The invitation from the Northern Quarter ....... and a mystery

There are still a few of those odd little passages and open doors in the Northern Quarter which beckon you in with the promise of something different and a bit edgy.

Tib Street, 2023

And so, it is with the passage which leads off from Tib Street, down a narrow way opening out onto a small court.

With a degree of imagination and with the light fading fast you could conjure up one of those places beloved of Dickens where few ventured who were not local.

Once there were plenty of them and anyone who was a stranger might well regret letting their curiosity get to them and walk through.

In the 1870s the Manchester Guardian reported on heaps of these places, many of which were off Deansgate and whose reputation for criminality and low life was such that the Police seldom ventured there alone.*

I doubt that our passageway is that dangerous flanked as it is by a florist and a café .

Today it it leads to  the rear of the Freemount pub which fronts Oldham Street.

But what is interesting is that it shows up on Adshead’s map of Manchester dated 1851.

Tib Street, and The King Inn, 1850

And then as now it led to a pub which back then was the King Inn whose landlord was George Todman.

Now I have become interested in Mr. Todman, because he like me was from Eltham in what was then Kent.  

He was 69, married to Mary who was 55 and  was born in Nottingham.  

They shared the property with eight others, three of whom were their children along with a grandchild, a servant, a lodger and on the night of the census a visitor and a “child”

The visitor was Rebecca Stevens from Derby who gave her age as 22, while the child, George Smith was just 8 years old and was from Manchester.

Just how young George got to be living with the Todman’s is unclear but intrigues me, and of course provides that bit of mystery which deserves more research.

As for the pub it commanded an annual estimated rental value of £120 which marks it off as a going concern and was owned by a “Hobson”.

Thomas Street, 2023

And that just leaves that other “invitation to the Norther Quarter which is on Thomas Street and amounts to an entrance to a gym in the cellar of the building.

Location; the Northern Quarter

Pictures; that mysterious passageway, 58 Tib Street, 2023 and total sports, Thomas Street, 2023, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and in 1851 from Adshead’s map of Manchester, Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ 

*Walking the streets of Manchester in 1870, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Walking%20Manchester%20in%201870

** 75 Oldham Street, 1851 census, Enu 1r 19 Market Street and 75, Oldham Street Manchester Rate Books, 1852

Breaking news …… the past is back

Corny title perhaps but good news because after a break of many months the online catalogue of over 80,000 images of Manchester is back and up and running.

Down an alley, Tib Street, 2023

It has been a barren and empty time for those of us who have wanted to search out a Manchester  street or a building but today I got an email from Jane Parr, at Archives and Local History in Central Library telling me that the glitch has been sorted.

Angel Street, undated

And that is about it.

Other than to say I wish people who trawl and post images from the database would credit Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council and carefully add the date, location and photographer.

Apart from it being good manners to acknowledge the source of the picture it provides a context.

Otherwise all we have is "an old picture of Manchester, it looks different from now".

So for those unfamiliar with the service just follow the link and get looking.

Picture; Angel Street, S.L.Coulthurst, undated, m08543 courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and Down an alley, Tib Street, Manchester, 2023, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Art on the street …….. the Northern Quarter

They come in many different sizes, styles and artistic quality, but the artwork across the Northern Quarter adds to the “quirky” nature of the place.

Now I know that there are heaps of towns and cities all over the place where you can see street “art” ranging from Sidney’s spray can efforts, to commissioned works which jostle for attention with the odd fading ghost sign.

And just before New Year I came across some that I liked, and which did indeed brighten up that drab spot dominated by the multi storey car park on Tib Street.

I could say more but I think that is about it.

Location; Tib Street

Pictures; Art on the street, The Northern Quarter, 2022, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Out in the Northern Quarter …… the poster

I became a regular at the Royal Exchange Theatre some time around 1977, just a year or so after it opened with its futuristic looking structure.

Back then I got a season ticket and while there were sometime productions which I didn’t enjoy there were plenty more that were fun, electrifying and totally memorable.

Some were high theatre while others like Leaping Ginger and a heap of farces were the best anecdote to a bleak week in the middle of winter or a rainy June.

We tried to get tickets for the latest musical but left it too late, leaving me just to reflect on some of those earlier productions and wonderful afternoons in the bar.

Location; Tib Street, Manchester

Picture; the poster, 2023, and Vintage Royal Exchange, 2001, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

A wall ……. the plaques …….. and the story of the men who went to fight

I will have passed these brass plaques countless times and never stopped to study them.

They are on one of the walls of the Northern Quarter Car Park which is bounded by Tib Street, Thomas Street, Red Lion Street and Church Street.

