In Hulme at the Brook Building reflecting on Didsbury

Now there will be some who mourned the end of Didsbury’s association with teacher training which began in the 1940s and its even longer link with theology students which went back another full century.

I have to say I was one of them partly because I like tradition and because I was there for a year in the early 1970s.

But I have to concede that most of the buildings had run their course.

So the move to Hulme five years ago was bold and exciting and not that long ago I was given my own tour of the new building by my old friend Pierre.

It is truly a building for the 21st century with technology to keep it warm in winter, cool in summer and even withstand a once in a century storm.

More than that it offers both students and staff an amazing place to work and learn.

And of course it does seem to be giving a lift to the local economy, after all with so many students living in the surrounding properties there is a demand for everything bread and milk to fast food and places to liner over slow food.

I am well aware that some in Didsbury had long been uncomfortable at the presence of so many students amongst their midst in term time, and I also wonder if their wholesale passing has been missed.

But then Didsbury’s loss is Hulme’s gain.

Location; Hulme

Picture; looking out of the Brook Building and the Spanish Steps, 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Waiting for Carry on Down Up the High Street

For those who live in Eltham Ryan’s picture will be familiar, and for those who don’t it will be a reminder that the “Flicks” will be returning to the High Street.

And I choose that word carefully because when our first cinema made its appearance in Eltham at the start of the last century the work flicks was a popular name for the cinema.

It was one I still used in the late 1950s and early 60s, when the ABC stood in the High Street, along with  its neighbors on Well Hall Road, and Eltham Hill.

And that is it, except to thank Ryan for sending the image up.

Location; Eltham

Picture; new cinema, Eltham High Street, 2019, courtesy of Ryan Ginn

The places I usually don’t photograph ...................nu 1 that other entrance

It was September 2014 and I was  on my way to meet up.

Location; Mr Thomas’s St Ann’s Alley

Picture; Mr Thomas’s St Ann’s Alley, 2014 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The lost 1950’s collection ....... No 3 Eastbourne “wishing I was somewhere else"

Now this is not a sideswipe at Eastbourne and its attractions, just an observation that for many of us growing up in the 1950s, the seaside may have been magic as a child but was never guaranteed to deliver hours of constant sunshine.

And judging by the overcoats and that strong wind the day this picture was taken was one of those moments which were less about glorious summer and more “when do the pubs open?

I may be wrong and for that I apologies to Eastbourne and all those who had a good time by the sea in the 1950s.

Location; Eastbourne












Picture; Eastbourne, circa 1950 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Making their home in Chorlton, nu 2 the Clarke Family

The sales transaction, 1860

The Clarke family arrived on Chorlton in 1860 and worked the smithy on Beech Road for nearly 100 years.

I know this because I have a copy of the sale transaction he made between himself and the widow Elizabeth Lowe. He paid £55 for the “Goodwill, fixtures about the forge. Also the pig sty and wooden shed.....”

It is a remarkable document for many reasons. Not only does it shed light on what was in the smithy but it is in Clarke’s own handwriting which makes it one of only two dozen or so personal records from the period to have survived. But there is more.

This was a time when many were still illiterate and Elizabeth Lowe was one of these. Just a decade before in 1851, 45% of the women who were married gave a mark rather than a signature on the marriage certificate.

The Clarke family were to remain on the Row well into the 20th century, and their shop would have been at the heart of the rural community.

John Clarke and before him William Davis supplied the needs of the village, repairing broken tools, forging new ones and shoeing horses.

Charles Clarke, date unknown

When he was hammering and heating at his forge on the Row he acted as a magnate for people. Some coming to collect a repaired tool or bringing a horse which was in need of a new shoe would stop and pass the time of day.

And there were always requests to personalise a farm tool. This might mean making a left handed scythe or widening or narrowing hoe blades used to chop out weeds. Then there would be the endless procession of labourers needing tools sharpened from bill hooks and scythes to axes and all the other types of edged tools.

In the process William might well replace the broken or split staves

And all the time, gangs of children attracted to the smithy by the red hot metal and frequent shower of sparks would stand and stare rooted to the spot. Marjorie Holmes remembers being late for school in the 1930s because she, like countless young people before her had been lost in the magic of the smithy.

But as busy as they were they could still pose for a photograph, and so sometime in 1913 John’s son Charles stood outside the smithy and had his picture taken.

He was 55 and still lived beside the forge. He had been married for over 26 years and he and his wife Sarah had five children.

The two boys had followed their father into the trade. In the 1911 census John described himself as a plumber, and Charles the younger son as a blacksmith striker.

