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Mitchell's & Butler's Ltd.

Hi there. Yes I think I remember your grandfather Ernest Minchin. I would have been very young then. He had an electrical shop at the bottom of Cape Hill. There was the Beehive pub on the corner of Raglan Rd and also a newsagents ( Highams) a small tailors shop and your grandfather shop. My father was a dentist , George Duncan. We lived at his practice at 151 Cape Hill. Next door was a doctor.( Dr Aiken).
I havent been back there for many years now. I believe everything has changed now.The brewery is not there any more I know. I presume that most of the places I remember as a child no longer exist. I left Birmingham in 1965.
 
Hi Philip, Dr. Aitken was our family doctor when I was born! I still go to the same surgery but it's moved round into Raglan Rd. now.
M&B is like a little village now. Windmill Lane markets have gone and have been replaced by a shopping centre called "Windmills"....yes it's all changed!
rosie.
 
Hello Philip.
The newsagents was where I used to get my comics from. It was only a couple of doors away from where we lived, so I was allowed to go there, feeling very grown-up, and My Higham would greet me with "Here's your Tiny Tots for little dots" (Tiny Tots was the name of the comic.) When I grew out of it, I moved on to the Beano and then Bunty. The shop next door to us was a grocers, and the lady had been a cook before she opened the shop. She would cook meals which the workers from M & B would come and fetch in the dinner break. Moving down the road, there was a cafe, and part of my job during school holidays was to go and fetch sausage or bacon sandwiches for our lunch. Although we moved from living behind the shop when I was about 6, during school holidays I always spent my time at the shop, or popped up the road to 159 to visit my grandparents.
The last time I was on Cape Hill was in 2011 when I was invited to the old brewery for a book launch. It was a very different Cape Hill from the one I remembered, with many of the shops and houses at the lower end being demolished for the new road.
 
Hi zambodie
The real story is the brewery serve or dish out good mild in kegs or barralls what ever you want to call them
But the real reason and what you may have been told by your friend the true story is a myth
Just like he stories of the guiniss ( Oh its better in Ireland , ) than Here , and the other part of the story is they get rats out of the
liffy ,( That's the big River running through Dublin City as you would see if if you weren to go to Dublin Today
Compete and utter nonsence, its Neither of them there no rats added to the vatts nor is there diffents in there and oiur Guiniss
I would never drink mild because its slops in most cases when it is served at a public house
It all depends on the public house and the publican,
There is some gathers that operate and do this practice today and have done so for many years
And sell it off at a pound a pint like wise the offers of a pound a pint because of its sell by date is gone past its date
And top up with left covers from the drip trays , but also there is a brewery out on the market and they have been operating for years now
Across the country whom have corners the beer trade oriniganly they bought all pubs out of date lagers and they added a substance
To the lagers and it gave them a extra ten days of life to make it nice and gassie and drinkable
This practice first started by a certain brewers in our country and are doing very well indeed today
I cannot name this brewers for legal reasons when they first came to brum with it there was a club just off broad street
Was there first customer for 12 months before moving into a certain pub hence then its big time
And every body is Happy and no complaints From customers and the public
I was in the management for Mitchell's and butlers across the county and also ran many pubs
And another manager and myself on the day in question met a person from this brewer whom told us both
Over lunch of the very first customer in brum whom they was dealing with and told us of there add option to expand the ,life for extra ten days
Best wishes Astonian,,,,,,
 
my favourite beer M&B Mild, drank it from 14 years old, you couldn't even buy mild beer in the south when in the army, and it is still difficult to find now a days, but I agree with Alan, that Guinness beer is the same in Ireland as UK or Hong Kong for that matter. Paul
 
I'm not a connoisseur of Guinness, so cannot comment on any differences between Ireland and the UK. However it is not the same all over the world. In Africa, in particular Nigeria, malted barley is not used, but malted sorghum, and the alcoholic strength is also higher there.
 
Neither am I Mike, I have travelled quite widely my self most of the continents including Africa, and I have had the odd pint here and there and never noticed any change in taste or colour from the UK.Paul
 
I have had Guiness on tap in the USA and I apart from been COLD I can tell no real difference. I also have the bottled Guiness and its OK but not like on tap. Must admit I was not a Guiness drinker when I lived in Brum. Double Diamond I did drink a lot, of couse a good pint at the local pub my fav. Never was a big fan of M&B or Ansells. John thirsty Crump
 
Zambodini,
Remember Trevor from the 1980's(had the compulsory bubble perm of the time!), was on "shop floor" and got promoted to position of Brewer, very nice bloke no airs and graces, he used to live in Hall Green at the time as I recall.

