Marjorie Holmes, 1921-2014, a dear friend and historian of Chorlton

Marjorie with her mother, circa 1929 on the lockups by Chorlton Green

Over the years Marjorie had become a close friend, and because she lived just around the corner we saw each other regularly.

She delighted in hearing the news of my four lads and in return I would listen attentively to her stories of growing up in Chorlton.

For Marjorie really was a Chorlton girl, born here in 1921 and an apart from war service this is where she lived.

A letter from Marjorie

And so she was a fund of stories, pictures and memorabilia which I have plundered over the years.

But there was never anything precious about Marjorie and so as I dug deeper in the history of our township she was always wanting to know more, adding my research to her memories and always there to encourage me “to push on, find out more and don’t forget to tell me.”

More memories

From her I have that vivid memory of a young girl entranced at watching the blacksmith on Beech Road performing his “magic of heating and hammering,” which more than once made her late for school.

Or her memories of the old parish church with its blue ceiling and white star, illuminated in the early morning sunshine.

Jasmine Cottage, painted by Marjorie

Hers were I think some of the last living memories of a building closed in 1940 and demolished in 1949 and which had served our community since it was opened in 1800.

And of course I could go on, but it would be wrong just to present my friend as a living piece of history for she was much more, including an accomplished artist a brilliant conversationalist and someone who was not averse to a risque joke.

In later years she would often refer to me as her toy boy and I will value that as much as I valued her friendship and what I learnt from her about the place we both loved.

So on an upbeat note and with the permission of Bernard here is part of a conversation* she recorded for Chorlton Good Neighbours.**






Pictures; from the collection of Marjorie Holmes

*In conversation with Marjorie Holmes, http://chorltongoodneighbours.org/2011/04/26/marjorie-holmes/

**Chorlton Good Neighbours, http://chorltongoodneighbours.org/

One place …. just 87 years apart ….. Beech Road 1935 …. 2022

The blog doesn’t usually do then and now pictures.

Beech Road, 1935

But this one which was taken by the sister of Marjorie Holmes is a favourite of mine.

It is a bit blurred but that is what comes with a “snap”, but then the quality of the second is only marginally better.

 The first was taken during the Jubilee celebrations for King George V in 1935 and mine just a few days ago.

I will leave it to others to make the obvious observation and repeat that request for more “snaps” of where we live.

For those interested behind the wall on the left of Marjorie's picture was still a laundry, while what is now Suburban Green, had been variously an ironmonger's, a hair dressers and even a piano shop before settling down to its long association as a bar and restaurant in the mid 1980s.

Beech Road, 2022

The first of which was Café on the Green.

Location; Beech Road

Pictures; Beech Road, 1935, from the collection of Marjorie Holmes, and in 2022 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

A shopping list, a coal receipt and a little bit of how we lived in the winter of 1963

Now in an age of online shopping I still like the idea of making a list and going down to the shops but I have grown lazy and have reverted to that simple practice of the man with the van.

And today that was what arrived at 6.30 this morning courtesy of the latest supermarket to get into the business of delivering our groceries.

I resisted for a long time arguing the joy of getting out and meeting people and choosing for myself was a paramount adding that it was just another example of that creeping invasion of the internet into my life.

But historically of course the idea of the man with a van is not new, and if I had been from a certain class I might well have expected pretty much all of my food to have arrived at the door courtesy of the “boy and the cart” from the local tradesmen.

The only difference I suppose is that instead of sending the servant with the list or making a phone call today the order is placed by computer and of course the man in the van is equally likely to be a woman.

And as I stare at the itemised receipt I am reminded what a wonderful little bit of history this list is containing as it does not only a record of what we consume but the cost of everything from two bottles of Gavi, three of Pinot Grigio and assorted household products.

All of which neatly leads me to the shopping list made out by my old friend Marjorie Holmes in the winter of 1963 along with a receipt for two bags of coal delivered to the house by H.Hawkard, “Coal & Coke Merchant, Station Approach, Chorlton-cum-Hardy.”

Now such lists and receipts are the stuff of everyday life and most will be discarded pretty much straight away.

My father being a more canny person did tend to keep these records if only to make it easier to shop next time, which I guess is not unlike that tab on the online site which directs you to your favourites.

