This is another of those cards for which I don’t have a date, but judging by the clothes and the vans we are sometime in the 1950s.
So this is the market place in Ashton-Under-Lyne a full twenty years or so before I knew it.
The impressive Town Hall is still covered in a century of soot and grime, the market stalls are positioned differently from where I remember them but the place still looks familiar.
Like all market places there is a bustle and purpose to what you see. The merchandise is piled high and you have a choice ranging from fresh food to clothes, and novelty goods and toys.
So in that respect not a lot has changed. The last time I was there the stalls of vegetables and fruit competed with plastic toys, dubious electrical goods and all manner of fashions.
And on the periphery are the ice cream vans and fast food businesses, offering tea, coffee and sandwiches with of course the attractive looking but often slightly stale cakes and buns.
All a lot different from the designer markets which regularly appear in the city centre and on the village green.
These remain a bit of a novelty, but all too often there is little to choose between Italian week and that German experience, and I rather think that in many cases the produce is exactly the same.
As for bargains I don’t know.
All of which is a bit different from the old Grey Mare Lane Market opposite where we lived and the Ashton market.
I still remember that wonderful bright marbled sponge cake in layers you buy in slabs and the record stall from which I bought a treasured Marvin Gaye, Tammy Tyrell LP which over thirty years later I still have.
But enough of such memories.
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Instead I shall add those of Margaret Gain who posted that she was "born and bred in Ashton and that is exactly as I remember the market.
My mum shopped there every other day.
The ice cream vans were Fairclough's and Howard's. Kelly's salad stall, Latus for fruit and veg, the dolls hospital, the roundabouts and the swings.
It was a real delight to go to the market.
There's an excellent book called 'to market, to market' in the Local Studies Library all,about Ashton Market."
All of which leaves me to hope there will be plenty more memories from Margaret and others who remember the scene.
Location; Ashton-Under-Lyne, Tameside, Greater Manchester
Picture; Market Place and Town Hall from the series Ashton-U-Lyne, issued by Tuck & Sons, courtesy of TuckDB http://tuckdb.org/history
The impressive Town Hall is still covered in a century of soot and grime, the market stalls are positioned differently from where I remember them but the place still looks familiar.
Like all market places there is a bustle and purpose to what you see. The merchandise is piled high and you have a choice ranging from fresh food to clothes, and novelty goods and toys.
And on the periphery are the ice cream vans and fast food businesses, offering tea, coffee and sandwiches with of course the attractive looking but often slightly stale cakes and buns.
All a lot different from the designer markets which regularly appear in the city centre and on the village green.
These remain a bit of a novelty, but all too often there is little to choose between Italian week and that German experience, and I rather think that in many cases the produce is exactly the same.
All of which is a bit different from the old Grey Mare Lane Market opposite where we lived and the Ashton market.
I still remember that wonderful bright marbled sponge cake in layers you buy in slabs and the record stall from which I bought a treasured Marvin Gaye, Tammy Tyrell LP which over thirty years later I still have.
But enough of such memories.
My mum shopped there every other day.
The ice cream vans were Fairclough's and Howard's. Kelly's salad stall, Latus for fruit and veg, the dolls hospital, the roundabouts and the swings.
It was a real delight to go to the market.
There's an excellent book called 'to market, to market' in the Local Studies Library all,about Ashton Market."
All of which leaves me to hope there will be plenty more memories from Margaret and others who remember the scene.
Location; Ashton-Under-Lyne, Tameside, Greater Manchester
Picture; Market Place and Town Hall from the series Ashton-U-Lyne, issued by Tuck & Sons, courtesy of TuckDB http://tuckdb.org/history
