Calling all Chorlton club memories ………………..

Over the years the blog has gone back to that club on Barlow Moor Road, which has had a collection of names, attracted stories from a range of people and stood on the site of the McDonald’s.

And today I am back with a picture from 1963 sent over by Cath Brownhill who added,

“Hi Andrew, just having a lockdown sort out of bookshelves. I have come across a Manchester United souvenir booklet with this ‘Good Luck’ advert from the Ponderosa club, interesting that it says adjacent to the Princess Theatre Club., commenting, 

I thought the Ponderosa came after the Princess Theatre Club, but I was only 8 in 1963. There is no date on the front of the booklet, but reference to 1963 on a Raleigh advert on the back”.

Now the “Ponderosa” is one I never knew, although Tony Golding referred to it in one of his Princess stories “Ponderosa” is given as one of the clubs formerly owned by Bill Kerfoot in an article in ‘The Stage’ on 23rd April, 1964 describing his new venture into theatrical agency".

So, I shall sit back and await the memories.

And, no sooner had I posted the story, and Margaret Lee responded with "My father was the manager of both the Ponderosa and the Princess Theatre Club. 

The Ponderosa came about, as I understood it at the time, Bill Kerfoot had a room that was being used as storage and someone pointed out that it was big enough for a small bar, and so the idea was put to him that it was a western themed bar and so the Ponderosa was born. 

Both clubs had their own enterance and you could not get from one club into the other without going outside and entering the other club via the front door. 

The Ponderosa didn't have the same opening hours as the Princess".

Adding, "This is the story as I remember it being told at the time, I also remember being on school holidays on the day it was opening and having to go in to wash 

ALL the glasses that were to be used on the opening night!!! 

Thankfully I didn't go in on the night or the next day. Reading the poster the Ponderosa did have the same opening hours as the Princess, but it was not designed as a place to stay in all night so a lot of people would go in the Ponderosa for a drink and wait until the entertainment came on in the Princess then change clubs. 

As I understand it Bill Kerfoot sold both clubs to the Moss group a few years later and went on to pastures new".

Location; Chorlton

Pictures, Manchester United souvenir booklet, 1963, from the collection of Cath Brownhill

*The Princess Ballroom; https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=Princess+Ballroom&max-results=20&by-date=true

Night clubs Variety evenings and live music

I had many late nights in Valentines on Barlow Moor Road. It was later to have other names, from Ra Ra’s, to Adam & Eve’s, the Charlie Brown’s Fun Pub and Valentine’s Health Club, although don’t ask me in what order.

I remember it as Valentine’s , not that I can truly say any of the nights there were memorable. It was a place you went after the pubs closed and back in the 1970s and ‘80s that meant half past ten in the week with a 30 minute extension on Fridays and Saturdays. So if you wanted to party on after closing time Valentine’s was the place.
To be honest they were not that enjoyable, no more than the equally drunken evenings in the long room above the Pottery shop on Wilbraham Road.

Looking back I might have preferred it when it was the Princess Club. Then according to the historian Cliff Hayes it attracted many of the top entertainers in the 1960s, including the Drifters, Bob Monkhouse, Billy J Kramer, Lonnie Donegan and Tom Jones.

It is hard to think that somewhere like Chorlton could have been a venue for such performers. But back then there were plenty of clubs across Manchester which offered doing the same. Just a little further south and a bus ride from Princess Road was the Golden Garter in Wythenshawe which was still pulling them in during the early 1980s.

Now I never went to the Princess Club and I am not sure when it had changed its name from the Chorlton Palais de Dance, but there will be some who do.

Live acts as well as live music was more in evidence, and it could also be found in those big pubs built I guess in the 1930s. There were plenty of these just outside Chorlton. I would occassionly fall into the Mersey Hotel on Princess Road. It was a big barn of a place, with lots of different rooms and may even have still had waiter service. But like our cinemas the days of these barns were numbered. Despite changing its name to the Mersey Lights it eventually went. But in its time according to Cliff Hayes it hosted appearances by Little and Large, Les Dawson, Bernard Manning and Freddie and the Dreamers.

Still there is now the Edge which may soon be all we have left of the big venues since the news that the Irish Centre may close.

Leaving me just to add that the rise of the bar culture has offered new and more intimate places for live entertainment.

Location; Chorlton and Manchester
Picture; The Mersey Hotel m 49963 1970 A Dawson, Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council