Amberleigh ... 1953-1997 ........ that prep school on Wilbraham Road

Sometimes you encounter a story which is well beyond your own experiences.

The Oaks, Wilbraham Road, 1929

And so today I plunge into that world of private education and in particular the schools and academies which flourished here in Chorlton in the first half of the last century.

It is something I was never privy to.  I went from one state school to another, effortlessly moving from Edmund Waller Junior school to Samuel Pepys Secondary Modern and Crown Woods Comprehensive to Manchester College of Commerce.  And then after a post grad year at Didsbury Training College, I spent 35 years teaching in inner city schools.

So, mine was a paid education but one funded by local authorities from the public purse.

Mr. Dadley's Grammar School, High Lane, circa 1911

But today I am looking at the private schools of Chorlton which flourished in the years before the Great War continued into the brave new world after 1945 and lasted into the 21st century.

I have written about them in the past, from the Convent school on High Lane to Mr Dadley, whose Grammar School specialized in training for “Law, Medical Accounts, Prelims, University, and Civil Services Exams”.

What they had in common was that they attracted the “middling people” who had moved into Chorlton during the housing boom which had begun in the 1880s and who could afford to enrol their children in these private educational establishments.

In 1911 there were seven in Chorlton, which slowly fell to four in 1929, and three by 1961. **

Of the last three it is Amberleigh Preparatory School at 398 Wilbraham Road which caught my attention today.  It closed in February 1997 and was listed as an “Independent Selective Mixed School for 4-11’s.***

Amberleigh Preparatory School, Wilbraham Road, 1960

The first reference to it is in 1953 in a street directory and in a series of adverts in the Manchester Guardian offering “a course of Evening Classes for children between the ages of 11 and 13 who will be eligible to sit for the local grammar and municipal scholarships in February 1954.  

The course will cover a period of 23 weeks, consisting of 46 lessons each of two hours duration”.****

To this can be added three articles from 1964 and 65, recording the school’s participation in art competitions run by the Manchester Guardian. Under the heading “Enterprise of imagination” the newspaper described the work exhibited by students from Amberleigh in connection with “the Single-handed Transatlantic Race”, and a family’s sailing adventure to Easter Island. ****

The first competition saw five hundred schools enter and the second six hundred, with Amberleigh winning through on both occasions and featuring in the coverage.

Sadly, although some of the students are mentioned by name, no teacher who quite clearly was something of an inspiration is lost to us.

Advert for Amberleigh, 1953

At present that is pretty much it, although there is a Facebook presence from students who share their memories starting in 1955***** and rolling through into the 80s, and a homemade film of a school day outing from the 1970s.******

Just what was taught, the organization of the school day and other stories will I guess come to light as people come forth with their contributions.

Well I hope so.

It now seems quite remote and yet it is well to remember that the Convent school on High Lane lasted into the 1990s and was supersede by the Islamic School for Girls which only vacated the site recently.

Location; Wilbraham Road

Picture; Mr. Dadley’s Grammar School, circa 1911, ,The Oaks College, advert from the St Clements Parish Bazaar Magazine 1928 kindly supplied by Ida Bradshaw, Amberleigh Preparatory School, 1961 m18331,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass  Mr. Dadley’s Grammar School, circa 1911, from the Lloyd Collection

*Carlton House, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Carlton%20House

&

Denbigh Villas ...... the name that was lost and is found, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2018/08/denbigh-villas-name-that-was-lost-and.html

**1911 Balgarie, Miss Edith, 19 Whitelow Road, Barker, Miss Agnes, 8 Yerk Road, Booth Miss Ann Shepley, 41 Holland [Zetland] Road, Brotherton, Misses Adelaide & Eva, 23 Manchester Road, Dadley Mr. C 57-59 High Lane, 55 High Lane, Convent High School for Girls, 55 High Lane, Timaeus, Mis Kathleen, 21 York Road

1961 Amberleigh Preparatory School, Mis F. Ashcroft, 398 Wilbraham Road, The Oaks College, Miss A Haigh, 643 Wilbraham Road

***Advert, Manchester Guardian, June 12th, 1953

****Get Information about a school Gov UK, https://www.get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/Establishments/Establishment/Details/105586

***** Transatlantic Adventure, Guardian, September 17th, 1964 & Easter Island Adventure, Guardian September 22nd 1965

*****Facebook,  https://www.facebook.com/groups/wegrewupinmanchester/posts/3490982651176452/

******School Day out, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YcUreTixHo

Buying that armchair and bed from M E Coupe on the corner of Wilbraham Road in 1985

Now I am never surprised at the interest shown in photographs of Chorlton in the recent past.

