Christmas Postcards

This was sent on December 24th 1906 at 11.30 and given the frequent collections and deliveries would have arrived on the same day.

There was no message but perhaps the caption was enough. The manufacturers had already issued this card and so were cashing in on the season.




Picture; from the collection of Rita Bishop

Christmas greetings from the beginning of the last century

Christmas greetings from the beginning of the last century







Picture; from the collection of Rita Bishop, courtesy of David Bishop

One hundred years of one house in Chorlton ....... part 149 …..the end of a Christmas tradition …….and a big thankyou Tony Adams

The continuing story of the house Joe and Mary Ann Scott lived in for over 50 years and the families that have lived here since.*

Christmas is full of family traditions and ours is no different.

Many of the things we do date back beyond the children and are imports from how we celebrated Christmas as youngsters and even bits from our parents, and grandparents.

It makes for a seamless and slightly unique family Christmas.

But today one of those has happened for the last time, and that is the delivery of the trees from Tony Adams in the precinct.*

We have been getting our Christmas trees from him for nearly 40 years and have never been disappointed.

In the early years we went to him with the kids making the choice, and then when they had got to the stage of doing other things I went on my own.

But I must confess I was rubbish at choosing and over a decade ago I left it to Tony who has always done a better job.

Along the way we went from one to two.  

The first must be so big we have to cut a chunk off the bottom, and the second which began just as a token to mark the decoration of the dining room in 2009 has continued and has  also grown.

That said Tony always does a deal for “my teacher friend” and we get them at a wonderful price.

But the demolition of the Precinct means he is closing down and with that ends the tradition.

So, a thank you to Tony and his staff at his shop in the Precinct.  

Our kids have grown up enjoying the trees and that for me has been a part of what has made our Christmas.

Location; Chorlton Precinct, and our house

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*The Story of a House, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2023/11/one-hundred-years-of-one-house-in.html

**A. J. Adams, 15, Chorlton Place, Manchester, M21 9AQ

On Christmas Day with presents from the 1950s

Dinky toy, circa 1955

Now I doubt that any one will be beating their way to a computer today and the readership of the blog will take a dip.

Nevertheless as you are sitting back amongst the discarded wrapping paper, with a day of indulgence ahead I thought that I would just be more than a little selfish and share a few of the Christmas presents that came my way when I was a child.

A book I still read, 1954

Most have long since vanished like the wooden toy forts my dad made, complete with battlements, towers, drawbridges and even one year a portcullis.

This was also the year he made four identical rocking cribs for each of my four sisters for their Christmas dolls.

They were massive affairs and each painted a different colour.

But for me throughout the 1950s and into the early 60 presents were dominated by the train set and the Eagle comic.

So there would be an addition to the big train set which stood on a converted ping pong table and took up all of a big room with its track lay out, marshalling yards stations, signals and model village.  Usually this might be a new locomotive or a few freight wagons.

Alongside these there was always an Eagle annual and the odd Dan Dare toy.*

Dan Dare from Eagle Annual nu Six, Christmas 1956

The toys had usually broken by February but the annuals have lasted the test of time and can still fascinate me over 50 years after I opened them under the tree infront of an open fire.

And as you do I continue to collect a whole range of the books put out for children during the 1950s.

Some I wish I had been given, others are totally new to me, and others still were ones that at the time I would not have gone near but now are as interesting as the Eagle.

Of these it is the Girl  which was the companion to the Eagle annual that I return to.

And that I think is enough of nostalgia for another year.

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson







*The Eagle, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/The%20Eagle

One hundred years of one house in Chorlton part 60 ............ traditions and continuities

The continuing story of the house Joe and Mary Ann Scott lived in for over 50 years and the families that have lived here since.*

Now I have no idea how Joe and Mary Ann celebrated Christmas.

My memories stretch back to 1976 when I lived here with Lois, Mike and John.

Back then we celebrated it on the Saturday before because they went home for the day.

A little later after we moved back and the boys were born the event took a different shape as it always does when there are children in the house.

But in all that time one of the traditions which marked the event was the arrival of the Christmas tree which had to be big and has always been bought from Tony Adams in the precinct.**

For over thirty years we have wandered down there with a selection of the children agonized over which to buy and always come away happy.

