This is how you honour a shop with history

Today over eighty people gathered on an indifferent morning to commemorate and indeed celebrate one of our local Co-ops.

Gathering for the event, 2026

What makes this Co-op as special is that it has retained its public hall which for nearly a century has acted as avenue for a variety of local community events.

So it was fitting that Chorlton Civic Society should erect a blue plaque to honour its place as a centre for education, social events and  home to the Co-operative and Labour Movement.

The plaque was unveiled by Kathy Lee who as a member of the Co-op Party was active in promoting the ideals of co-operation.

Kathy about to unveil the plaque, 2026

Unveiled, 2026

Many of those present will also remember that Kathy's husband, Lawrence Beedle played a unique role in recording the history  of all things co-op and retold the stories in his  blog.*

Sean, Cll Shilton-Goodwin

So much so that when Angela Downing began to explore the possibilities of a blue plaque it was to Lawrence that she first turned and much of what we now know about the hall and its activities is due in no small part to Lawrence's knowledge. 

Which leads me to thank Angela for liaising with Chorlton Civic Society's blue plaque committee and the Co-op who funded the plaque.

The shop was opened in 1929 to serve the new housing estates which were being built along and behind Barlow Moor Road.

Lord Bradley

At the time most of the shops had their own hall but sadly most have now gone and ours may indeed be the last in the Greater Manchester area.

Some of the Hall's friends

The Hardy Lane Co-op Rooms can boast a rich and diversified series of events which have taken place in its room.

They range from meetings of the Wood Craft Folk and Co-operative Guilds to pollical assemblies of the Labour and Co-operative Parties doubled up as election committee rooms and the venue for  heaps of social events from film nights to whist evenings.

All of which made today's unveiling very special, and so along with Kathy we had Lord Bradley who as Keith Bradley was elected in 1987 as the first Labour MP for Withington, and the present MP Jeff Smith, both of whom spoke of their vivid memories of the hall.  Cllr Mandie Shilton-Godwin and Shaun Fensom from the Co-op were also present and I think the ghosts of  all those who have in some ways been part of the hall over the last century.

Jeff Smith, MP

Shaun from the Co-op

The Friends gather

Location; Hardy Lane Co-op

Pictures: on the day from the collection of Andrew Simpson and Peter Topping, 2026

*Hardy Lane Scrapbook, https://hardylane.blogspot.com/

More stories ….. from that Co-op shop on Hardy Lane … a carpenter and a blue plaque

Now for anyone who delves into the past there is one over arching observation and that is the simple one that the work is never done.

And that is particularly so of the Hardy Lane Co-op store. 

It was opened in 1929 to cater for the new housing estates which were being developed on either side of Barlow Moor Road, and like all co-op shops it was built with a public hall.

Ninety-seven years on that hall is still at the heart of the community, and during that near century it has been a venue for heaps of educational, social and political events.

Many people will have their own fond memories of “doing the hall”, and on Saturday I discovered a chap who added another story.

I didn’t catch his name, but he described his own connection with the venue, which was that as a carpenter and trade unionist he attended branch meetings of his union in the hall in the 1980s.

It was a snatched conversation and I missed the name of the union but I think it might have been the Amalgamated Society of Woodworkers (ASW) which merged with  the Amalgamated Society of Painters and Decorators (ASPD) in 1971 and later became known as the Union of Construction, Allied Trades and Technicians.

I should have pursued the conversation but didn’t, which was a great pity.

That said someone may remember being in the same union and attending branch meetings in the rooms above the co-op.

We shall see.

Suffice to say that the conversation was occasioned by the unveiling of a blue plaque sponsored by Chorlton Civic Society and supported by the Co-op.

The event was of special significance because our hall maybe the last still in use across Greater Manchester.

So, with that in mind fifty or so “friends” gathered to see the plaque unveiled and listened to some of us who had memories of meetings and social events in the hall.

Leaving me just to say if you have your own memories and want to share them do make contact.

