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Gravelly Hill - Slade Road / The Slade

Deltics said:
did you see the video of noele gordon driving down slade road, and the old cinema next to the brookvale pub, my dad used to sell his comics there too 3 for a bob . i recall we rented the cafe near the bridge, never had much custom but it was fun for a while
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Hi Deltics,
You brought back memories for me with your post. Although my dad went to your school (long time before you) it's isn't that which jogged my memory. It was your mention of the 3 comics. Dad always went to the Greyhound in Court Lane on a Sunday morning and very often brought back comics for my brother and me, much to Mom's disgust. Needless to say we enjoyed them. I seem to remember that they weren't the usual ones we saw in the shops and often wondered where they came from.
 
Lyn, I'm pretty sure that as you say the shops at 341 have been demolished and a whole new row built. They were a long time in the building but when we went past some time ago several of them were occupied. At first I thought they were going to be residential but they are separate shop units.
 
They are photos of 341 Slade Road Vivienne14. As has been said, that was the bakery. It was run by Mr Salmon during my time @ 331 and by Barkers before that. The shop fronts that were 331 & 333 have been somewhat "modernised" Astoness as you rightly suggested and the old shops do remain hiding behind their new facades. It does look like the rest of the shops leading to the corner of Fentham Road were replaced by the current owner. I have to say that those photographs @ 152 above demonstrate in my opinion, that "new" is so often not better than "old". That bank of shops, would now be almost unrecognisable to the shopkeepers that traded there fifty years ago. I much prefer them as they were, but as a former resident of one of them, I would say that wouldn't I?

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The former "off licence" is the shop, on the corner of Slade Road & Fentham Road above as it now looks, and 341 is the second shop down (although now part of the same business). The building at the rear in which the baking and food preparation was done (that contained the large original oven), was knocked down, when it became one of many so called "supermarkets" on the road, that replaced the individual butchers, grocery, greengrocers, newsagents and hardware shops that had previously stood there since the early 1900s.
 
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Slade Road
oldMohawk said:
As I look at old street pics I've noticed that Slade Road Erdington seems to have been one of the most photographed roads in Birmingham, there are dozens of photos. Many of them have a tram somewhere in the view so maybe the photographer liked trams.
Slade Road long ago at the junction with Hunton Hill.
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The corner building and others are still there although a roof dormer window has been removed and other changes.
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oldMohawk said:
Slade Road
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Thanks for those pictures. I like the way those people caught in that terrific first photograph wandered so freely in the road itself, which in time became so busy with traffic.

As you say there are a lot of photographs of Slade Road, which makes it so frustrating for me, that I haven't ever been able to find one of my grandfather and father's old greengrocery shop, which was among the bank of shops at the corner of Fentham Road and the Slade. We ran 331 Slade Road for sixty years from the mid 1920s. I remember it so well, the fellow shopkeeper's had their own little community "band of brothers" and I remember my Nan, Mom and Dad "chewing the fat" in the shop with our regular customers. Any photographs that we took however, even in my time, were of days out, rather than of days spent at the shop, where my family spent so much of their time.
 
John L said:
Thanks for those pictures. I like the way those people caught in that terrific first photograph wandered so freely in the road itself, which in time became so busy with traffic.

As you say there are a lot of photographs of Slade Road, which makes it so frustrating for me, that I haven't ever been able to find one of my grandfather and father's old greengrocery shop, which was among the bank of shops at the corner of Fentham Road and the Slade. We ran 331 Slade Road for sixty years from the mid 1920s. I remember it so well, the fellow shopkeeper's had their own little community "band of brothers" and I remember my Nan, Mom and Dad "chewing the fat" in the shop with our regular customers. Any photographs that we took however, even in my time, were of days out, rather than of days spent at the shop, where my family spent so much of their time.
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I mentioned Fentham Rd (on the left in the photo) in this old post but it is probably the wrong shops on the wrong corner ... :)
oldMohawk said:
Slade Road in 1913 and a tram on it's way to Stockland Green approaches Fentham Rd and Albert Rd crossing.
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Today the buildings on the right were there in 1913 but changes on the left.
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oldMohawk said:
I mentioned Fentham Rd (on the left in the photo) in this old post but it is probably the wrong shops on the wrong corner ... :)
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Thanks so much for finding that. No, it is the right row of shops. The off licence was on the corner, next door to the bakery, then there was a hardware shop, a grocers, a butchers and our fruit shop on the end (where a group of people are looking up, in the direction of the photographer).

We used to have a display of fruit at the front of the shop that we put out each morning and I think there is one in this picture too (I will use my Nan's magnifying glass later to have a look :)). Ours would have been the last shop of the row and the last of the two shop blinds. My grandfather bought the shop ten years later, so it was probably the previous owner that was among that group in the picture. Thanks again.
 
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John L said:
Viv thanks for posting this and I do indeed remember Mr Salmon. He was a really nice chap, always smiling. There was nothing better than his hot sausage rolls and mini Hovis loaves, straight from the oven. I used to go into the bakery at the rear of the shop in the 60s to watch him make the bread, pastries and cakes (one of the perks of my parents being fellow shopkeepers, like his wife and himself). As the Mail indicates, he was a keen Villa fan and had a season ticket in the upper Trinity Road. He got me a ticket for the 1971 League Cup Final and gave me his seat for a game at Villa Park, that he was unable to get to. They both worked such long hours and so very hard. That has brought back some nice memories...
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My parents had a shop 339 Slade road. Wool & small items I think it was next door or very near the bakery.
 
CAHarry said:
My parents had a shop 339 Slade road. Wool & small items I think it was next door or very near the bakery.
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Nice to hear from you. Could I ask you, how long ago that was and for how long your parents ran the shop? That would have been between Mr Salmon's bakery and Mr Rushby's grocery shop. I do recall there having been a wool shop and I think that my grandmother and Mom, would most likely have been customers.
 
I see that one of the last of the old shops on Slade Road has closed down:(. Griffiths Shoe Repairs @ 319 Slade Road had been trading there since 1931, when Malcom's grandfather relocated from the Stratford Road. His son Arthur, inherited the business in the 1950s and ran the shop with his wife Lily, during my time at the greengrocer's shop which was just up the road from it. I remember the Villa took their football boots to be repaired by Mr Griffiths in the 60s and there was no better shop for shoe repairs in my opinion, he knew his business like the back of his hand and he and his wife, always had a smile, and a kind word for me, when I popped into their shop. Malcolm began working in the shop with his mother and late father in 1983, and has now retired. The business will be much missed by local customers and by those from further afield. Best wishes for a long and happy retirement Malcolm, from one shopkeeper's son to another.

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M
Lady Penelope said:
Hi Deltics,
You brought back memories for me with your post. Although my dad went to your school (long time before you) it's isn't that which jogged my memory. It was your mention of the 3 comics. Dad always went to the Greyhound in Court Lane on a Sunday morning and very often brought back comics for my brother and me, much to Mom's disgust. Needless to say we enjoyed them. I seem to remember that they weren't the usual ones we saw in the shops and often wondered where they came from.
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my dad used to go to the big pub on Chester road, then after he would go to the greyhound, the comics were DC Comics, superman and batman etc, he used to go to leister to collect them from the distributor
 
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