In many ways they are more interesting than those from a century and a bit ago and I think it is because it is of a Chorlton many of us can remember and relate to.

That said the passage of even thirty years makes many of them look very dated. 

It is like looking through a dirty window, some of what you see you recognise but the rest is just a little unclear and unreal.

So here is the last of Chorlton in 1985.  The picture has featured before at  WilbrahamRoad where there is the story.

The short life of a Chorlton Post Office ….. and the lost Fleming Hall

 It began life shortly after Chorlton’s main Post Office on Wilbraham Road was badly damaged during the Manchester Blitz in December 1940.

Chorlton Post Office,  Manchester Road, 1941-1961

That Post Office had opened in 1905 and did all things posty till the night of December 24th into the early morning of December 25th when enemy action destroyed many properties across the city including here in Chorlton where thirty people were killed.

Just how soon after that event the Post Office took over number 70 Manchester Road is unclear.

Back in 1929 the site had been home to "Meta Manufacturing Co Ltd" and in 1954 the “Sub Post Office and MO Office” shared the site with “Liner Concrete Machinery Co Ltd service depot”.

But in 1961 we had a brand-new Post Office very close to the original 1905 building, and I guess soon after the temporary Manchester Road premise was vacated.  Just when that will be down to trawling the street directories for the years after 1961.

Chorlton Post Office, Wilbraham Road, 1905-1940

So, a short history but one that still plays a prominent part in some Chorlton people’s memories and perhaps this story will bring forth more accounts of the place.

And in conversations with friends I discovered more about the bomb-damaged Post Office.  For a short while in the 1950s into the 60s, it fronted the Fleming Hall, which was the centre of the local Conservative Party.  This was a bit of our recent past and I am indebted to my old friends and fellow historian Lawrence Beedle who told me it was named after Edward Fleming 1891 - 1950. He was the Tory MP for Withington Constituency 1945 - 1950. He then stood for Moss Side when the boundaries were redrawn and Chorlton was put in that Constituency.

Fleming Hall, Wilbraham Road, 1950?-1963?

It’s the 1950 General Election and sadly Mr.Fleming died on the 17th February during the campaign. I think he took a turn for the worse at his sister’s house on High Lane. Anyway, polling was immediately suspended by all the local parties. The Tories went on to win the General with Winston Churchill.

Moss Side Constituency voted two weeks later and elected Florence Horsborough. She’d lost in Midlothian and Peebles but got another crack at obtaining a seat. Manchester’s first woman MP, first woman in a Conservative cabinet".**

Chorlton Post Office, Wilbraham Road, 1961

Other friends have also shared their recollections of the hall which I wrote about in a series of posts and are available by following the link.***

And that is it.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; Chorlton-cum-Hardy, East Side: Corner of Keppel Road and Manchester Road, looking southeast, showing Chorlton Post Office (No. 70) 1958, m11798, former Post Office, Wilbraham Road, 1959, A.E.Landers, m18242, and in 1961, m18511, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and the Post Office in 1907 from the Lloyd Collection

*Kelly's Directory of Manchester & Salford, 1929 & 1954

** Lawrence Beedle

***Fleming Hall, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=fleming+hall

When Mr & Mrs Allendale sold apples at that shop on the corner of Wilbraham and Keppel

That shop having its makeover, June 2015

Never underestimate the power  of memory,

Recently I reflected on the changes to that shop on the corner of Wilbraham and Keppel Road.

But the occupants of the place during the last century were a bit hazy.

That is until I posted the story and then with the help of a shed full of people those long  lost businesses came flooding back.

Back in 1960 with the Allendale's

In the 1980s into the 90s it was the Cheese and Bacon shop which always seemed very busy and operated that old 19th century maxim of offer the customer a wonderful array of good food as they walk in through the door and display much more in the long window.

We went there and I was sad when it closed.

What I didn’t know was that during the 1940's for two decades it was Allendale's the fruit and veg shop.

Now it had been Pauline Kelly who told me about Allendale’s, and Sandra who found the 1960 picture on the digital archive.

And I bet it will bring back a host more stories.

More so because of the cast iron and glass veranda which occupied the Keppel Road side.

Underneath the veranda, 1960

It can’t think it was original to when the shops were built and must have come down in the late 1960's or 70's but what a wonderful addition it must have been allowing the Allendale’s to serve out on the street in all weathers and capturing passing trade.

Added to which it that pre slick marketing age no one thought that trays of fruit on upturned wooden boxes would deter interested customers.