More recently I have left the choice to Tony and his staff who have always managed to select a better one than I ever did.

And then for reasons now lost in time we began buying a second one which was smaller than the first and sits in the dining room while the big tree takes over the front room.

I fully accept that this is an extravagance but it is part of the tradition of the house and like all traditions is one that we continue but also one which we add to and adapt.

So every year there is a new decoration which sits beside the older ones along with those which were made by the children when they were young.

Now Christmas trees don’t come cheap but Tony has always done us a good deal and now he has become as much a part of event as his trees or the cards which are displayed on green ribbon hanging down from the picture rail in the hall.

Not that this is a blatant bit of advertising.

It is more a reflection on Chorlton’s history, because A J Adams has been in the precinct for over 30 years and Tony is now the oldest trader in the complex.

And that is worth remarking on, after all if we go back thirty years many of the names I was familiar with have long gone, from the big stores like Woolworths, to the small independents like Quarmbys, Burts, and the wool shop.

So this Christmas like the others stretching back to into the early 80’s will be celebrated by a tree from Tony.







Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson

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


**A J Adams,
19 Chorlton Place,
Chorlton cum Hardy,
Manchester,
0161 881 1349

One hundred years of one house in Chorlton part 38 December and beyond

The continuing story of the house Joe and Mary Ann Scott lived in for over 50 years and the families that have lived here since.*

Joe and Mary Ann did not have children and it would be a full sixty years before there was a Christmas in the house which centred on young people.

The first was our eldest who was born just a month and bit before the Christmas of 1984 and in the succeeding years the event has been dominated by the children.

Now all four are grown up but we still pretty much celebrate the way we have done for nearly 30 years.

The tree has to be the biggest we can find and somewhere along the way we added a second more modest one.

Everyone has their own spot in the front room where each year their stocking is placed and Christmas dinner is worked around the boys playing football on the Rec.

Usually during the late morning we have people round and in the evening the house empties as one by one the lads go off and meet up with their friends.

And some years we have the family from Italy over which always transforms the traditional Christmas into something a bit different.  And of course now we also share the event with Polly and Anna.

I have no idea what Joe and Mary Anne did.  They may also have entertained or gone visiting themselves to relatives.

Looking back those old Christmases would have been cold.  This is not a warm house and in the absence of central heating I guess must have been uncomfortable outside the rooms Mary Ann decided to have heated.

But of course anyone born before the 1970s will have lived with that simple fact that once you left the front room and before you reached the kitchen the house was very much a cold zone.

You went to sleep in a cold bedroom warmed perhaps only with a hot water bottle and as often as not woke to ice on the inside of the windows.

If you were lucky like me you lived in a house which had one of those solid fuel stoves which heated the water and was kept going day and night through the winter.

It made the kitchen a cosy and reassuring place and pretty much ensured that was where you stayed.  Ours had been knocked through and so a full forty years before such things became popular we lived in the one big room just as they had done two centuries before.

This was where you ate your meals, listened to the radio, watched as the food was prepared and played on the big kitchen table.

Joe and Mary Ann’s kitchen was smaller but it did have the range and I guess was a warm enough place during the cold months from late November through to March and April.

And like many families before them there is some evidence that they lived in the rear of the house leaving the front room as for best and special occasions.

Now I can’t be sure of this but their television aerial was at the back of the house and the cable led down into the back room.

All of which meant that the front was surrendered to a peace and quiet which has never been the case since 1984.

Of course now that they are all grown up we seem to be experiencing more and more of that quietness which Joe and Mary Ann must have known.

So perhaps the house has almost come full circle, although not quite yet.  All four will be here for Christmas and a lot of the old magic will return.

And if we are lucky it might just snow.
Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson

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

Winter on the meadows

Another of those wintry scenes of the township which perfectly captured a winter’s day somewhere on the meadows. As such it made a perfect Christmas card for friends in Leeds. I would love to know why it was not sent through the post. Perhaps the young ladies were visiting or maybe it was delivered personally.
Today the meadows have been reclaimed from the old sewage works and recovered from its use as a tip. Until recently it was used by our farmers as pasture and water meadows. In places the old irrigation ditches are still visible and there are those who remember falling into them while playing there.
Picture; from the collection of Rita Bishop