wythenshawe and work.

But of course, on a cold wet grey day, somewhere on the Ashton Old Road the sight of a limited stop bus was just a frustration as it zipped past without a second thought to those passengers waiting at the bus stop.

I seldom travel on the bus now, preferring the tram, so I am not even sure that the limited stop service still operates.  I could of course go and look, but where would the fun be in doing that?  Instead Reginald of Heald Green will offer up chapter and verse.

And in the meantime, I shall just reflect that Andy Robertson’s trip out to the Museum of Transport Greater Manchester on Sunday provided me with some excellent pictures of buses. *

Here be fine examples of Corpy blue buses from Ashton-Under-Lyne, the brash SELNEC livery and my own favourite, a red Manchester Corporation bus, from 1963.

And here for one moment I must confess I was confused, because I grew up in London with Routemaster buses, and travelled on the 161 from Eltham to Woolwich, and for one moment Andy’s picture took me back 40 years.

But this red Routemaster is a Manchester one, the livery is slightly different and those in the know will point out the technical differences.

All this I know because the Museum has a full list of its collection, and thus I know the details of all those Andy photographed. **

Location; Museum of Transport Greater Manchester

Pictures, from the collection of Andy Robertson

*Museum of Transport Greater Manchester, http://www.gmts.co.uk/index.html

** RM1414 - 414 CLT - AEC Routemaster 2R2RH - Double deck bus, from 1963, Manchester Corporation Transport,
 44 - PTE 944C - Leyland Titan PD2/37 - Double deck bus, from 1965, Ashton-under-Lyne Corporation Passenger Transport, 5871 - KJA 871F - Leyland Titan PD3/14 - Double deck bus, from 1968, Greater Manchester Transport

On being 10 in the summer of 1961 with a Red Rover and a city to explore

Now if you are of a certain age this Red Rover will be your passport to many happy memories.

Andy's ticket to roam, 1965

It offered unlimited travel for a day across London and  I can think of no better thing to do than travel anywhere those old red double deckers would take you.

In 1960 we were still living on Lausanne Road and I think we would have collected the ticket from the New Cross Garage, which begs the question of where I might have picked one up in Eltham.

I am pretty sure you couldn’t buy them on the bus but I guess someone with put me right on that.

Andy sent me this one just a few minutes ago adding, “as a bus spotting nerd I used to use these lot. This one was purchased 2 days after I was 12 3/4 years old. 

I would plan my journey taking in various bus garages, leave about 7 in the morning armed with salad cream sandwiches and arrive home about 10 hours later, all on my lonesome!”

Sadly I never had the forethought to plan in advance, going off on the spur of the moment when the sun shone and the pocket money was burning a hole in my pocket.

Needless to say some at least of my adventures ended in the most disappointing places.

The White Tower in the Tower of London, 2014

It remains one of those cast iron certainties that just because a place sounds interesting and the bus goes there it doesn’t always mean that the destination will prove memorable.

Even now I shudder at the thought of the run down canal beside some sad looking buildings which proved not to be the highlight of one trip.

But then the beauty of the Red Rover was that you could just wait for the next bus and travel on to pastures new.

And all the time there were things to see from out of the window.

 So even if the front seats on the top deck were taken there was always that seat behind the driver which not only offered up the same view that he could see, but with a bit of imagination allowed to imagine you were driving the 161 down to Woolwich or the 36b across town.

In my case it would start and sometimes end at the Tower of London, but that as they is another story.

Instead I shall just reflect that having reached that magic age which qualifies me for a concessionary bus pass I can and do roam across the city making full use of both the trams and the trains.

So there you have it, one Red Rover a shed load of memories and not once did I throw in that title of a Beatles song.

Location; pretty much anywhere in London

Picture; a Red Rover, 1965 from the collection of Andy Robertson, and the Tower of London, 2014 from the collection of Ryan Ginn

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 95 Chadwick Street ...and Mrs. Matilda Lovitt

This was Chadwick Street in 2021.

It is off Fairfield Street and faces out on to Piccadilly Railway Station.

Wyre Street, 2021

Despite being a popular place to park up and wait for someone arriving off a train, you won’t find it on any maps, and it ends pretty much soon after it starts.

Today it is called Wyre Street and dribbles out as a footpath before connecting with Travis Street.

To the casual visitor it has nothing much to commend itself, lacking any buildings bar a brick wall, the railway viaduct that cuts across it and heaps of grass.

Nor was it ever thought worthy of an entry into the directories, although back in 1850 the Stag and Pheasant was recorded in the trades section of Slater’s Directory.  The pub served the 22 houses, and surrounding streets and some closed courts, which will have provided a lot of potential customers.