And that is about it, until more stories come flooding in about the Allendale's, and the cheese and bacon shop which they did just minutes after this was posted.

Lesley Smith remembers that the Cheese & Bacon shop was run by a Mr and Mrs Carney whoretired to Wales.

So the stories aren't over yet.

Picture; the shop on a June day in 2015 from the collection of Andrew Simpson and in 1960 by A E Lander’s m18303, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

Losing another Chorlton ghost sign …….

I rather think if I go back later this afternoon this ghost sign will have gone.

It was uncovered as work progresses on what was “Close”, the “Male Grooming” shop at 539a Wilbraham Road.

It was doing the business of all things male grooming from 2012 and was still last year.

Now for those who don’t know ghost signs are all that remain of a business, or product that no longer exists, and so here we have two, the former sign high up at the top of the building to Close, and uncovered for a brief while that of "J.M. Trophies, Engraving and Shoe Repairs".

I have a vague memory of the trophy shop, but it is vague and may not be real.

But since I have been in Chorlton for fifty years I might have passed it, which just leaves someone to come forward who used the place.

I know that back in 2008 it was "NV The Dawn of a New Era in Tanning" while in 1969 it was home to the Manchester Corporation Rating Office and before that I have yet to discover.  I know that the building dates from around 1904 but that at present is it.

Not that I shall be deterred from finding out more.  There are the street directories which lists businesses, and the Rate Books so with a bit of research the story of 539a Wilbraham Road will be revealed.

As for its future, a quick loo at the City’s Planning Portal has not shown up anything.

Location; Wilbraham Road

Pictures; ghost signs on Wilbraham Road, 2026, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The Lost Chorlton pictures ......... no 15. .........

 Now I am pretty confident that this one will bring up a rich collection of memories.

It continued trading into the 1980s and was a wonderful place where the chesses were piled high and there was pretty much any cheese you wanted.

And l have been corrected by John Paul Moran who tells me it continued trading well in to the 1990s. Thanks John.

Location; Wilbraham Road










Picture; the bacon and cheese shop, 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Looking for a ball of wool, a lb. of apples and much more on Wilbraham Road

I doubt that any one born before 1980 would ever think that the stretch of Wilbraham Road from Albany down to Manchester Road would be populated by a string of fast food outlets, bars and charity shops or that Quarmby’s, Dewhurst’s and Meadow’s would have vanished like snow under a winter sun.

It’s not an original idea I know, but in the space of two decades much traditional retailing has gone.

I miss it, but I recognize that that way of shopping has pretty much gone, and the arrival of the bar culture has at least kept the shops from staying closed.

What follows are two pictures taken some time in the 1950s into the 1960s, of the businesses on Wilbraham Road and Barlow Moor Road.

I could write more, having explored the history of some of the shops, and made comment on the road signs and bus stops, but I won’t.  

However, the challenge is there for anyone what can to trawl their memory and offer up some memories of the shops, or better still some pictures.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; Wilbraham and Barlow Moor Road’s, circa 1950s/60s. from the collection of Dave King

When we still had a furniture shop and a free car park .... down by the Lloyds in 1990

Now I am on a roll again with pictures from our most recent past.

And so here is another of Andy Robertson’s taken I think in the early 1990s.

I will leave you to identify the shops which have gone, along with that little piece of history which was Chorlton’s lost car par, which I think was free, contained also a set of public lavatories, and once a very very long time ago had been a set of tennis courts beside the Lloyds.

Picture;  looking out towards Wilbraham Road, circa 1990, from the collection of Andy Robertson

Looking for "June" The Ladies hairdresser and Busy Bee Stores, sometime in 1930

Looking "June" the Hairdressers on Wilbraham Road

I never underestimate the power of a collection of old local adverts to offer up fascinating stories and pretty much take you all over the place.

So here in front of me are a set of those adverts which appeared on the dust jacket of a book lent out by Mr R. Greig Wilson who owned a newsagents on Sandy Lane and also ran one of our Circulating libraries.

Now circulating libraries were private affairs and existed alongside the local public library, and such was the demand for novels and lighter factual material that many of our newsagents went into business renting books out.

Busy Bee

At home in London mother was a regular at the local bookshop who also traded in lending copies and across Chorlton there were quite a few, from the one that operated on Beech Road, to Mr Lloyd’s on
Upper Chorlton Road and of course R. Greig Wilson’s on Sandy Lane.

It is a topic I have visited quite a few times over the years and no doubt will return to.

But for today my attention has been drawn to Busy Bee Stores  (W. Wellard, Proprietor) at 264 Upper Chorlton Road, and “June” The Ladies’ Hairdresser and Beauty Specialist on Broadwalk Wilbraham Road.

