Life beyond the front door ........Hyde Street Hulme in 1913

It is not often you get to see into the home of someone from Hulme at the beginning of the 20^th century.

And I rather doubt that in the normal course of things the people behind the door of this house on Hyde Street would have agreed to a picture being taken.

But then I bet they were not even aware it had been taken.  Looking through the collection there are no more interior photographs so I guess this was just one of those opportunistic moments when travelling photographer encounters an open door.

What I like is that it takes me back to my own grandparent’s two up two down in Hope Street and for that matter our own house in Lausanne Road.

The lower part of the wall is covered in that thick embossed paper painted brown and varnished, and above it a slightly lighter pattered design off set by pictures of long dead cherished relatives which stare out at you and almost seem to act as door guardians.

And if this were like Hope Street and Lausanne Road then there would be thick lino on the floor, which was cheap to buy, easy to wash and from memory pretty durable.

All of which just leaves the coal hole and the cellar which mark it out as superior to either Hope Street or my own first house in Ashton-Under-Lyne which had no cellars and in the case of my grandparents home lacked any foundations.

So if you lifted the stones in the kitchen there was just bare earth.

But Hyde Street was a cut above that, witnessed by its residents who could count a postman, a coal dealer, baker and undertaker amongst those who lived there.

And if there were some who might describe themselves as unskilled there were plenty of others who had a trade including a safe maker painter and a printer.

So in time I shall return to Hyde Street having done some research from the census returns.  In the meantime I shall thank Sally who showed me the picture in the course of her own family research.

Picture; Hyde Street,1913, m26173, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

Wilmott Street …… just waiting for something to happen

Walk along Wilmott Street today and you know it is waiting for something to happen.

Walking the street, 2021

The stretch from the old gas works down to the Mancunian Way is pretty much just open space on either side.

But great chunks of it are already blocked off with builder’s boards offering up artists impressions of the new developments which will arise from the waste ground.

And when these have finally come to be I suspect Wilmott Street will once again reach a density of living which it did back in 1849, when it and the streets off were full of back to back properties, some of which were situated in closed courts.

From car parks to high rise, 2021

So, for those living in Jones’s Court, access was off Wilmott Street by a narrow passage which ran along side a coal yard, while to reach Pomona Square, you had to make your way along an even narrower path.

It could hardly be described “as a place with a view”, added to which there was the  noise and smells during the day from the gas works, and the nearby textile mills.

Fifty or so years later, while the closed courts had vanished, we could add a rubber works and foundry to the industrial landscape, making it no less a desirable place to pass your days.

1913

But by the middle of the last century much of the housing had gone, either by council clearance programmes or German bombs.  

I suspect it was the Council, given that the rubber factory and assorted engineering metal and prints works were still there.

That said some at least of the housing appear to have gone before the Great War.

Later I will pick a section of the street and trawl the census returns and rate books to bring out of the shadows some of the people who lived and worked here.

The future, 2021

But for now I will leave you with Andy’s pictures, taken on a day when he slid out of the cultural hub of First Street and wandered down on to Wilmott Street, to ponder on how already the street is dominated by those new developments.

Location; Wilmott Street

Pictures; urban wasteland with the promise to come, Wilmott Street, 2021, from the collection of Andy Robertson, and George Street, Wilmott Street, Irving Street and Newcastle Street, 1913, J Jackson, m26069, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

City Road School ........... the one I knew nothing about.

Now, I only attended three schools and then worked at one other during forty-five five years and in all that time just one changed its name.

So I am always fascinated by schools that have had multiple name changes and have adapted to different educational needs.

And one of these was City Road School in Hulme.

It “opened on August 15, 1910 with boys from the recently closed St. Stephen's School, Hulme, Lloyd Street Infants Department and St. Mark's School, Hulme. 
Girls were transferred from Duke Street School. 

The Infants Department closed for admissions and the school became City Road Senior School on August 26th 1935. 

From the 1920s until the 1950s there were two Handicraft Centres on the site. 

The school was renamed North Hulme Secondary School 23rd July 1953. 