In the case of Marjorie few of her shopping lists have survived so I can’t say how typical this one was but it gives an idea of the cost of living back in 1963.

Moreover it indicates she was both a regular customer of the Co-op as the divi number at the top of the page testifies and that the order was delivered.

Back in 1963 we still had a Co-op on Beech Road and the coal merchants continued to operate from the Station approach after passenger trains ceased to rum from Chorlton into Central.

Of course there will be those who mutter this is small history, compared to the bigger picture which saw the Cuban Missile Crisis the year before, the assassination of President Kennedy in the November of 1963 and the slow decline in the popularity of the Conservative Government but this is my sort of history.

Pictures; shopping list circa November 1963 and coal receipt, November 1963, courtesy of Marjorie Holmes from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The story behind the Quirks of Chorlton-cum-Hardy ...... part 2 ..... my story ..... Marjorie Holmes

Now as everyone knows the publishing event of the year is the arrival of the new book on Chorlton and its past.

Marjorie circa 1966

It was published today and copies will be available from Chorlton Book shop later today or from http://www.pubbooks.co.uk/

It is the story of the bits of Chorlton that don’t get into the history books, from some well loved personalities to little known facts like the goat enclosure and swimming pool in Chorlton Park and the  strange meandering course of the Rough Leach Gutter.

And because Peter and I are not parochial we have included stories from Whalley Range, Didsbury and Stretford and celebrated that great highway that is Barlow Moor Road.

But as quirky as the book is there is a serious side to why we set about the exercise and today this is my story from behind the book

From the start we decided it should include not just buildings and events but people, and those people should be individuals who were, or are special to Chorlton.

So while there are references to the big names that always appear in history books, we chose others like David Wilkinson,  Stan and Mona of the Trevor and Allan Brown.

Marjorie and her sister, date unknown

And at the top of my list was Marjorie Holmes.

She was a dear friend and a guardian of our history.

Marjorie was born in Chorlton and apart from her war service lived all her life around the old village.

Her dad had a workshop in the yard of the old farmhouse on the green which is now Finney Drive and the family possessed one of those old fabulous looking cars.

She was an accomplished artist and had a wealth of stories,when according to her, Chorlton was “still Chorlton”.

I never quite understood what she meant by that but hers had been a childhood when the last vestiges of the old rural Chorlton were just passing away and she could talk about that period with great authority.

She had played on the meadows, when it was still farmland, remembered going to the local farm for milk and was firmly of the opinion that, “them in New Chorlton were a snooty lot who were all fancy cakes and silk knickers”, and if she wanted to be particularly dismissive she added “all fancy cakes and no knickers”.

Marjorie, 2011

Of course I could never really be sure that underneath her bold sweeping statements there was not more than a little mischief.

I must have spent hours sitting in her back room on Provis Road listening to tales of everything from her frequent late attendance at school because she had stopped to watch Mr Clark the blacksmith carrying out his magic of “heating and hammering”, to sitting in the cellar of the family home on Stockton Road during the Manchester Blitz.

She was one of those rare people who saw the value in everyone, and if she adopted you as her friend it was a lasting friendship which brought with it great pleasure and much fun.

Much of what she remembered she committed to paper, including a vivid account I still have of Beech Road in the early 1930s, and this we have included in the book.

Marjorie Holmes 1921-2014

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; 1930s -2011, from the collection of Marjorie Holmes and Andrew Simpson

*The Quirks of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, is available from Chorlton Book Shop or from http://www.pubbooks.co.uk/  or 07521557888

Marjorie

Sometime in the 1960s

Today will be the  the funeral of my friend Marjorie Holmes.

But Marjorie would have been the first to tell me off for dwelling on those few hours at Southern Cemetery at the expense of a few good stories about her life and times.

And I want to start with this picture which is a constant reminder to all of us who were born in the first half of the last century that we were once young and got up to some pretty silly things.

This is Marjorie in the back garden of her house in the 1960s which means that she was possibly in her in early 40s when the picture was taken.

By then she had experienced a world war, served in the RAF and sat in a damp and dark cellar in the family home in Stockton Road during air raids and gone through the post war period and the beginning of the “swinging 60s.”

I suppose I really got to know her back in the late 1990s and began regularly visiting here a decade after that when we discovered our mutual fascination for local history.