It will take some time to date the collection of adverts and that will involve trawling the directories but I think they will be from the 1930s.

Not that Mr Grieg has been much of a help for he was selling his “Stationary, Tobacco and Picture postcards” along with delivering his newspapers from at least 1911.

That said it will be after 1911 because down on Upper Chorlton Road at 264 was a Mr John Joseph Taylor who was a tailor.

Now Mr Wellard was trading as an iron monger at the shop by 1929 and Charles Slightman who also advertised on the dust cover was selling his newspapers and lending out his collection of over 1,000 books from his lending library on Manchester Road from 1923 through to 1935 so we are in the right decade and a bit.

"June"

And until those directories yield up a definite date I am settling for sometime in the 1930s for it was around then that “June” at the Broadwalk began Permanent Waving by the Nestlé System which was the "Radione" system in which the hair was wound dry and inserted into hollow cellophane tubes sealed at both ends, but contained moistened paper”*

Long along Wilbraham Road circa 1930s

She was in her saloon at 523 Wilbraham Road by 1929 but Karl Nessler who had perfected his alternative method of curling hair in 1905 using a mixture of cow urine and water did not come up with the improvement which he called the Nestlé System until the 30’s.

“June” charged 20/- for the process and also offered "Tinting, Manicure, Face Massage , [and] all kinds of hair work carried out by experts.”

I have often wondered whether her customers were aware that Mr Nessler had arrived in Britain from Germany in 1901 and facing being interned when the Great War broke out fled to America, or that during his first experiments on his wife he managed to burn her hair off and cause some scalp burns.

That advert for an early perm, circa 1905

All of which is a complete digression but is one of the fascinating little journeys behind which there is a serious point because together the eleven adverts will reveal a little bit more about the Chorlton of just eighty or so years ago.

And in one of those nice little twist of coincidences, 264 Upper Chorlton Road is again a hardware store specialising in much the same stuff as Busy Bee which along with offering “Glass and China [as] a speciality offered “Electric Vacuum cleaners for Hire.”

But there the coincidences stop for now where “June" permed and manicured the present proprietor offers sweets and newspapers which I suppose has almost brought us full circle.

Pictures, adverts from the dust cover of a book courtesy of Margaret Connelly, Wilbraham Road in 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson and an  early 20th century advertisement for Nessler's permanent wave machine, transferred by SreeBot, Wikipedia

*Perm (hairstyle), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perm_(hairstyle)

Nightingale’s, and an old 78 RPM ............. a little bit of our retail past on Wilbraham Road

Now I wonder if anyone remembers Nightingales the electrical shop which traded from 436 Wilbraham Road.

Like most of the strip of shops along the stretch from Keppel to Albany no 436  is now a fast food out let but back in the middle decades of the last century Nightingale’s sold all things electrical and by 1960 had an impressive range of televisions, transistor radios, fridges and washing machines in its window.

Now I know it was there by 1938 and still there in 1960 by a chance find and three photographs from the Manchester Digital collection.

The chance find was an old 78 RPM record of the Boston Promenade Orchestra performing the Ritual Fire Dance and the Conclusion to Bolero conducted by Arthur Fiedler.

And the catalogue number dated the record to 1938 while the perfectly preserved dust cover offered up the Nightingale name and the address of both the Chorlton shop and another at 58 Wilmslow Road in Withington.

At which point I can claim little credit for the find or much of the subsequent research.

It was Andy Robertson’s son who came across the record and Andy who went looking in Manchester's  digital collection, leaving me the easy job of hunting down the record in the HMV catalogue.

In time I am sure there will be people who offer up all sorts of memories of the shop, what they bought there and perhaps a beginning and end date to the business.

For now I shall just reflect that it wasn’t too long ago that high streets and more humble parades of shops could boast a full range of shopping experiences from the wool shop, electrical business along with DIY, hardware and the odd travel agents.

So there you have it a bit of our consumer past on Wilbraham Road, with just one last observation that it had gone by 1969.

Additional research by Andy Robertson

Pictures; record and dustcover, circa 1938 from the collection of Andy Robertson and Nightingale’s on Wilbraham Road, 1960, A E Landers, m18308 & m18307, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

It’s the little bits of Chorlton’s history that can be fascinating ……… the other billiard hall

I bet I won’t be the only one who has passed 446 Wilbraham Road and not given it a second glance.

Two shops hiding a secret, 2021

Today 466 is the Admiral Casino and its neighbour the Royal Cod, and slip back a few years and the two properties were occupied by Quick Silver and a Touch of Class.