Despite there being no reference to the street in the directories, I know that some of the 22 homes were back to back properties, and Chadwick Street gave access to a number of closed courts with even more small and mean houses.

Chadwick Street, 1851

We also have the names of the residents who lived there in 1851, and equally important the occupations they were engaged in.  These ranged from skilled and unskilled jobs to a clerk, the inevitable charwoman, as well as those making a living from the streets including a milk seller.

The largest group were connected to the textile trade, covering all the main areas of work and interestingly one who described himself as a handloom weaver.  This was Elias Johnson from Stretford which had been a centre for handloom weaving. 

But as he was 62 I suspect he was describing the occupation of his youth given that by 1851 machines had all but squeezed out most handloom weaving.

Just how many of these visited the Stag and Pheasant is lost, but its landlady a Mrs. Matilda Lovitt ran the place from at least 1848 and into the early years of the next decade.  The Rate Books record it separately as a Public House and also a Beer House, with the pub rated at £40 a year and the beer house at £12.

By contrast the neighbouring houses were rated at between £12 a year down to £2 suggesting that her business was indeed profitable.

We know that she was born in 1808, married her first husband in 1829, and her second in 1856, and was widowed twice.  By the age of 30 in 1841 she had three children and that two of them were still living with her at Chadwick Street in 1851.

Her second husband was also a publican who was the landlord of the Railway Inn at 221 Deansgate.  

He is listed there from at least 1850 through to 1856, but by 1863 has gone.  By which time the Stag and Peasant also does not appear on the records. 

Wyre Street, 2021

And a full thirty years later  Chadwick Street has become Worsley Street, and the Directories record only a clutch of industrial units with one beer shop, leaving yet another name change from Worsley Street to Wyre Street  sometime by 1915.

I doubt we have finished with the street, and in the fullness of time it would be fun to return to track the residents in 1851, leaving me just to add that in 1881 the former Mrs. Levitt recorded as living with one of her children in Preston at the grand old age of 71.

Location; Manchester, 

Pictures; Chadwick Street, 1851, from Adshead's map of Manchester, 1851, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ and Chadwick Street, 2021, from the collection of Andy Robertson

The lost pub on Port Street ...... Mrs Ann Gleave and bit of a mystery

I am looking at a picture Andy Robertson took back in 2018 of no. 75 Port Street.

The White Lion as was, 2018

Andy told me that  "I have unwittingly taken photos of. This the White Lion on Port Street which is a pub on the 1849 map but not a pub by 1969. The building is unusual in that it now stands alone"

Once of course it was just part of a long line of properties, stretching down from Great Ancoats Street to Dale Street.

Like Andy I have passed it over the years, and watched as some of its neighbours were demolished, the car parks on either side were upgraded, and it gained and lost a mural painted on the gable end.

 It appears as the White Lion in the directory for 1822, and is lost as a pub sometime between 1909 and 1911.

In 1849, the landlady was Anne Gleave  who first appears in the Rate Books as the landlady two years earlier and continues on the books till 1857, although there is strong evidence that she died in 1855.

Either way by 1858 the new landlady was Harriet Gleave, and in the fullness of time I go looking for her.

The White Lion with its traditional lamp, 1908

For now, I want to say with Ann Gleave, who is also down in the census return as living at 54 Newton Street and was a shop keeper.

All of which is a bit odd, because the Rate books list a James Gleave living at the property which is described as a house.

Part of the answer may lie in the fact that Ann married James in 1847, both are listed as living in Newton Street and both James, and Ann’s father, described themselves as weavers.

But James  does not appear on the 1851census with Ann on Newton Street, all  of which is a bit of a mystery.

Still, I am content that we can give a name to the landlady which ran his mum back in the middle decades of the 19th century.

And soon after the story was posted, PJ commented, "The White Lion can be seen at the beginning of this brilliant drone footage of the Northern Quarter. Now with a stunning artwork on the side of the building. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7c4IeTOSmZM "

Location; Manchester

Pictures; the White Lion, 2018, from the collection of Andy Robertson, and in 1908, m04847, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester ......... nu 56 the vanished fourteen and the story of the BBC

The lost streets in 1894

There will still be plenty of people who remember the close network of streets and houses that stretched back from Oxford Road to the Medlock, and from Charles Street down to Great Street.

In all there were fourteen streets and countless houses which were all swept away so that the BBC could have a new broadcasting centre here in Manchester.

The lost streets included Pritchard Street, Hesketh, Leigh and Saville Streets and along with the houses there had been a school and a pub.

