Wishing you were here, Eltham in the past Nu 3 Eltham Green

We have walked west from the parish church and have just about reached Eltham Green.

In the distance are those fine detached and semi detached houses built in the late 1840s.

And some at least of the land on the northern side was Glebe Rectoral land which went with the other benefices of the local clergy.

Over to our right hard by the road was the pound which was the area designated to take stray animals until their owner could be found and fined.

Picture; The Eltham Green from the Eltham End, 1909,   from The story of Royal Eltham, R.R.C. Gregory, 1909 and published on The story of Royal Eltham, by Roy Ayers, http://www.gregory.elthamhistory.org.uk/bookpages/i001.htm

Summer days in south Manchester No 8 on the meadows circa 1900

It’s a picture that often crops up in the collections and the reason is obvious.

For while large parts of Chorlton were fast being built over, the meadows and the area between the brook and the Mersey remained open land.

Now this was mainly because we are on the flood plain of the river and back then people were well aware that you don’t build on a flood plain.

And when you do the houses are apt to be washed away as were the two cottages in Hardy which were flooded out in the mid 19th century and abandoned.

So this area was developed as meadowland and in the summer months was a perfect place to come and walk.

The bridge was one of those used to cross the irrigation channels which crossed the land and were used to flood the fields.

Picture; summer on the Meadows, circa 1900 from the Lloyd collection

Back on Alex Road South with a college, the park and two missing houses

The entrance to the college

Yesterday I wandered out and found that house next to St Edmunds on Alex Road South and pondered its future.

It is not quite clear what is happening to it but its two neighbours went a long time ago and in so doing provided accommodation for a lot more people than the occupants at numbers 18 and 20 in the spring of 1911.

These were the two houses which stood on the plot of land which runs up to Mayfield Road.

In 1911, number 18 was occupied by Martha Murphy aged 70, her sister Mary Watts, 74, Elizabeth Watts, 72 along with Lucy Kathleen Warrior who was 46 and Sophia Fildes also in her 70s who was visiting.

St Edmund's Church and the homes of Mrs Chapman, Mrs Murphy and Mrs Lord 

Now as you do I was drawn in to the household.  Elizabeth Watts was described as a servant, while Miss Warrior described herself as a Nursing sister, which made sense given the advanced ages of the other three.

And I have to say I rather think they must have rattled around in what was an eleven roomed property.

Next door at number 20 Mrs Lord and her three daughters shared the ten rooms with a servant and Mr Joshia Freldendred who was a Builders Merchant.

The park directly opposite the college

All of which is an introduction to the magnificent St Bede’s which is best seen on a bright sunny day rather than wet grey ones which give the place a rather gloomy appearance. It dates from the early 1880s and I have to confess was a place a rarely spent much time looking at.

But not so the park directly opposite.  We have spent pleasant times there with the children attended various musical and political events and marvel still at how pleasant the place is.

It was opened in 1868 and covers a 60 acre site.

So there you have it, not bad for a morning out on Alex Road South as the sun shone.

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and detail of the park and road from the OS for South Lancashire, 1888-93, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

On Alexandra Road South pondering the future of house in 2013 ......... and the correction seven years on

Staverton House, 2013

I wonder the fate of this house on Alexandra Road South.

Long ago its two neighbours disappeared to be replaced by a block of flats which themselves look to be in the first stages of a makeover.

Now I have passed it countless times over the last thirty-seven years and never given it a second glance.

Well I say that but because it is almost directly behind the bus stop I guess I have looked at it but it never registered, stuck as it is along the road that takes in the impressive St Bede’s, that block of flats and St Edmund’s.

I haven’t a date for it yet but it was there by 1891 and I guess a search through the directories will fix it sometime in the decade before.

In 1911 it was home to Mrs Elizabeth Chapman her four grown up children and Annie Bickerstaff who was the 26 year old the servant from Frodsham in Cheshire.

Staverton House as it was known was an impressive place with eleven rooms and a fairly large garden with the added attraction of the park directly opposite.

The family were there by 1891 having moved sometime in the decade before from Bishop Street which was off Great Western Street.

Josiah her husband described himself variously as a chemist, and photographic chemist with his own shop at & Albert Square.

Now I do not think we are dealing with some small time operator, for he styled himself “Chapman Joshia Thomas, photographic chemist and manufacturer of and dealer in photographic apparatus and chemicals.” *

Albert Sq and No 7, Chapman Joshia Thomas, circa 1903

His business was situated on the ground floor of the large commercial building running from Tasle Alley down to Brazenose Street opposite the statue of Prince Albert and the Town Hall which made it a prominent place to sell photographic equipment.

He had been born in Staverton in Wiltshire which pretty much explains the name of the house.

But as ever there are gaps in their story. I have no record of their marriage or their deaths, which is one of those things that happen.

The references will be out there but are proving elusive.  But their eldest son was born in 1873, and two years earlier Joshia was single and living as a lodger in Moss Side.

All of which is a long way from our house and its future which I shall watch with interest.

And seven years after the story was posted, I have a correction, from Lawrence Richards, who is the
Great grandson of Josiah Chapman. "Hi Andrew, In fact I don’t think this is Staverton but the house next door to where Staverton was. I believe this house is 18 Alexandra Road South and Staverton was 16. 