Proff.
 
Astonian said:
Hi zambodie
The real story is the brewery serve or dish out good mild in kegs or barralls what ever you want to call them
But the real reason and what you may have been told by your friend the true story is a myth
Just like he stories of the guiniss ( Oh its better in Ireland , ) than Here , and the other part of the story is they get rats out of the
liffy ,( That's the big River running through Dublin City as you would see if if you weren to go to Dublin Today
Compete and utter nonsence, its Neither of them there no rats added to the vatts nor is there diffents in there and oiur Guiniss
I would never drink mild because its slops in most cases when it is served at a public house
It all depends on the public house and the publican,
There is some gathers that operate and do this practice today and have done so for many years
And sell it off at a pound a pint like wise the offers of a pound a pint because of its sell by date is gone past its date
And top up with left covers from the drip trays , but also there is a brewery out on the market and they have been operating for years now
Across the country whom have corners the beer trade oriniganly they bought all pubs out of date lagers and they added a substance
To the lagers and it gave them a extra ten days of life to make it nice and gassie and drinkable
This practice first started by a certain brewers in our country and are doing very well indeed today
I cannot name this brewers for legal reasons when they first came to brum with it there was a club just off broad street
Was there first customer for 12 months before moving into a certain pub hence then its big time
And every body is Happy and no complaints From customers and the public
I was in the management for Mitchell's and butlers across the county and also ran many pubs
And another manager and myself on the day in question met a person from this brewer whom told us both
Over lunch of the very first customer in brum whom they was dealing with and told us of there add option to expand the ,life for extra ten days
Best wishes Astonian,,,,,,
Click to expand...

Your mention of Guinness and Liffey water reminds me of a trip to London, donkey's years ago, to Park Royal Dogs and Park Royal Brewery. The question was asked about the difference in taste of the Guinness in London and Dublin, and the old saying "it doesn't travel well."

The answer given was something like this...Even in Dublin the mineral content of the water is constantly measured. The water used at Park Royal, although from a different source, would be adjusted to be almost identical. The difference in taste would be undetectable.....never had a winner at the dogs!
 
I have posted an update that will be of interest to anybody trying to find relatives that worked at Cape Hill and other M&B sites during the Spring of 1953 at :

Mitchell's and Butler's Deerstalker Magazine 1953 Volume 5 No.4

Mitchell's and Butler's Deerstalker Magazine 1953 Volume 5 No.4
www.midlandspubs.co.uk www.midlandspubs.co.uk

Could I ask an admin/staff person to change the name of this thread from "mitchell & butlers!" to "Mitchell's and Butler's Limited" - it is pedantry on my part perhaps but I am Truss-like at times!
 

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Added. Will have to do an in depth study of the Midland pubs site's typography and see what I can find - He He
 
mikejee said:
Added. Will have to do an in depth study of the Midland pubs site's typography and see what I can find - He He
Click to expand...
Mike, there are bound to be a few. In the last year alone I have typed up half a million words so I cannot imagine it will be 100%. If my partner reads a page and spots a typo she soon lets me know! Attached is what I see when I am typing a web page - it is easy to get a coding letter or number wrong. For example, for a semi-colon I have to type &#59; for it to be valid in html. I also validate every single page at WC3 when published to make sure the code is nice and clean. Oh, the pedantry!
 

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I am going slightly off-topic here but I thought this might amuse some folks. I learned to touch type up to 60wps when I was in the army of all things. It was required in the Royal Signals where teleprinters were hooked up to radios. However, even in the harsh regime of Catterick Garrison, we were not made to have the attached headgear! You wouldn't want to make a mistake with a Catholic priest to punish you!!

Before anybody types in with a complaint, I am supplying some satire on this week's news. Besides, I was an altar boy in my very early youth. No naughtiness in my church - the priest was too busy glugging the wine and had big rosy cheeks for his sins.
 