Planning permission had been granted in 1968 and after a hiccup building began in 1971 was finished in 1975 and the place was home to the BBC until 2011.

The closed building, 2011

And for those wanting to impress a companion, about 800 staff worked there and with the opening of the second studio in 1981 the BBC closed Broadcasting House in Piccadilly which had been there for 52 years.

And now after Broadcasting House has gone the developers, and builders are back.

In the meantime I wonder how many memories of those that lived in that small area can be shared.

Afterall the buildings only began to be cleared in 1968.

The cleared ground, 2014

Location; Manchester







Pictures; BBC New Broadcasting House, Oxford Road, 2011, Andrew Bowden, Wikipedia, and remaining images courtesy of Andy Robertson, 2014,  and map of the area in 1894, from the OS of South Lancashire, 1894, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

When we still had a furniture shop and a free car park .... down by the Lloyds in 1990

Now I am on a roll again with pictures from our most recent past.

And so here is another of Andy Robertson’s taken I think in the early 1990s.

I will leave you to identify the shops which have gone, along with that little piece of history which was Chorlton’s lost car par, which I think was free, contained also a set of public lavatories, and once a very very long time ago had been a set of tennis courts beside the Lloyds.

Picture;  looking out towards Wilbraham Road, circa 1990, from the collection of Andy Robertson

Looking for "June" The Ladies hairdresser and Busy Bee Stores, sometime in 1930

Looking "June" the Hairdressers on Wilbraham Road

I never underestimate the power of a collection of old local adverts to offer up fascinating stories and pretty much take you all over the place.

So here in front of me are a set of those adverts which appeared on the dust jacket of a book lent out by Mr R. Greig Wilson who owned a newsagents on Sandy Lane and also ran one of our Circulating libraries.

Now circulating libraries were private affairs and existed alongside the local public library, and such was the demand for novels and lighter factual material that many of our newsagents went into business renting books out.

Busy Bee

At home in London mother was a regular at the local bookshop who also traded in lending copies and across Chorlton there were quite a few, from the one that operated on Beech Road, to Mr Lloyd’s on
Upper Chorlton Road and of course R. Greig Wilson’s on Sandy Lane.

It is a topic I have visited quite a few times over the years and no doubt will return to.

But for today my attention has been drawn to Busy Bee Stores  (W. Wellard, Proprietor) at 264 Upper Chorlton Road, and “June” The Ladies’ Hairdresser and Beauty Specialist on Broadwalk Wilbraham Road.

It will take some time to date the collection of adverts and that will involve trawling the directories but I think they will be from the 1930s.

Not that Mr Grieg has been much of a help for he was selling his “Stationary, Tobacco and Picture postcards” along with delivering his newspapers from at least 1911.

That said it will be after 1911 because down on Upper Chorlton Road at 264 was a Mr John Joseph Taylor who was a tailor.

Now Mr Wellard was trading as an iron monger at the shop by 1929 and Charles Slightman who also advertised on the dust cover was selling his newspapers and lending out his collection of over 1,000 books from his lending library on Manchester Road from 1923 through to 1935 so we are in the right decade and a bit.

"June"

And until those directories yield up a definite date I am settling for sometime in the 1930s for it was around then that “June” at the Broadwalk began Permanent Waving by the Nestlé System which was the "Radione" system in which the hair was wound dry and inserted into hollow cellophane tubes sealed at both ends, but contained moistened paper”*

Long along Wilbraham Road circa 1930s

She was in her saloon at 523 Wilbraham Road by 1929 but Karl Nessler who had perfected his alternative method of curling hair in 1905 using a mixture of cow urine and water did not come up with the improvement which he called the Nestlé System until the 30’s.

“June” charged 20/- for the process and also offered "Tinting, Manicure, Face Massage , [and] all kinds of hair work carried out by experts.”

I have often wondered whether her customers were aware that Mr Nessler had arrived in Britain from Germany in 1901 and facing being interned when the Great War broke out fled to America, or that during his first experiments on his wife he managed to burn her hair off and cause some scalp burns.

That advert for an early perm, circa 1905

All of which is a complete digression but is one of the fascinating little journeys behind which there is a serious point because together the eleven adverts will reveal a little bit more about the Chorlton of just eighty or so years ago.

And in one of those nice little twist of coincidences, 264 Upper Chorlton Road is again a hardware store specialising in much the same stuff as Busy Bee which along with offering “Glass and China [as] a speciality offered “Electric Vacuum cleaners for Hire.”

But there the coincidences stop for now where “June" permed and manicured the present proprietor offers sweets and newspapers which I suppose has almost brought us full circle.