From an old picture we have of Staverton it is a different design and also the gate was on the right of the house whereas this one is on the left. I believe the plot where Staverton was is now occupied by a modern building attached to St Edmund’s Church, so as far as I can see, sadly the house no longer exists. 

You can see this on streetview on Google Maps".

Now that's a picture I would like to see.

Pictures; the house from the collection of Andrew Simpson, detail of the commercial building on Albert Square from Goads Fire Insurance maps, 1880-1900, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Slaters Manchester, Salford and Surburban Directory, 1903

Summer days in south Manchester No 4 the Beech Road Festival

Now it is that time of year and yesterday was the Beech Road Festival, or to give it its new name the Family Fun Day.

And a lot hangs on the change of name for what had started as a small event to raise money for the Rec and draw local people together grew to monster proportions,

The amusement rides grew bigger as did the crowds and for some it became an event to endure.

We always looked forward to it, invited friends down and passed the day in the Rec and later in the back garden listening to the music.

And like our neighbours it was a matter of getting in the food, checking out the assorted deck chairs cool box and car rugs and making sure that there was plenty of change to hand out to the lads who never tired of the rides and the stalls on Beech Road.

But the Festival of 2011 exceeded the rest in the numbers who converged on Beech Road and by common local consent it was time for a break.

And now it is back, as a family fun day, with the accent on small manage able events on the Rec and on the green, no bands but a chance to sit and play with the kids.

What lingers in my mind long after the music, swirly amusements rides  and the debris of discarded litter  was the Brookburn Steel Band performing on a wet drizzly day outside the old box factory along with  Murial's face painting stall, which combined face art with fresh strawberries.

Of course over the years plenty of street traders were drawn to the event.  Some were selling interesting art as well as food while a few I suspect were there just for the main chance.

All that we need is the weather.  And there was a time when it seemed the weather alternated between cold grey days with rain and very hot ones.

Which meant depending on which ever one we had had the year before you bought the sun cream or made sure the wellies jumpers and rain hats were ready.

One in particular still lingers in my memory when after a torrential downpour something like 2011 of our Joshua's friends made for the house and every towel we possessed was pressed into service.

Or the year when the rain just fell like stair rods all day and only a brave hardy few stuck it out under the protection of the trees listening to the bands.




Pictures; of past festivals from the collection of Andrew Simpson 

My old Nokia

It was so long ago that I can’t even remember which Nokia model this was, but it was my first mobile phone. I don’t count the brick I briefly rented around 1994, it was very heavy not easy to use and really at the time there were few people I wanted to contact using it.

Now I got thinking about phones, and smart phones after listening to a sketch on The Now Show on BBC Radio 4.  It was a simple enough idea, the chap phones his mobile company and asks for a down grade, “to a phone which just allows you to call people, send texts and play snake with a battery which doesn’t run out by lunch time.”


All of which I suppose ranks me with the dinosaur or those people who welcomed the rule that a man with a red flag had to walk in front of motor cars.

I did try a smart phone. In fact I tried two. First I went with Nokia who I have always been with, but the screen was too small so following my partner’s advice I tried a different model only to realize that I wasn’t smart enough to use either of them.

Now one of my friends just thinks they are the bee’s knees, allowing him to send emails track where he is, where he was, and where he might want to go, along with accessing his emails, facebook and twitter. So this is the future, and my old Nokia which didn't even have a camera is as antiquated as the wireless and the telegram.

In the same way my friend Lawrence reflected on the demise of the postcard on his excellent blog, Hardy Lane Scrapbook*, http://hardylane.blogspot.com/2012/02/making-new-archives.html
“The long and short of it is they are no longer around. Eventually I did obtain an amusing one from a shop called Number 68 on Beech Road. They brought an old box of them from out of the back. Who needs postcards now - too slow to communicate, it takes days, too expensive to mail, 60p for the old card, plus 35p postage.”


Nevertheless I did downgrade back to an older Nokia which I now see has become obsolete. It is only the second I have got since that first Nokia and I still remember it with affection. It was not unlike the old Morris Minor car, simple and reliable. And unlike its smart successor could be dropped on the pavement and still work happily. The old one went on to to be used by two of my sons when their more sophisticated models gave up the ghost or were lost and is I think somewhere in the house much scratched and battered and held together with tape.

Picture; A cherished first Nokia

Travelling with the Manchester Ship Canal in 1927

Now like most people I have always taken the Manchester Ship Canal for granted. 

I remember the noise from the ships’ sirens welcoming in the New Year,  failed to notice the canal’s decline and have watched as the Salford end reinvented itself with an art gallery, theatre, war museum and Media City.*

It was begun in 1887, took six years to build and cost £15 million and was one of those bold commercial ventures which ranks with the building of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway fifty years earlier.**

And as a way of celebrating its construction and its role in the prosperity of the twin cities, here is one of the posters advertising its work from the 1920s and 30s by courtesy of Adge Lane.

*In 1958 38 million tons of freight came through the Canal which had fallen to 7.8 million tons by 2001.
**Opened in 1830, and was instantly a success.

Picture; from the collection of Adge Lane, from the Manchester Archive Flickr account