Location; Hardy Lane Co-op

Pictures; the Hardy Lane Co-op, 2026, courtesy of Peter Topping, the carpenter and the unveiling, 2026 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Lawrence Beedle ... my friend

 I have been thinking of my friend Lawrence who died recently, and as you do I have been reflecting on over 40 years of friendship.

Lawrence

We shared an interest in history and particularly the Labour Party and the Co-op movement which for Lawrence translated into a deep knowledge which was a product of years of research.

Co-op Spring fashions, 1939

I always remember the time he compiled a complete collection of local election results for Chorlton stretching back to 1904 which also included all the MPs elected for our bit of south Manchester charting the complicated journey of boundary changes. 

Nor was it just the obscure.  

His knowledge and understanding of Co-op history was so detailed he could talk with authority on the founding of Co-operation in Manchester, the advance of the Manchester and Salford Equitable Co-op Society not to be confused with Marks and Spencer’s which carried the same initials on their shop fronts.  

And Lawrence could offer up the dates for the opening of the stores and exactly which Co-op store was best for buying furniture. 

Lawrence recounting when the Co-op went Self service, undated

Equally Lawrence was his blog on just one Co-op store … the one on Hardy Lane.   *

The blog ranged over all sorts of history from food to retail stamps, old 78 gramophone records and the story of Sanatogen that “Tonic and Restorative Wine”.

As he once said “before Lucozade there was Sanatogen”.

Now that blog is still live and is well worth a visit.

And all of this was done with joy as if the discovery and retelling was the fun.

And the fun also came in testing the past like the time he announced he was going to recreate some now forgotten war time dishes using the same rationed ingredients.

Orange curd, 1940

He started with the National Loaf from 1941 and accompanied it with Woolton Pie which consisted of diced cooked potatoes, cauliflower, carrots and turnips to which were added rolled oats chopped spring onions and vegetable stock which formed the gravy.  

Both the loaf and the pie were met with derision and even hostility during the war and so Lawrence just wanted to taste them himself and see what the fuss was all about.

I brought to the table a bowl of orange curd made from a 1940 recipe.  

We sat back and reflected that as vegetarians all three dishes were pretty dammed good, and the project was the perfect example of reenacting history.

And along the way we had touched a bit of the past even if it was a tad silly.

That silliness could also be the academic challenge, like the day he found a card of fuse wire, and challenged me to turn it into a history story, commenting,  “We’ve all got things at the back of a drawer. This must be 40 or 50 years old. Fuse wire in three different amperages. When did you last use fuse wire?

Winfield was the brand name for own label goods from Woolworths”. 

The Lawrence fuse wire challege

Of course there was so much more to him, from his days with Rabid Records, his fascination with the possibilities of the early internet, his contribution to the Unicorn Food Co-op, along with his impish sense of humour, his rabbit hole interests and much more.

So there you have it, my friend Lawrence.

Pictures; Lawrence, courtesy of Kathy his wife, and other images drawn from his blog, Hardy Lane Scrapbook

*Hardy Lane Scrapbook, https://hardylane.blogspot.com/

The co-op tower

Now  I am a great fan of all things co-operative.

After all the Co-op socities which sprang up in the 19th century offered quality food and other products at reasonable prices and for those who joined, provided a share of the profits at the end of the year.

Our family shopped co-op, I worked for the Royal Arsenal Co-operative Society, and I have often written about them.*

So here is another story, this one from Salford, which Andy Robertson encountered earllier in the month.  

It is one of the 54 branches of The Pendleton Co-operative Industrial Society which had been founded in 1860 and by 1911 had shops across Salford.

Its central store which included a grocers, and drapers had opened in 1887 was extended in 1903 and became a listed building in 1990.

The society also boasted a warehouse, bakery, diary, ice making and refrigerating plant, slaughterhouses and a coal office.

And since reposting the story several people have asked where this one was.