Below the five plaques there is one of those modern murals which pepper the Northern Quarter which in this case is a field of poppies.

The mural is a fairly recent addition to what had been a space which for a while was dominated by public lavatory and a set of railings which prevented the curious from getting a good look at the inscriptions.

But now they are easier to see, even if like me you passed them by.

They record the men who worked for J. & N. Philips during the last two world wars, but interestingly contain only some of those who went off to fight.

So, looking at the Manchester City Battalions Book of Honour, which lists those who enlisted in the first few months of the war and joined the Pal’s Battalions the entry for J. & N. Philips, stretches across four pages and includes the names of 360 men.

My Wikipedia tells me that “J. & N. Philips and Company was a business established in 1747 by members of the Philips family, and which ceased trading in 1970. 

Originally based in Tean, Staffordshire, England, the business was a manufacturer of textile products that expanded both by organic growth and by taking over other businesses involved in the manufacture and merchanting of textile products and smallware. 

It formed a part of a network of companies operated by the family, whose business interests came to include manufacture of hats and textiles such as linen smallwares, silks and fustians, as well as cotton spinning and dealing, power loom weaving, export merchanting and general warehousing. 

The family made the majority of its wealth from their involvement in the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. 

The family was also involved in politics, with George Philips, Mark Philips and Robert Needham Philips all being Members of Parliament and all promoting the ideals of Manchesterism while in office. George's son, George Richard Philips, was also a member of the House of Commons”.*

And from 1826 till 1969 the firm occupied the corner of Tib Street, Church Street and Red Lion Street in what is now a big chunk of the present car park.

In time I will go looking for pictures of the building and follow up on the names of the men listed on the plaques, but for now that is it, leaving me just to reflect that if it hadn’t been for an idle half an hour waiting for the family I would have not taken pictures of the plaques, and so started off on the journey of discovery.

Added to which I doubt I would have delved into the story of J. & N. Philips, made the link with the MP Mark Philips, or once again pondered on the connection between Manchester and the slave trade.

Location; Manchester

Pictures, remembering those who fought, 2023, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*J. & N. Philips, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._%26_N._Philips

 

Twisty stories of the Albert Hotel ......... on Oldham Street

You won’t find the Albert Hotel or its predecessor, the Queens Stores Vaults, on Oldham Street, and their disappearance calls up some fascinating and twisty bits of history.

The Albert Hotel, Oldham Street, 1970

Today, 109 Oldham Street is home to Gullivers, which as well as being a bar is a centre for live music and is totally separate from an earlier pub by the same name which superseded one called the Grenadier which in turn replaced the Albert Hotel.

Nor is that quite all, because along with all these names we can add the King’s Arms and Coronation Vaults, where in 1850 a Mr. James Buxton dispensed beer and good cheer.

This pub appears to date back to 1803, but not necessarily at 109 Oldham Street, indeed the following year it has shifted along the road to no. 133 where at one time it had added “Top King” to its listing to distinguish it from The King at 73-75.  And for those not already overwhelmed with names the King’s Arms is now the City.

So, with that done and dusted it is back to the Albert Hotel which, was one of the few pubs in the city centre, where you could enter on one street and exit on another.

The other was 90 Tib Street, and the story of how it became part of the Albert has occupied me for most of the day.

The Queens Stores Vaults, Oldham Street, 1851

Up until 1868 the Tib Street property had been the home of a Maria Greenwood who was a cap maker, and for the purposes of the Rates Book is listed as a house and shop, with annual rent of £14.

And here comes the twisty bit, because just four years earlier, a Mr. James Ramwell had bought the Albert Hotel from Esther Rowbottom, paying £700 for the goodwill of the business and spent a further “£1000 in improving the house, by adding a beer shop and cottage”.*

I can’t quite fathom how Maria Greenwood fitted into the new development, but by 1871 she has moved on to Rochdale Road, and is again renting a house and shop for the much increased yearly rent of £22.

And by the mid-1870s the street directories list the Albert Hotel as at  “109 Oldham Street, Whittle Street and Tib Street”, which remains the case into the middle years of the last century.

But sometime after 1969, the Albert loses its Tib Street bit, and no. 90 reverts to a separate property.

Just what it morphed into I have yet to discover but in 2008 it was the CEBU Café, offering “FLIPONO FAST FOOD AND TAKEAWAY”, which by 2015 had again become part of the pub again, which is a nice bit of historical continuity.

The Albert Hotel, Tib Street, 1959

All of which leaves one last puzzle and a final twist to the story.

I had long wondered when the Queens Stores Vaults, became the Albert Hotel.  It was still listed as such in 1863 when it was run by Esther Rowbottom, and that was also the year James Ramwell applied for the license, so I guess that will be when it was renamed.