Beyond that I must confess I can’t remember …. but someone will know.

They may even be able to offer up a detailed history of the building which always struck me as out of keeping with that stretch of the road, especially as the present east side of the closed Precinct had been a row of five Victorian houses.

Years ago I had gone looking for the story, but pretty much had given up after discovering the plot had been a vacant slot of land as late as 1907, and built on by 1933.

The unromantic side of that former billiard hall, 2024

And then as so often happens in the middle of doing some research I came across the information that in 1929 it was a billiard hall owned by W.R. Bridgens & Co Ltd and was fronted by Malley and Adamson, opticians and Simon Beattie, tobacconist.

There does appear to have been a third shop front which shows up on the 1952 OS map but this may have been a later subdivision of the other two.

I have Anthony Petrie to thank for the update as he was trawling his collection of street directories for me and came up with the names associated to the building.

And he also identified that in 1962 the three shops fronts were occupied by a “ladies hairdresser, estate agent and optician”

And like so much research it just begs heaps of further questions.  

Can we push the date of the billiard hall back?  When did it close?  Was it a rival to the Temperance Billiard Hall on Manchester Road?  What more is there to find out about W.R. Bridgens & Co Ltd, and is there any one out there who used the hall more recently.

Hall and shops in the distance, 1959

So many questions.

Location; Wilbraham Road

Pictures, The shop fronts of the former Billiard Hall, 2021, courtesy of Google maps, and down the side of the hall, 2024 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and the hall in 1959 by A.H. Downes, m17486, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

Losing Fleming Hall in Chorlton

How easy it is to lose a building.  

1961

In this case it was Fleming Hall which in the 1950s and 1960s was used by various organizations but has long since all but passed out of living memory.

I say almost passed out of living memory but not quite, because my old friend Wendy emailed me yesterday with, “Fleming Hall was on Wilbraham Road and I thought it was where the Post Office now is but the Chorlton Townswomen's Guild held their last meeting in the Hall on the 15 October 1963 according to their Minutes,  but on page 159 of your book, "The Quirks of Chorlton-cum-Hardy" there  is a photograph of ‘The New Post Office 1961’.  

1961

It could have been where Sue Ryder's charity shop is, but it would have covered more land”.

And that set me going, because this spot was the home of the old Chorlton Post Office which was damaged when neighbouring houses were destroyed during the Manchester Blitz in the December of 1940.

Looking at photographs from the period it is possible that Fleming Hall was located in what had been that bit of the Post Office that survived the bombing.

I asked Oliver Bailey for help and it remembered “Fleming Hall on Wilbraham Road, on the left hand side heading towards Barlow Moor Road junction maybe forty metres past where Corkland Rd comes in, almost opposite where Stevensons the hairdressers were, and H T Burt/ Brown Brothers, right next to where the parade of shops started that continues to the traffic lights.

My recollection is that it was used a lot by the Conservatives for various get- togethers, dances, young conservatives, whist drives and so on. 

1959

It might even have been owned by them as I remember on several occasions moving stuff, including chairs and tables from there to one of the fields off Wilbraham Road in the stretch past St Werburghs, beyond Morville Road. 

On one occasion we even had to move an upright piano down the steps of the Fleming Hall and get it into the back of my father's land rover as there was going to be some dancing at one of the Fetes and offload it. All done by muscle power. But young conservatives generally responded well to the whip.

Internal layout; at the end away from Wilbraham road there was a stage for jollifications and speechifying, then the body of the hall and nearest Wilbraham Road a kitchen of sorts, but only for brewing tea and coffee and cutting up cakes. I think there might have been offices above the kitchen and loos, but memory is hazy on that”.

1907

All of which chimes in with the two images from 1959 and 1961, which clearly show the sign announcing the Conservative Party Committee Rooms and an election poster on the side of the building.

And for those with a keen eye for detail, the front of the building matches that of the old post office.
But, and there always is a but, Oliver added, “I don't remember it looking like the old Post Office though clearly someone kept the entrance structure for a while”.

So, there is still more to find out, including who actually took over the bomb-damaged Post Office, converted it into the Fleming Hall, and who was Fleming? Wendy remembers a prominent Chorlton individual named Fleming and I think we can rule out Sir Alexander Fleming.

Finally, I don’t yet have a date for its demolition, although I know it will be before 1969, because in that year the site is listed as the Maypole Grocers, which later became Lipton’s and is now Sue Ryder.

And after 1963 when the Chorlton Townswomen Guild met there.

So that is that, ………… I now just await someone with a story or a picture of the place.