Lillian the eldest of the daughters described herself as a machinist while Ethel worked in a laundry and Florence was still at school...

Charles Clarke Junior, 1893

One of the boys was also active in the Chorlton Brass Band and in the summer of 1893 was also photographed when the band played at Barlow Hall. Sadly he was to die in Gallipoli in June 1915 aged 23.

Pictures; sale of the smithy October 1860, picture of Charles Clark, 1913 Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, picture of Charles Clark, DPA 328.18, 
Courtesy of Greater Manchester Archives, and photograph of Charles Clarke junior 1893 from the collection of Alan Brown

The lost 1950’s collection ....... No 2 eating tapas in London

The second in a series taken from a selection postcards produced in the 1950s.

I like this one, it is of the Ronda Room in Martinez Spanish Restaurant on Swallow Street off Piccadilly in London.

The restaurant opened in 1923, survived the death of its owner in 1951 and continued for another three decades.

I was drawn to it by the unabashed claims for its warmth and brightness, but know I would never have been able to afford to eat there, which is all to the good because as it was a haunt of the Spanish dictator Franco I rather think I would have avoided it.

That said there is a fascinating article on the place well worth a read.*

Location; London

Picture; the Martinez Spanish Restaurant, London, circa 1950 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

















*Interesting bits and bobs from my research into the connections between Britain and Spain during the long nineteenth century

OF COCKTAIL SAUCE AND KINGS, OR, LONDON’S FIRST SPANISH RESTAURANT (PROBABLY)
April 25, 2014 · by Kirsty, in Anglo-Spanish. ·
https://hispanicbritain.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/martinez-spanish-restaurant/

Salford buildings that tell a story ........ part 3 Mrs Burke's beer shop on the corner of Bank and Encombe Place

The beer shop which is now no more

It is amazing what little bits of history you come across when you just set off wandering across the twin cities.

Bank Place, 2014

This is the corner of Bank and Encombe Place and it is somewhere you could easily miss.

But if you did turn off Chapel Street and wander along the route that comes out at Upper Cleminson Street I doubt that you would be aware of its former history.

The road twists and turns and as it does actually changes its name five times, starting as St Paul’s Place, then turning left to become Bank Street then Wilton Place before briefly assuming the name Bank Place and finishing off as Encombe Place.

Bank Place, 1894

All of which is a clue to what we have lost because until relatively recently Bank Place continued from Wilton Place round the side of the church to join up with Bank Street with the church in the centre.

Today all of the ten houses which ran from Bank Street round to Encombe Place have gone.

Back in 1911 these were seven and roomed properties and home a mix of people from Joshua Ross who was a foreman and Daniel Roberts a printer to an office cleaner, clerk and carrier.

But it is the building in Andy’s picture that draws me in.  I don’t know when it stopped selling beer but I do know that in 1911 it was the beer shop of Mrs Josephine Burke who shared the six roomed house with her five children and one niece.

Mrs Burke and her neighbours, 1911

Mrs Burke was a widow and she had taken over the business from her husband on his death in 1907.

In time I will go looking for Mr Burke but for now I shall content myself with Josephine who had been married in 1882.  She had been just 21 gave her occupation as a sewing machinist and came from a comfortably off family.  Her father was a plumber employing four men.

Three of her own children were clerks and two helped behind the bar.

Hers was the only house on the west side of the street but her neighbours included the Rev Arthur Lyle who was the curate of St Philips, a Miss Hood who ran a “Free Kindergarten” along with a clerk plumber and caretaker.

Bank Place, 1849

Today there is little sense of what was once here, the buildings have gone and with them the small community that lived around the church.

Go back another fifty years and that life around St Philips is even more apparent.

All of which makes me think there is even more to find out about the people of Bank Place and its neighbouring streets

And just minutes after the story was re-posted Rick has written in to say that "the Borough Tavern,when I worked at Farmer Norton.On the corner of Upper Cleminson St and Adelphi St was the Brewery Tavern,so named after the Adelphi brewery Co.

Later the buildings were used by Wire drawing dies and Anglardia Ltd.".

And breaking news ....George Edwards tells me "sadly I think it was only in the last 12 months. I was hoping since they have rejuvenated this area with new town houses (time keepers sq) to go with the remaining Georgian townhouses, that someone might reopen it as a pub". News which has been confirmed by Pete Harrison

Picture; Bank Place, 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson, the same place in 1844 from the 1842-49 OS Manchester & Salford, and in  1894, from the OS for South Lancashire, 188-94 courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/