Either way, his entrepreneurial ambitions rather hit the buffers because in 1864 he fell foul of the licensing authorities, who took umbrage that he had extended the pub on to Tib Street using the old license, which didn’t cover such a move.

Once the authorities discovered what he had done they at first ordered him  not to use the Tib Street end, and later“refused to grant any license at all either to the premises, including the additional portion or to   the old house”.

Happily, all was eventually sorted out.

Except to say Mr. Ramwell saw a gold mine.  In the 1860s it commanded an estimated annual rent of £200, which was much higher than the surrounding properties,  and in 1911 the then landlord employed eight staff, to look after the twelve rooms of the property.

All of which just leaves me to mention the three pubs books which feature 78 city centre pubs, the 33 Chorlton pubs and bars and the 49 bars and pubs of Didsbury.

They are less a guide and more a history of all that is good, combining original paintings by Peter Topping, stories by me and lots of photographs.

You can order the books at www.pubbooks.co.uk email Peter at peter@pubbooks.co.uk or the old fashioned way on 07521 557888 or from Chorlton Bookshop

Location; Manchester

Pictures; The Albert Hotel, 1970, A Dawson, m49145, the Albert on Tib Street in 1959, H W Beaumont, m49149, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass 
and Tib Street in 1851, from Adshead’s map of Manchester, 1851, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

Sources, Manchester Rates Books, 1849-1900, census returns 1841-1871, Whellan and Co’s Directory of Manchester, 1852, Slater’s Directories of Manchester  and Salford, 1850-1911, Manchester Guardian 1860-1864, Manchester City Licensing Records, 1730-1964, courtesy of Bob Potts.

*The City Magistrates and the Licensing System, Manchester Guardian, November 25th, 1865.

That house on Tib Street ………………… with a long history and uncertain future

I can’t say I ever really noticed no. 88 Tib Street, but I wish I had.

February 2018

It stands almost on the corner with Whittle Street and already its neighbour has vanished, leaving it shrouded in scaffolding next to Gullivers.

It has been empty and boarded up from 2008, and probably much earlier, and despite passing it many times, I only clocked its existence last week when the Manchester Evening News ran a story on its uncertain future.*

And that article, reminded Andy Robertson that he had taken a picture of the place last February, all of which prompted me to go looking for its story.

The MEN, referred to it as “one of the last remaining weaver's cottages in the city centre, dating back to the 18th Century”, and a quick look at the maps of the period show that it was there by 1794, and is clearly marked as a workshop of some description on Adshead’s map of 1851.

January 1851

Just when it stopped being a workshop and indeed a weaver’s cottage is unclear.

In 1849 the Rate Books show that it was occupied by a Thomas Higgins, and the annual estimated rent for the property was £18.

Now I  can follow Thomas Higgins around the city, in the years before and after 1849.

He appears on Whittle Street, Long Millgate, Sutton Street, Hanover Street, Reather Street and Portugal Street, with guest appearances also in Hulme , and Chorlton-on Medlock, which clearly suggests we are dealing with more than one man.

So, the historian in me advises caution in linking number 88 to any one man, but the romantic makes me lean towards the Thomas Higgins who described himself as a handloom weaver in the 1851 census and who was living with his family on Portugal Street.

May 1959

A year later a Thomas Higgins is listed in Whellan and Co’s Directory of Manchester, as a tailor in the firm of Waite and Higgins at 10 Reather Street, which was off Oldham Road.

It is possible that a handloom weaver in a shrinking and dying industry might have branched out into a tailoring business, or we might just have the wrong Mr. Higgins.

Either way, our house appears to sever its links with the textile trade, and for the rest of the nineteenth and 20th centuries becomes a shop.

In 1861 it was home to a Benjamin Leigh who was a beer seller, a decade later it was occupied by a printer, and more recently was a florist in 1959, and ten years on, a toy dealer.**

All of which would appear to be almost the end of the story.

We shall see.

Location; Manchester

Pictures; number 88 in 2018, from the collection of Andy Robertson, in 1959, L. Kaye, m05812, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass 
and Tib Street in 1851, from Adshead’s map of Manchester, 1851, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

*'The city I love is crumbling around me'...anger as 200-year-old Northern Quarter building looks set to be demolished, Steve Robson, December 1st, 2019, Manchester Evening News, https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/the-city-love-crumbling-around-17328242

**Sources, Manchester Rates Books, 1849-1900, census returns 1851-1871, Whellan and Co’s Directory of Manchester, 1852, Slater’s Directories of Manchester  and Salford, 1850-1911