And not long after the post went live, Lawrence commented that "Saw your post on Fleming Hall and in case you didn’t know……

Named after Edward Fleming 1891 - 1950. He was the Tory MP for Withington Constituency 1945 - 1950. He then stood for Moss Side when the boundaries were redrawn and Chorlton was put in that Constituency.

It’s the 1950 General Election and sadly Mr.Fleming died on the 17th February during the campaign. I have got somemore details I can dig out. I think he took a turn for the worse at his sister’s house on High Lane. Anyway polling was immediately suspended by all the local parties. The Tories went on to win the General with Winston Churchill.

Moss Side Constituency voted two weeks later and elected Florence Horsborough. She’d lost in Midlothian and Peebles but got another crack at obtaining a seat. Manchester’s first woman MP, first woman in a Conservative cabinet".

And this I didn't know.

And Anne, responded almost immediately with "Fleming Hall used to be where the Sue Rider shop is, I remember going there for Christmas and Birthday parties in the 1960s" with Margaret adding, "I remember going to a dance there when I was at Whalley Range High School. Probably a barn dance as we had a club after school of country dancing to which boys from Chorlton Grammar attended. That would be about 1955/6/7".

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; Former Post Office, Wilbraham Road, 1959, A.E.Landers, m18242, and in 1961, m18511, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and the Post Office in 1907 from the Lloyd Collection

So, who did pay for the Chorlton Conservative Club back in 1891? ……… And why it matters

Now there will be some who dismiss the question either because they hold no time for the Conservative Party and others who can’t see the relevance given that the club was sold off around 2013 and was converted it into residential use.

The end of the story, the Conservative Club, 2013

But for over 120 years it was one of our biggest buildings, and with its clocktower was a local landmark.

Added to which, plenty of people will have attended all sorts of dos in what was the Public Hall, along with quite a few well-known actors who performed in repertory companies on the stage of that Public Hall.

And for anyone interested in our history, knowing who helped pay for its construction will help offer up a better understanding of who voted Conservative in Chorlton  in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as well as providing an insight into Chorlton-cum-Hardy, just as the township was evolving from an agricultural community into a suburb of Manchester.

I have long been intrigued by those who took a risk and subscribed in the new Conservative Club which opened in Chorlton in 1892 and have written about them. *

The share book opened on February 20th, 1891, and between that date and November 7th of the same year, 118 signed on the dotted line handing over a minimum of £1, with some putting down a lot more.

Mary Jane Weeks takes a punt, 1891

So far, I have only analysed the first 50 and they are an interesting cross section.

As you would expect there were a few individuals who bought between £100 and £250 in one purchase, while sliding down the scale there were quite a few buying just one share.  Of those that splashed out, one was the MP, John William McLaren of Whalley Range, another was a merchant and another two described themselves as engineers.

At the other end over a third bought shares worth between £10 down to £1, and as you would expect their occupations were also more modest, with a collection of clerks, shop keepers and craftsmen.

The Register, 1891

The largest single group of subscribers were professionals, including John William McLaren MP, a doctor and architect, three engineer’s and our own Charles Ireland who described himself a “Photo Artist” with a chain of Photographic Studios in Manchester and across the Northwest.

Occupations of the first 50 subscribers, 1891

But there were also plenty of businessmen, some who still made a living from the land, and commercial and traveling salesmen and one who was employed in a warehouse.

And with a few notable exceptions, most of our subscribers lived in properties on roads which were cut between 1880 and 1890.

These were the homes of the middling people who rented or bought properties on Albany, Chequers, and Stockton Roads as well as Oak Avenue and Whitelow Road. There's were the substantial tall semi detached houses, home to many who worked in the city but like the "country feel" of Chorlton, which still had plenty of open land.

Most of the 82 I have so far looked at were men, but there were a few women, and one in particular who gave her occupation as domestic servant.

She was Mary Jane Weeks who held shares amounting to £2. She had been born in 1849, in the small market town of Hathereigh in Devon, and was working as a servant by 1871.

Two decades later she was employed by the Adams family in their house on Chequers Road. Her employer, Mrs. Elizabeth de Worth Adams, had also taken out a subscription for £20 and both ceased membership in February 1900.

It may be that Ms. Weeks followed her boss in to subscribing on the basis that this was a venture worth investing in.

Of course, we will never know.  She died in January 1917 and was buried in Southern Cemetery.

The next task will be to research each of those early subscribers and in particular to dig deeper into their occupations because it has always been easy to categories some of them.

