Hi Phil, the one in Ladypool Rd was one of my favorite shops on a couple of occasions I bought a jack knife for 2/6.At one stage our gang thought we terrorized our area when we bought those ex commandos reversible face masks, one side white when were fighting in Norway (in our minds) and black when we were infiltrating Nazi headquarters.
We could not have survived 1947 without our 2/6 snowshoes and a bit later we clubbed together to buy a Nansen sledge and went in search of snow as far away as Sparkhill Park via Moseley. We tried to get it on the bus for the return trip but the Clippy was not up for it. They had an inflated rubber life raft suspended from the ceiling but at 30/- it was overpriced for our pocket money. We also bought those blue metal water bottles and US pistol holsters to carry our Ranger cap pistols, the one's with the plastic steer heads on the handles.
The Olympia Cinema was our local flea pit.
Cheers Tim