Pictures, adverts from the dust cover of a book courtesy of Margaret Connelly, Wilbraham Road in 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson and an  early 20th century advertisement for Nessler's permanent wave machine, transferred by SreeBot, Wikipedia

*Perm (hairstyle), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perm_(hairstyle)

Gasholders I have known and loved ........... no 2 Liverpool Street Salford

Now I knew when I launched the new series on Gasholders I was pretty confident it would make a stir.

And sure enough my friend Andy couldn't resist offering up three of his pictures of the gasometer on Liverpool Street.

All of which I am confident is just the start.

Location; Salford



Picture;Liverpool Street, Salford, 2017, from the collection of Andy Robertson


*Gasholders, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Gasholders

Walking the last 88 years of Redbank

2018

I like the idea that there will be people who remember how Redbank has gone full circle, from a place to live and work to one purely to work and after a period as an empty space is again full of residential properties.

For those who don’t know Redbank nestles behind Cheetham Hill Road, rising up from the River Irk like a series of terraced olive groves starting at Scotland which faced the river.*

Not of course that there was anything exotic about the place. The area was well developed by the middle of the 19th century and rows of back to back properties existed beside a mix of industry.

1936

In the 1850s just north of Scotland was a tannery with a nearby piggery and off to the east was the Ducie Bridge Brewery owned by Smalley & Evans while directly over the river were a series of Corn Mills, and the main railway viaduct of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway.

I hazard a guess that the bright sunlight of early spring struggled to lift the spirits and banish the noise of assorted industrial processes which vied with the all pervading smell from the tannery.

1930

By the time I was exploring the area most of the land from the river up towards the summit was empty waiting for the new development.

The transformation began in the late 1930s when the houses were demolished and replaced by low rise industrial units which eventually also were demolished.

Now I am not old enough to have seen that transformation but there will be people who have.

After all, a person born in 1930 will be just 88 as I write this and could have played amongst the half demolished houses in 1936, worked in one of the small factories or warehouses thirty-years later and have been invited by a grandchild to view a flat in one of the tall apartment blocks that look down on Redbank today.

1960

For the rest of us, there is that fine collection of pictures from Local Image Collection maintained by Manchester Libraries which hold photographs of the area from the 1890s from which I have chosen a few marking the changes.

Location Redbank, 1850-2018

1966

Pictures; the new developments, 2018 from the collection of Andy Robertson, and in 1936, m5139, later in the year, J F Stirling, m05142, and 1960, m05145 and 1966, T Brooks, m60605 courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*This stretch of Cheetham Hill Road was Ducie Bridge

Rediscovering Cheetham .............. nu 1 the Manchester Ice Palace

Now I will leave the story of Cheetham, Strangeways and Redbank to  those who are far more qualified to write about its history.*

Instead I shall feature some of Andy Robertson’s pictures from his collection taken of the area during August 2015.

It is thirty years since I was a regular visitor to the Strangeways area, and much has changed. 

In particular that area in the bend of the river which had once been a  notorious slum and which I knew as open ground has now been built on again.

But a few of the buildings which date to when the area was a thriving centre of Jewish life have survived.

And so here is the Ice Palace on Derby Street which Andy commented “was opened in 1910 and once reputed to be the finest ice skating rink in the world.”

Picture; The Manchester Ice Palace, 2015 from the collection of Andy Robertson

*The  Making of Manchester Jewry, 1740-1875, Bill Williams, 1976

Chorlton’s first cinema, a Molotov cocktail and a shed load of new stories

The story of Chorlton has just started a new chapter and it is all down to a phone call from Mr Hollinworth.

We all know that you can never close a book on the history of a place because there will always be a fresh discovery, a new set of memories and an unseen batch of photographs which add to the picture and even contradict what we all held to be the truth.

Looking at the petrol station, 1961

So until recently I had no idea that during the Great War there had been two Red Cross hospitals operating in Chorlton or that our first cinema had originally been a variety hall situated on Wilbraham Road.

And now there is the promise of a lot more from Mr Hollinworth who phoned me today after having read the blog.

He was born in Chorlton in 1928 and lived on Silverdale Road until 1951, and has a vivid set of memories of the area.

These include the Manchester Blitz, the bomb that fell behind the air raid shelter on Wilbraham Road and the bomb crater which for a day became a venue for a man with a piano and an impromptu choir to see patriotic songs as a gesture of defiance.

And it is these small bits of history which in their way are as revealing as any academic account of the war and of course are the ones that often get lost.