Share holdings of the first 50 subscriber, 1891

So I can be pretty sure Mr. Arnold Bryce Smith was one of our more wealthy inhabitants, for while he described himself as a “Calico Printer” he lived in the fabulously big house called Rye Bank which was on Edge Lane. *

But the jury is out on Mr. William Chester Thompson, of Manchester who listed his occupation as brewer, although as he subscribed £25 I think he was not from the factory floor.

It really all will be down to the detail.  That said some are easier to identify, like Mathew Henry Holland of the Horse and Jockey, Mr. and Mrs. Lomax who farmed the land around Hough End Hall or the prestigious Samuel Gratrix of West Point on the border with Whalley Range.

The New Conservative Club, Chorlton-cum-Hardy, 1892

Leaving lots of the “middling people” who were clerks, shop keepers and salesmen.

All in all, the register will gives us a fascinating insight into the Chorlton of the 1890s.  Not all the subscribers will have voted Conservative, and some may just have fancied an investment while others may even have just wanted to join a club.

We shall see.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; The Conservative Club in 2013 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, in 1892 from the Manchester Courier, April 30th, 1892. and the cover and a page from the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Conservative Club, Limited, Register of Members, 1891

*Chorlton Conservative Club Financing, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Chorlton%20Conservative%20Club%20Finances

**Register of Members Chorlton-cum-Hardy Conservative Club Limited 1892-96

***Rye Bank, Edge Lane, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Rye%20Bank

Chorlton’s palace of varieties …………. part one ....... The Chorlton Pavilion and Winter Gardens

Now there is always more to find out about our old theatres and cinemas, and so it is with the Chorlton Theatre and Winter Gardens, which is an old favourite of mine. *

It was situated just over the railway bridge on Wilbraham Road on what is now Morrison’s petrol station.

Until now I had just one photograph and a few memories from Ann Love’s dad who saw Tom Mix the American film star in a western sometime in the early 1920s

But in the space of a few days there is much more.  I now have a detailed description of what it was like, evidence of its chequered history and the names of those who walked its boards and the plays they performed in.

The actual date of its opening is still a little hazy.  I thought it opened in 1904, but I can be certain it was up and running by1906 when a Walter Broadhurst of 71 Nicolas Road applied for a license to put on shows at the “Chorlton Pavilion adjoining Chorlton Railway Station”, which were followed up by yearly applications thereafter.

In the June of 1907, The Stage carried the notice that Messrs. Levy and Cardwell were performing their “musical Comedy, Little Paul Pry” with an appeal from the managers of the Theatre wanting “Musical Comedies, Burlesques Opera Light Drama” for slots in July into September asserting that “Good Companies do well.  Packed nightly”. **

And that was all to be expected, given that there had been a housing boom in Chorlton which from the 1880s had seen the area around the Three Banks go from open fields to rows of houses, which catered for the “middling people” who worked in town in a range of professional, clerical and entrepreneurial businesses.

These were the very people with money in their pockets who also supported a range of cultural and sporting groups and clubs and will have been a ready audience for a place of varieties.
And this was not lots on a group of businessmen who in 1910 founded the Chorlton Entertainments Ltd.  Their prospective argued “that there was a want of a high-class theatre and place of entertainment in Chorlton a district which is well known”.

To this end they had bought the old theatre for £700 including the “furniture, fixtures, electrical and other fittings, scenery” and “the goodwill attached to the said Pavilion and to the business”

It was an ambitious plan which saw the addition of land laid out as a "Winter Gardens”, which was incorporated into the new name of the Chorlton Pavilion and Winter Gardens”.
And the business plan fully recognised that the site was “in the centre of the populous and growing township of Chorlton-cum-Hardy adjoins the railway station and  is within two minutes’ walk of the Manchester electric tramways [and] within easy access of Moss Side, Fallowfield, Withington, Didsbury, Old Trafford, Stretford, Sale and Urmston, with an estimated population of one hundred and fifty thousand”

Its five directors lived in Whalley Range, Levenshulme and Gorton, and listed their professions as broker, Assurance manager, supply company manager and solicitor’s clerk, and included as one of its auditors Mr. H. D. Morrhouse who was later to establish a popular chain of cinemas of which the Pavilion would later be part of.

But I will close with a description of the newly opened theatre from March 1910.
“It is situated close to the railway station, and is a fine, commodious, and spacious building, standing within its own grounds, which are laid out as gardens; hence the appellation Winter Gardens.  

The building is of corrugated iron on a brick foundation, the exterior being painted a green colour, whilst the entrance is plain, and effective in a white fibrous plaster, with several rows of electric lamps, which gives it a bright appearance when it is lit up.  The seating capacity is a 1,000.