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My F/Law worked at M&B for over 25 years is name wasEdward ( Ted ) Wathen.Worked in Brewing anyone remember him
 
Hi had a great time reading through the posts Tis a great shame we lost are breweries I was an M&B man brew x1 was my tipple can’t get pint of it anywhere now I heard it is brewed in Cardiff now never be the same read an earlier quote saying brew x1 was pap it was the finest pint in the midlands as far as I’m concerned as for so called micro breweries brewing over priced ales if you can call it that you can keep it bring back the good old brew that made the midlands great
 
Joefish said:
Hi had a great time reading through the posts Tis a great shame we lost are breweries I was an M&B man brew x1 was my tipple can’t get pint of it anywhere now I heard it is brewed in Cardiff now never be the same read an earlier quote saying brew x1 was pap it was the finest pint in the midlands as far as I’m concerned as for so called micro breweries brewing over priced ales if you can call it that you can keep it bring back the good old brew that made the midlands great
Click to expand...
Joe, like you I used to love Brew 11 but when when we bought our first house we couldn't afford Birmingham prices and we ended up in a small village in between Tamworth and Atherstone. Our first weekend there some friends came over and we went to the local pub at the bottom of the close. It was a Marstons house and when we went in and ordered a a couple of pints of bitter. The landlord pulled the pints and we took a good pull on the beer. Not a taste we were used to! The gaffer saw our faces and asked us what we normally drank and we told him Brew 11. He told us not to drink too much as Pedigree bitter, was a bit different to M&B or Ansells and as we were not used to it it may affect us. We took his advice with a pinch of salt thinking beer's beer and we could drink anything. How wrong we were. Normally a Saturday night consumption was about eight pints (I couldn't do that now!) but after 3 or 4 pints of this we were well gone.
Now normally I am a great defender of Brum and it's products, it's beers, foods and goods but I have to admit that since that first pint of Marstons Pedigree nothing can come close to it, except perhaps Bass blue triangle on draught.
 
M&B Dark Mild was my pint in the 60's, great drink,10d pint, went in the army to Surrey, never heard of mild, sat and cried. They were a great brewing company, so sad Birmingham has lost so much over the past 50 years, so many great company's just disappeared.. Paul
 
Pedrocut said:
Your mention of Guinness and Liffey water reminds me of a trip to London, donkey's years ago, to Park Royal Dogs and Park Royal Brewery. The question was asked about the difference in taste of the Guinness in London and Dublin, and the old saying "it doesn't travel well."

The answer given was something like this...Even in Dublin the mineral content of the water is constantly measured. The water used at Park Royal, although from a different source, would be adjusted to be almost identical. The difference in taste would be undetectable.....never had a winner at the dogs!
Click to expand...
I just looked at this thread and particularly this post...…….I used to manage the largest keg maker in the US. We dealt with all the North American and Canadian breweries including InBev and SA brewery. Astonian & Pedrocut are absolutely on point. beer is a global thing...….Micromatic and European company makes most of the valves used in kegs globally, like 90 plus %. They also make about the same % of taps/crowns and lines.
Personally I knew Dick Yuengling quite well who owned the oldest brewery in the US 1829, I know not very old compared to Europe.
The beer business has SO many old tales and that is far far from reality!
 
Well, if you are going to bring the USA into this then Milwaukee just has to be mentioned, the proclaimed capitol of beer in the USA, much as Burton-on-Trent was here. Miller (known here), Pabst, Schlitz and smaller breweries were mostly set up by German immigrants. Access to wheat from the prairies and water from Lake Michigan made it the ideal place. The bigger city of Chicago, situated at the end of Lake Michigan was another good area for sales. The larger breweries have mainly gone, as far as I know, but craft beers are prolific there. The city's baseball team is called The Brewers and there was, in the past a railway line known as The Beer Line which served many breweries.
Old Brit will chip in, I guess, with Coors at Golden, Colorado.
When passing through Burton-on-Trent a few years ago I noticed the name Coors on silos there.
 
Radiorails said:
Well, if you are going to bring the USA into this then Milwaukee just has to be mentioned, the proclaimed capitol of beer in the USA, much as Burton-on-Trent was here. Miller (known here), Pabst, Schlitz and smaller breweries were mostly set up by German immigrants. Access to wheat from the prairies and water from Lake Michigan made it the ideal place. The bigger city of Chicago, situated at the end of Lake Michigan was another good area for sales. The larger breweries have mainly gone, as far as I know, but craft beers are prolific there. The city's baseball team is called The Brewers and there was, in the past a railway line known as The Beer Line which served many breweries.
Old Brit will chip in, I guess, with Coors at Golden, Colorado.
When passing through Burton-on-Trent a few years ago I noticed the name Coors on silos there.
Click to expand...
Great point...………. Miller is owned by South African breweries a UK company. Miller and Coors are European owned. Pabst & Schlitz all good beers are long gone. The Pabst brewery in Florida is now run by Yuengling Brewery. My point is that BEER is a global business and it is all scientifically run!
 
Could members please read the title of this thread, and remember that this is the BIRMINGHAM history forum
 
The present day M&B seems quite different to the one when it was based in Birmingham. At least the name still exists whereas other Birmingham brewery names seem to have gone.

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