Our first cinema, circa 1906

So I was intrigued when Edward also told me of the Molotov cocktails that were stored behind the advertising hoardings on the railway bridge which he and his friends were determined to use if German tanks ever rumbled along Wilbraham Road.

But the jewel in the conversation was the story of his father’s garage on the corner of Wilbraham and Buckingham Roads.*

Today this is the site of the shiny new Morrison’s petrol station but once it was home to our first cinema.

This was the Pavilion which had been the Chorlton Theatre and Winter Gardens which opened in 1904 and became part of H D Moorhouse chain of picture houses three years later.

It offered that usual mix of exciting silent movies from the comedies of Chaplin and Keaton to the daring exploits of Tom Mix and stories of the place have yet to fade from living memory.

That said those memories are second hand because the cinema closed in the 1920s in the face of stiff competition from the newly built Palais de Luxe on Barlow Moor Road and the even newer and far grander picture house on Manchester Road.

Building the new petrol station, 2014

But the actual date of its closure remained unclear until now.

I now know that it had gone by 1924 to make way for the garage and petrol station owned by Edward’s father who had lost a leg aged just 20 in the Great War.

Along with the petrol station there were a set of lock up garages running along the railway fronting Buckingham Road and both the lockups and the petrol station had been built by Edward’s grandfather.

The business was sold in 1951 but the original 1920s building was still there eleven years later and looking at that 1962 picture it is possible to pick out evidence of the old theatre which judging from more recent photographs was a very substantial building.

So there you have it, a chance phone call and a whole new set of stories have been set in motion.

Pictures; the petrol station in 1962 by A Landers, m18047, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pas the Chorlton Theatre and Winter Gardens, later the Pavilion 1910 from the Lloyd collection, and the construction of the new Morrison’s petrol station, 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson

*The story of a garage, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/The%20story%20of%20a%20garage

Additional information Edward Hollinworth

A choice of images on Red Lion Street and the story of a lost church

From Red Lion Street, 2014

I am always fascinated at how a photographer chooses an image.

The best capture something about a place and time and leave you admiring the photo but also wondering about the stories that sit there.

This is Red Lion Street on the corner with Catlow Lane and we are looking at one of Andy Robertson’s pictures and instantly it drew me in.

He had been out by Church Street and “had passed lots of lovely buildings but was particularly interested in this one” and I can see why.

A sorry state

This is the rear of the place and it fronts on to Union Street.

Back at the turn of the last century it belonged to Harrison & Co who were carpet factors, and I should be able to follow its ownership back  another half century or more.

Today it is empty, and pretty forlorn.

What had once been a grand entrance is bricked up and painted over and the neglect is pretty apparent from the picture.  Some of the windows are broken, the warehouse doors look to be on their last legs and at least one window frame is in danger of collapsing.

Not a promising prospect.  But that said the building next door has been renovated and has a new purpose.

So in time and with some money so might this one.

The area in 1844

Of course a developer might just pull it down and fill the space with something new.

Now I could rail against this but this little bit of the city has constantly been pulled apart and rebuilt.

The property on the other side of our old carpet warehouse was in 1911 the Bulls’ Head and Commerical Hotel and there was a pub here as far back as 1844 and perhaps longer.

In this warren of tiny lanes and back streets there have always been those smaller enterprises whose fortunes have waxed and waned but were always central to the business life of the city.

St Paul's Church from Turner Street, date unknown

And it is important that people like Andy continue to capture the changes to an area which is often neglected.

That said of course we are on the edge of the Northern Quarter a place which once thrived, went through a pretty shabby period and has emerged as an exciting part of Manchester.

As you might expect the area has always been changing, and back in 1844 Catlow Lane was called Church Lane and continued across Red Lion Street to link with Chapel Street which ran beside St Paul’s Church.

This 18th century church faced onto Tib Street and had “an unprepossessing appearance; it is built of brick, with stone dressings, there is a tower at the west end, the top of which is entirely of stone.  

The interior is very handsomely decorated.  

There are three galleries, the pillars supporting the roof, are gilt, as well as the back of the altar, organ case, pulpit, &c.  

The church has lately been much improved by the addition of a handsome coloured window over the altar.  The choral service is performed here on Sundays at half past ten and half past six.”*

Interior of St Paul's

But it had gone by 1894 and today both this stretch of Church Lane and Chapel Street are buried under the car park.

So on the turn of a photographer’s choice of image comes a a jumbled collection of half stories with the promise of more to come.

Picture; from the collection of Andy Robertson and detail of the area in 1844 from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1842-44, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ and St Paul's Church, m80323, & m80324, date unknown,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass 

* The Strangers Guide to Manchester, The Strangers Guide to Manchester, 1850