The orchestra stalls and stalls, which are now fitted with tip-up seats, upholstered in crimson velvet, can accommodate 500 persons.  

The pit and promenade seat another 500.  The stage has an opening of 23 ft., and extends from the footlights to exterior wall, 28 ft. 6 in.  There are four commodious dressing -rooms, the ladies on one side and the gentlemen on the other.  

The dressing rooms are spacious and supplied with every convenience and can be heated as required.  

There is a complete electrical installation, and the heating is on the Radium principle.  For the opening week Miss Florence Baine’s company with Miss. Lancashire, Limited, have been secured and on a Monday a house packed in all parts gave a demonstrative welcome to the popular farce, Miss Madge Grey as the blunt Lancashire Lass”. ***

It was also the venue for shows by our own Chorlton Operatic Society and hosted at least one large political meeting by the Unionist Party in 1913.

Tomorrow; dark days, strange stories and its time as our first cinema

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; Chorlton Pavilion and Winter Gardens, circa 1906, from the Lloyd Collection

*Chorlton Pavilion and Winter Gardens, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Chorlton%20Theatre%20and%20Winter%20Gardens

**The Stage, June 27th, 1907

***The Chorlton Entertainments Ltd, Manchester Guardian, January 8th, 1910

Never be surprised at what you find on Wilbraham Road ............. nurses and Red a Cross Hospital

Now this is just the start of that story of a Red Cross hospital on Wilbraham Road and at this stage I have no idea where it will lead.

Until recently I knew that during the Great War the Red Cross ran two hospitals in Chorlton, one in the Sunday school of the Baptist Church on Edge Lane and the other in the Sunday School on Manchester Road.

The first opened in 1914 and the second must date from sometime in 1916 or 1917.

But given the demand for hospital beds I have always wondered if there were not more.

Just down the road in Whalley Range and south into Didsbury a number of private homes were given over to the Red Cross so it seemed logical that Chorlton must have had its own share of smaller Red Cross establishments.

That said none have turned up in the records of which the best is a book by the Red Cross on their work in east Lancashire which offers up a wealth of detail about the hospitals they ran.

But the book was published in 1916 and concentrates on those hospitals which had been set up between 1914-15 and so while the hospital on Edge Lane is included the one on Manchester Road is absent.

So I was intrigued when Pawel Lech Michalczyk told me that “the house next to the Chorlton Conservative Club is listed as a hospital in 1917.  It was Wycombe, and described as an auxiliary military hospital in the 1917 Slater's street directory.”

Now that set me off looking and back in 1911 Wycombe was home to Mr and Mrs Barnes, their four children and Miss Mary Jane Williams who was 27 and employed as a domestic servant.

Mr Williams described himself a “Merchant” and is listed in the 1911 directory as the “Managing Directory of James Barnes Ltd.”

Now Wycombe is a big house which was described as having 12 rooms making it large enough to have been run as a small auxiliary hospital.

And that is where the story stops, but I rather think it will only be a pause.

Picture;  picture postcard possibly Willow Bank Red Cross Hospital, circa 1914 courtesy of David Harrop,

Hair, .....accesories ..... and sunbeds ....... Stevenson's..... and Chorlton's history through its shopping bags

Now generations of people will remember with fondness the hairdressing business of Stevenson.*

J. R. Stevenson, 1910

For many it was where you went to have your hair done, or buy those must have accessories, and of course it provided employment for lots of young people, from those doing Saturday jobs to those training to be "Stylists to the stars".

It is a place I have written about, and its presence here in Chorlotn pretty much spans the last century, first on Barlow Moor Road and then on Wilbraham Road.

My interest was reignited when Annie Keogh offered up this bag from the shop, which is an appropriate image of where we shopped and kicks off a new series on Chorlton's history through its shopping bags. 

 Now that's a zippy title.

Included in the series will be many of businesses which defined Chorlton, from Kingspot and Hanbury's to the big chains like Liptons and Safeway.

And of course I am always open to more contributions.

Hair, cosmetics and fancy goods, date unknown

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; The shopping bag, date unknow, courtesy of Annie Keogh, and advert for J.R.Stevenson’s, 1908 from the Souvenir of the Grand Wesleyan Church Bazaar, 1908, courtesy of Philip Lloyd

*Almost a century of cutting hair on Wilbraham Road with the Stevenson family, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2020/04/almost-century-of-cutting-hair-on.html

**"Stylist to the Stars" is a lift from Carol Ardern's shop at All Saints who proudly proclaimed its connection to show business in the 1970s.