On December 19th 1962 the girls were transferred to South Hulme Secondary School for Girls and on January 7th 1963, the school re-opened as North Hulme Secondary School for Boys, also taking boys from South Hulme Secondary School. It closed July 20 1967 and all the boys were transferred to the new South Hulme High School”.*

I know that back in 1911Mr H Salt was the master, Miss E Fairbrother, the mistress, and Miss M Thornton was the infant’s mistress.

And that is as they say all I do know.

Andy, who took the picture, commented "that as a school building it is nothing special apart from the fact it is in Hulme. It is now flats and I am not sure what it was called. 

It was on the corner of City Road, and Bradshaw Street and once our two friends get their caps they might well pay a visit”.

Now that is a challenge I can’t resist and I have to disagree with his about the building.  I have always thought there was something very special about the municipal schools and the Board schools that predated them.
They were built, and have stood the test of time, being warm in winter and cool in summer.

Location; Hulme

Pictures; City School, 2018, from the collection of Andy Robertson

*Manchester Schools, Manchester Central Library

Looking for the story behind the picture of a building on Stretford Road

HQ 1& 3 Stretford Road, circa 1900s

This is the headquarters of the 2^nd Volunteer Battalion of the Manchester Regiment and it stood at numbers 1 & 3 Stretford Road.

It has gone now and I doubt that any one passing the new build on the corner of Stretford Road and Boundary Lane will now know that this old military building ever existed.

And I have to count myself as one of them, although it is just possible that it was still there in the late 1960s when I first arrived in Manchester.

So I was pleased that Bill Sumner posted this picture of the place in response to a story I did on 2^nd Volunteer Battalion of the Manchester Regiment.*

To be more accurate it had been about the First Manchester Rifle Volunteers and the military march that had been composed by Dan Godfrey for their Grand Bazaar.

The first Manchester’s had been formed in 1859 at the Star Hotel in Deansgate as part of the initiative to create volunteer units across the country.

Entrance of "nd V.B. Manchester Regiment HQ, circa 1900s

Within a year the force consisted of 900 men and in 1882 they took possession of their brand new HQ on Stretford Road.

Just six years later under the “reorganisation scheme the battalion lost its distinctive title of the First Manchester Rifle Volunteers and became the 2nd Volunteer Battalion of the Manchester Regiment.”**

And that takes us neatly to Bill’s picture postcard.  We don’t have a date for it but the original photograph will have to date from after 1882 when the HQ was opened and more likely to after the unit changes its name.

Woodall's Building circa 1900

But I think we can get even closer because the card was marketed by Entwistle & Thorpe who in 1911 had offices in Woodall’s buildings at 42 Deansgate which was on the corner with Blackfriars Street.

Today this spot in inhabited by that slab of late 60’s development which includes the Renaissance Hotel the reopened Italian restaurant and nothing else.

Back then there were seventeen businesses in Woodall’s building including Entwistle and Thorpe who were still a relatively new company which had been formed by the amalgamation of two existing photographic businesses which were trading separately at the Deansgate address in 1909.

That said while they had separate listings they also were down as Entwistle Harry, photo engraver (Entwistle Thorpe & Co).

All of which may seem the nerdy end of history but is a nice lesson in how little bits of the past can be coaxed to reveal a bit of their story.

Now there will be someone who remembers the HQ on Stretford Road and when it was demolished.

Music sheet The First Manchester March, date unknown

If we are very lucky they may also have memories of visiting the buildings have their own pictures.

In the meantime I will return to that military march and the music sheet which started me off on the journey.

It is owned by David Harrop and is currently in an exhibition at St John’s parish church in Heaton Mersey.

Pictures; headquarters of the 2^nd Volunteer Battalion of the Manchester Regiment, Stretford Road circa early 1900s, courtesy of Bill Sumner, Woodall's buidlings, 1900 from Goads Fire Insurance maps courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/\and front page of the First Manchester March, date unknown from the collection of David Harrop

*One historic piece of sheet music and a special event tomorrow in Heaton Mersey,http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/one-historic-piece-of-sheet-music-and.html

**The 2nd V.B.M.R. BAZAAR, the Manchester Guardian April 12, 1904