That said I never let on that on more than one occasion I had knocked her door canvassing for the Labour party in the 1980s and been given short shrift.  If she remembered the event she was too gracious to bring it up in our long conversations that rambled over everything from the Manchester Man to Mr Clarke the blacksmith on Beech Road.

Marjorie in a Dakato top left

She was a wealth of stories about Chorlton when according to her it was still Chorlton.
I never quite understood what she meant but hers had been a childhood when the last vestiges of the old rural Chorlton were just passing away.

She had played on the meadows, when it was still farmland, remembered going to the local farm for milk and was firmly of the opinion that “them in New Chorlton were a snooty lot who were all fancy cakes and silk knickers.”

Of course I could never really be sure that underneath her bold sweeping statements there was not more than a little mischief.

And even when misfortune fell she could brush it off.

Her cousin, Michael remembered that

“the last time my wife and I visited Marjorie was about 4 years ago. When we left by the front door to return home Marjorie came out to the front gate to wave goodbye (in her slippers). 

However a gust of wind came through the house and slammed the door shut. 

Marjorie was without her door keys and her neighbours who had a spare set were not at home. Then we figured that the rear of her house must have been open to allow the wind through so we went round the back only to find the garden gate at the rear locked. 

So my wife who was able to get her foot into a broken brick of the wall managed to get over it falling on the dustbin at the other side as she did so. 

She picked herself up and entered the house to open the front door for Marjorie. 
We then laughed about the event and said our goodbyes once again. 

To our horror Marjorie came out of the house to wave us off at the front gate and the door closed again but fortunately not completely shut so she was saved. 

We insisted that she went back into the house rather than wave us off so that we would be sure that she was safely inside.”

The  funeral will be at the Crematorium in Southern Cemetery on Monday March 10 at 11.20

Pictures; from the collection of Michael Armstrong and Marjorie Holmes

Marjorie Holmes, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Marjorie%20Holmes

Marjorie Holmes, a life remembered

Marjorie with the History Group in the Horse & Jockey, 2009

There will be many of us here in Chorlton who will treasure fond memories of Marjorie Holmes who died aged 93 at the end of February*

I will remember her sense of fun, keen interest in the history of Chorlton and her no nonsense approach to life.

She was a founder member of the Chorlton History group when a small band of us met in the Horse & Jockey on the green.

Back then there were just usually enough of us to sit around two tables by the door and Marjorie could be relied on to always have a relevant and often witty anecdote about the Chorlton she loved which had been where she was born and where she lived all life.

She was born in 1921 and the family lived first on Higson Avenue, then Stockton Road and later on Provis.

Marjorie with her sister on her old bike, 1930

And because she lived here all of her life apart from a short period away during the war, she had a rich set of memories and still talked of old and new Chorlton, a distinction which for most of us today is a mystery.

But for Marjorie it was still part of her everyday life.

She had grown up and lived her whole life in old Chorlton which was the traditional centre of the township concentrated around the green and the Row.*

New Chorlton or the new village was that area around the four banks up to the library and down towards the station.  It had once been known as Martledge a name that was lost as the area was rapidly developed for homes for the “middling people” who worked in the professions, and the offices of the city and who commuted everyday into Manchester by train or tram.

During the 1920s and 30s that division was a real one.  New Chorlton had the banks reflecting the people with money while  we in old Chorlton had a post office and the Penny Savings Bank which opened a few hours every Friday night in the school on the green.

Marjorie in full flow

I remember Marjorie telling me that this was the first bank that the family used.

She was proud of being from old Chorlton  and whenever she ventured to Morrisons or the big post office, it was as she said “going to the posh end”.

And when she wanted to be particularly provocative she would mutter that “them at the new end were different from us,   all fancy cakes and silk underwear.” 

I shall miss Marjorie as will all her friends.

So I know there will be many who will want to know that her funeral will be at the Crematorium in Southern Cemetery on Monday March 10 at 11.20

Picture; courtesy of Bernard Leach,and from the collection of Marjorie

*Marjorie Holmes, 1921-2014, a dear friend and historian of Chorlton
http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/marjorie-holmes-1921-2014-dear-friend.html

**Chorlton Row was the old name for Beech Road