To my embarrassment I never asked Andy, where he took the pictures, but here is a list of all of the local co-ops from the 1911 directory which should allow someone to pinpoint our tower.

From the 1911 directory for Manchester & Salford

And spark a hunt for the rest.

Location; Lower Broughton

Picture; the co-op, 2021, from the collection of Andy Robertson

*Celebrating some more of Salford’s finest buildings ........ the Pendleton Co-operative Industrial Society, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2019/07/celebrating-some-more-of-salfords.html

Collecting Co-op Societies ..... no. 7....... The Failsworth Industrial Society

Now I have just added another co-op society to my Co-op Hall of Fame.

Failsworth Industrial Society Limited, 2022

It is The Failsworth Industrial Society which was formed in 1859, with a co-operative grocery shop opening in Dob Lane on 28th March 1859. 

“Its first members were William Fletcher, James Taylor, Jock Whitehead, William Barlow, Charles Cordow, James Robinson, Robert Barlow, Thomas Hayes, Tom Taylor, Jonathan Taylor, Josiah Etchells, Ben Aldred, James Winterbotton and James Smith. Thomas Hayes played a prominent part in the establishment of the Failsworth Industrial Society and became the first Secretary of the Society. 

He drew up the rules for the Society based on those of the Rochdale Equitable Pioneers Society”*

The Graver Lane store, 2022

And in the fullness of time I think I will go looking for these fourteen co-op pioneers.  

For now I shall just reflect that “it set up a laundry business in 1908, which would join with 10 other local societies in 1913 and this federal enterprise would grow to be the United Co-operative Laundries. 

The Society was also a partner in the formation of the Manchester and District Funeral Association and in 1932 joined forces with four other retail societies and the CWS in establishing the United Co-operative Dairies”.*

Our shop was opened in the Society's Golden Jubilee in 1909 when it had nearly 10,000 members and operated 43 shops. 

And it easy to forget that co-op societies were not just trading organizations, but had a wide range of cultural activities, including its own political party. 

The Failsworth Society had opened a library in 1873 and in 1909 it's valuable collection of 20,000 books was passed to the local Council as a nucleus to the first public library.

All of which has come from a most interesting history of the society produced by Jisc Archives Hub, which offers up the full history of the society, along with links to where its archives can be found and a select bibliography.

The Graver Lane store, 1960

Leaving me just to thank Andy Robertson who took these two pictures of the Graver Lane branch as was in Newton Heath.

Location; Failsworth

Pictures; former Graver Lane Co-op store, Newton Heath, 2022, from the collection of Andy Robertson, and in 1960, T Brooks, m35568, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

* The Failsworth Industrial Society,  Jisc Archives Hub https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/search/archives/e6180c09-f6ab-3211-9c51-d688f328f48f

A “divi number” …..and a lost shop …….. in Droylsden ……. with a bit of our Co-op history

Now, like many of my generation, I grew up with the Co-op.

It was a movement which offered good quality food, clothing, and a heap of other services at affordable prices and gave its members a “dividend”. 

So, you might well be kitted out in your first baby clothes from one of their stores, later hold your wedding reception in one of its halls, and finally be buried by its funeral department, which plays on that phrase from “cradle to the grave”.

In the early years there were shedloads of small local co-operative societies, catering for a clutch of villages, a small town, or parts of our big cities.

Ours was the Royal Arsenal Co-operative, which operated on the south side of the Thames.

And while many people can still remember their “divi” number, which had to be offered up with any purchase, I long ago forgot ours.  

That said we still have a few odd bits which were bought from the RACS store on Well Hall Road, and I loved the way that on a Saturday in the 1970s I could cash a cheque from my Co-op Bank account at the Arcadia store in Ashton-Under-Lyne.

All of which is an introduction to these two pictures of No. 6 Branch of the Droylsden Industrial Cooperative Society, Moorside Street, Droylsden, taken by Andy Robertson on a day out last week.

