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Busker

postie

The buck stops here
Staff member
Do you remember this guy. O0
 

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Postie was the picture taken in the sixties, I am almost certain I recognise him? but is it one of those memories that your mind construct?

I also remember a man with what I was told were injuries to face caused by action hed seen during WW2. I think he played the mouth organ, and acordian.

There were so many of them back then busking, being theatrical, escape artists.
 
he was part and parcel of the city centre when we were kids playing his accordion this picture is out side the old C & A building in Corporation street as you can see he was blind he first appeared after WW2 and he was around for quite a few years I never once heard him speak
 
If my memory is right, didnt he also sell matches, or similar items, and was taken away at the end of hsis Saturday stint by a young girl. I dont remember the accordion though.
 
I seem to remember him in the late 60s,does anyone remember a man that sold shoe laces,matches and pens sometimes in the underpass by the outside market,also are there any photos of him? only this could have been my grandfather,his name was Harry Rose around the early 60s.
Years earlier Harry sold fruit and veg from his cart pulled by his beloved horse,but someone may remember him when he lost a leg,i think this was when he started to sell laces etc.

Ps The Bull Ring area
 
Honest I remember him but most Beggers if I may use the word have a dog at their feet or is that a Great Trilby :eek:
 
:angel: My Dad was almost totally blind, he used a white stick and I would go around with him after school, we traveled all over Brum on the bus, I was about 12/13yrs old but looked much younger.
Selling writing Pads, Pens, Pencil and envelopes for 2/6d to 2/9d a packet. The money went to the Institute For The Blind in Margrate St, Dad got a small percentage for doing the job and I was allowed to keep any money give to me by kind people who thought I was a good daughter taking my Dad around. (Dad and I called it T.C.C.F The Chris Charity Fund :2funny: )
After school we sold from door to door, but often on Saturdays we sold at the Pubs, I must have sat or stood in every passage of every Pub in Brum drinking Vimto and eating Oxo crisps waiting for Dad.


Chris :angel:
 
I have discovered that the busker in the picture was Reginald Cooper.
O0
 
I remember the busker in the photo very well. As stated he was a regular sight around the city centre in the 60's. There was also a blind man with his white stick held aloft who sold matches from a tray suspended around his neck. He would repeat "Thankyou. Thankyou" non stop. He used to stand at the top of the steps outside the Big Top post office
 
It was this man with the stick held aloft to whom I was referring in my earlier reply. Someone told me that he held his stick in the air because kids used to try and snatch his matches and things, and he would bring the stick down on them, even though he couldnt see them.
 
I remember the Blind man Silho well done O0

Lets have your name sometime please ;)
 
No I didn't think so thanks Colin & thanks Shilho :D my you are a young one where born ::)
 
Re.Busker

Does anyone remember the man with the little dog who used to sit in Eden Place and do pictures on the flagstones.He must have been there for quite a few years.His pictures were really good.I always wondered what happened to him and if anyone knew his name or where he was from.
 
That man in Eden Place used to fascinate me every time I passed by him. A pavement artist, something that you don't see these days, he was very talented and drew some excellent pictures. I would ask my Mother to give him some money not because I felt sorry for him but because I thought he
had earned it by drawing these amazing pictures on the pavement.
He was there most days if I remember and the only time you didn't see him
was when it was raining.
 
busker of eden place

hi there bobs ,
i do recall this old chap in eden passage ,but i cannot recall his name and his little dog and the marvellous pictures he done every day for a decade , the public did appreciate his drawing and his cap was full of pennies
mind you even thou you called him a busker ,i don,t think that was right
i was told by my mother that he waspartialy blind , or completely blind
and i know he was there in the late forties until the late fifties i seem to re call i did,nt know of anybody else around in them days , still .
one of our good researchers will come up trumps with the answers you want .
i cannot recall the year it was ,but he was published in the sunday mercury
one sunday ,in fact there could have been two tpoics on him
one showing his talent ,and another time the relatatives of him
brought him back to memory and telling us his name in later years
i think around the years of 1957 when he was first mentioned in the mercury
then in the early sixties a relative mentioned abot him and giving his name
i,m pretty sure some-one will fill you in on the rest
have a nice day astonian
 
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