If I have this right the Droylsden Co-op was started in 1872, although I have seen an early date of 1861, and it  ran till 1963 when it merged with the Ashton Society.

This will explain why its records were “Placed on permanent loan by Mr. G.R. Bennett, Vice President of the Ashton-under-Lyne and District Co-operative Society Limited, Registered Office, 'Arcadia', Stamford Street, Ashton-under-Lyne, OL6 7NH. (October 1984).”*

On one level there is nothing exceptional about No 6, other that it has survived, and still carries a reminder of its origins which are there picked out in brick.

And here I cannot claim this short reference to the society is the first.  Others like Stephen Marland and Wikipedia have gone before me.**

Location; Droylsden

Pictures; No. 6 Branch of the Droylsden Industrial Cooperative Society, Moorside Street, Droylsden, 2022, from the collection of Andy Robertson

* Droylsden Industrial Co-operative Society Minutes and Reports. The records are held by Tameside Local Studies and Archives,  DD264, National Archives, https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/4fb568b3-f861-4359-9755-b61acbe5e585

** Ravensbury Street – Droylsden Cooperative Society Store, MOOCH, https://modernmooch.com/2020/05/07/ravensbury-street-droylsden-cooperative-store/ & Droylsden Industrial Co-operative Society, Wikipedia, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Droylsden_Industrial_Co-operative_Society

Lost in Gorton ....... part 5 .... shopping at the co-op

Now, if you are of a certain age, you will be able to quote your divi number, from countless trips to the Co-op.

If I am honest I can’t remember ours.  We were with the Royal Arsenal Co-operative Society, and used our number till they switched to blue stamps.

And thinking of all things co-op, this is Andy’s picture of the Beswick Co-operative Society’s store on Hyde Road.

“Beswick Co-operative Society was registered on 4 June 1892. Its central premises were at 30 Aston New Road, Manchester. Its first president was Arthur Cuss and its manager was a John Dobson. Its first branch was opened on 25 January 1894 at the corner of Mill Street and Carruthers Street in Ancoats, Manchester.

By 1905 its central premises were listed as Rowsley Street, Manchester and it had 5,700 members. It had branches in Manchester, Ancoats, Ardwick, Bradford, Openshaw and a bakery, warehouse and stables Beswick. It traded in grocery, drapery, hardware, shoes and boots, butchering, furnishing, tailoring, coal, flour, baking and dressmaking.

By 1951 the society had 36,047 members and had its central premises at Grey Mare Lane, Manchester. It had added branches in Burnage, Clayton, Denton, Didsbury, Gorton, Levenshulme, Longsight, Rusholme and Withington. It had expanded trade into millinery, jewellery, ironmongery and tobacco. It also produced dairy goods, offered shoe repairing services and had business in meat preparation.

The society became a part of the Co-operative Retail Services in 1959”.

And I have yet to find out when it closed.

Location; Gorton

Picture; former co-op store on Hyde Road, 2020, from the collection of Andy Robertson

Sources: The Co-operative Union directories, and the published history by AE Worswick, "History of the Beswick Co-operative Society Limited from 1892-1907".

*Beswick Co-operative Society, https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/search/archives/f2e8292a-178b-3996-b98b-07fd82464939

A little bit of Co-op history rediscovered in that Chorlton cinema ……………… 80 years on

Now I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that tucked away and pretty much forgotten in the old Gaumont cinema on Manchester Road is a reminder of the history of the Co-op movement.

After all, for over 50 years, this former picture house has been home to the Co-op’s Funeral Care Service.

But just how this framed picture ended up, discarded and looking very sorry for itself is a mystery.

The Co-op maintained a library and collection of resources covering its history in the building, but I am saddened that the picture got detached from the rest and sat gathering dust for decades.

There will be other copies I know, but it would be a shame, and a loss.

I went looking for a report on the “Grand Pageant” at Bell Vue on June 10th 1930, commemorating 80 years of “Glorious Co-operative Achievement”, but a trawl of the Guardian proved a dead end, but I am convinced that my friend Lawrence will have chapter and verse.

For now, I hope that this framed bit of history can be retrieved.

It was part of a collection of pictures taken by Chris Peacock, during a survey of the former cinema on behalf of the Chorlton Community Land Trust. *

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; framed photograph, commemorating 80 years of Co-op Achievement", 2019, from the collection of Chris Peacock, 2019

* Chorlton Community Land Trust,
https://chorltonclt.org/index.php/2019/10/02/staying-alive-2019-09-26/?fbclid=IwAR2EmkOwVXnwSNTgfeCbhlAgHfAMJPpiLlQ4Q8XC3-oKYlRwXUpEAEzvbFU

Celebrating some more of Salford’s finest buildings ........ the Pendleton Co-operative Industrial Society

Now here is an example of all things that were best about the Co-op.

We are on Littleton Road and this is one of the 54 branches of The Pendleton Co-operative Industrial Society which had been founded in 1860 and by 1911 had shops across Salford.

Its central store which included a grocers, and drapers had opened in 1887 was extended in 1903 and became a listed building in 1990.

The society also boasted a warehouse, bakery, diary, ice making and refrigerating plant, slaughterhouses and a coal office.

The central store is still an impressive building but I have fondness for the smaller one on Littleton Road.

And part of that is because of the detail of the architecture.

Now the building is practical no nonsense example of a late 19th century retail outlet, but there was a pride here in what the co-op was doing and the vision of co-operation which was at its heart.

So while this is a functional building there was pride n the border over the door, and the name picked out in the eaves.

I don’t know how many residents gave it a second glance but I know I would.

So there you have it.

This was the first of Andy's strolls into Pendleton and in the course of the day he came across a whole set of interesting buildings.

Some are still doing what they were intended for, others have fallen on hard times and others have become something else.

Location; Salford




Pictures; Pendleton Co-operative Industrial Society, 2016 from the collection of Andy Robertson 

The story of that other Co-op ………….. Hulme 1840

Now there were plenty of people attempting to follow the Rochdale Pioneers and set up local co-operative societies which aimed to offer good quality food and goods at a decent price with the added benefit of a loyalty dividend from the profits to be shared out amongst the members.  

And one of those groups which did not make it long past their brave start was the Hume and Chorlton Joint Stock Provision Company founded in the October of 1840 with one shop on Clarendon Street Chorlton on Medlock.

The Chartist paper the Northern Star covered their launch and early expansion in 1840 and for me it sums up exactly what these early co-operators wanted to do.

“Hulme And Chorlton. – At a meeting of the Committee of management of the Hulme and Chorlton Joint Stock Provision Company, October 22nd it was unanimously resolved, in consequence of the increase in business, and for accommodation of shareholders and other, that we open another shop in the township of Hulme.  

The above resolution has been carried into effect, and we have opened a shop at 10 Melbourne-street, Bradshaw-street, Hulme.  We are determined to make the shopkeepers of the above township sell their bread at the same price we have made them in Chorlton, that is, the 4lb. Loaf for 7d.  On opening our shop in Hulme, several customers, on calling for a 4lb. Loaf, tendered 8d. For it; and when the shopman returned them one penny they seemed surprised.  

This shews that the working classes are not alive to their own interest, or else they would have known the advantage of co-operation.  If they will only pay us a visit, we will assure them they will lose nothing by it; but on the contrary, gain.  

We likewise call on all Corn Law repealers to visit our shops, and we will give them what they have been fighting for a long time-namely, cheap bread.  Working men, come forward and assist us in keeping down the profitmongers.  Shares, 5s each may be paid in instalments of 6d per week.  The Committee meet every Thursday evening, at eight o’clock, at their rooms, over the shop, No 26, Clarendon Street, Chorlton.”*

Sadly it seems they fell by the wayside.  A trawl of the directories for 1841 and 1850 show no listings for the Hulme and Chorlton Joint Stock Provision Company, and they are not mentioned again in the Northern Star for 1840.

It may be that like many of these early societies they lacked sufficient resources.  Certainly the price of their shares at 5s [25p] was far less than the Rochdale Pioneers who just four years later set their shares at £1.  And the 1840s were a hard time.

Location; Hulme

Picture; Co-Operative Union Plaque, Erected in 1911, M Luft, 1990, m09363, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*The Northern Star November 7th 1840

150 years of Co-operation at the People's History Museum till May

A CWS jam advert circa 1930s

Now all most all my close friends can remember their mum’s co-op divi number.

Whenever you bought anything at the local store you had to quote it, to earn the dividend.

Sadly I am not one of them and try as I might it has been forgotten.

But I can remember quoting it when I was sent to the shop and came across some of those blue stamps which took the divi number’s place.

Later I went to work for the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich and later still joined the Co-op bank when we lived in Ashton.

That bank account in the 1970s was quite a life line, for in a time when there were no holes in the wall to dispense money, the Co-op would cash cheques at the weekend at the big Arcadia store.

Co-op cocoa made at the CWS & SCWS-factory,1902

All of which is an introduction to the new exhibition at The People’s History Museum* on 150 years of the Co-operative Movement which runs till May 2014.

“For 150 years The Co-operative has grown to first manufacture and then to sell products. Its services continue to support the families and communities of Great Britain and the world ‘from the cradle to the grave’.

This people’s business began its humble origins as the Co-operative Wholesale Society in Greater Manchester in 1863. The exhibition explores the story and values behind the ‘caring sharing co-op’ and offer a unique insight into the way we shop and live.”

So along with my friend Tommy and a group of fellow co-operators we were taken around the exhibition which includes a number of interactive displays along with plenty of posters and other things to see.

There was a guided tour and the staff opened up some of the archive material for us to handle.

So I shall be going again, taking the family and anyone else who wants to come.

And it is an important exhibition celebrating as it does the idea that people can co-operate to make a better world and that profit is not the only means by which products can be produced and traded.

In an age of banker’s bonuses and that much peddled idea that the markets determine all it is worth reflecting on the Co-op which “is the UK’s largest mutual business, owned not by private shareholders but by over seven million consumers. 

Bus advertisement for The Co-operative Bank circa 1970s

They are the UK’s fifth biggest food retailer and a major financial services provider, operating The Co-operative Bank and The Co-operative Insurance. 

They also operate a funeral services, the third largest pharmacy chain and one of Britain’s largest farming operations. The Group operates 4,800 retail trading outlets, employs more than 100,000 people and has an annual turnover of more than £13bn.

Their members are their owners; members tell them what is important to them and they listen and act on it. 

Its part of their model: as a consumer co-operative, they run their business for the benefit of members. That means members are involved in democratic decision-making and profits are shared with the members. 

Dividend stamps introduced nationally by CWS in 1969

Members also set a social and campaigning agenda that they support.

They have become pioneers in areas such as Fairtrade and combating climate change. The more commercially successful they are, the more they can do to give back to the communities they serve and to influence the wider world.”

So even despite its current embarrassment with its banking arm and faces challenging from the big companies
I think the Co-op is still worth considering and certainly visiting its history.

*The People’s History Museum, Manchester, http://www.phm.org.uk/

Follow @PHMMcr on twitter to keep up to date with the exhibition  #coop150ex

Pictures; A CWS jam advert c1930s, National Co-operative Archive, © The Co-operative Group,
Advertisement-for-co-operative-cocoa-made-at-a-joint-CWS-and-SCWS-factory-in-Luton-from-1902-National-Co-operative-Archive-© -The-Co-operative-Group, Bus advertisement for The Co-operative Bank circa 1970s, National Co-operative Archive, © The Co-operative Group, Dividend stamps introduced nationally by CWS in 1969, National Co-operative Archive, ©The Co-operative Group