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New Street City Centre Birmingham
- Thread starter postie
- Start date
Struggling to work out exactly on New Street where this photo was taken. Can anyone tell me please? Viv.
sistersue61
master brummie
Not sure Viv, could it be looking down New Street towards its junction with Corporation Street?
I would guess someone will have a much more accurate answer though.
Sue
I would guess someone will have a much more accurate answer though.
Sue
horsencart
master brummie
In the distance you can make out Big Brum
Thanks everyone. That's very helpful. Now I can just about make out the curve of the shops on the right which must be, as Sue says, the turning into Corporation Street. Viv.
davidfowler
Exiled Brummie
"Cleaning up" my documents on new computer I came across this cutting from 16th April 1934 which I'd like to share. I have to apologise that a) I don't know the name of the paper and b) I can't remember where I found it. Probably on this forum (?), if so I apologise for not giving credit to the original poster!
HI DAVID
I can recall new street station being rebuilt inmy life span three time up till now ;
i there saying in the future that some where in the youngers of today they will see changes as welll as they get older
but i expext there is some members of the public whom are still with us can say they have seen the change of the new street four times in there life
i can,t wait to see the finish of this time around ;of our new station ; best wishes astonian
I can recall new street station being rebuilt inmy life span three time up till now ;
i there saying in the future that some where in the youngers of today they will see changes as welll as they get older
but i expext there is some members of the public whom are still with us can say they have seen the change of the new street four times in there life
i can,t wait to see the finish of this time around ;of our new station ; best wishes astonian
davidfowler
Exiled Brummie
Morning Astonian, I hope you'll enjoy being the first to see it changed 4 times in a lifetime.
regards
David
regards
David
john knight
signman
David, it says Gazette at the top.
It certainly was once very elegant. The first drawing is at the top of New Street looking towards the Town Hall. The second is looking past Christ Church to the right and down New Street. Viv.
davidfowler
Exiled Brummie
Hi John, yes but the first bit is cut off. Birmingham perhaps?
john knight
signman
Yes, and you can just see the half of the M at the top.
Would definitely have been Birmingham Gazette by that date, previously known as Aris's Birmingham Gazette. A bit of info :
Birmingham Gazette
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Birmingham Gazette, known for much of its existence as Aris's Birmingham Gazette, was a newspaper that was published and circulated in Birmingham, England from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. Founded as a weekly publication in 1741, it moved to daily production in 1862, and was absorbed by the Birmingham Post in 1956.
[edit]History
The Gazette was founded as the Birmingham Gazette and General Correspondent by Thomas Aris, a stationer from London who had moved to Birmingham in May 1740 and started a bookselling and printing business in the High Street. The first edition was issued on 16 November 1741, just under ten years after the town's first known newspaper, the Birmingham Journal.[1] By 1743 it had absorbed its rival Warwick and Staffordshire Gazette - which had been founded in London in 1737 and moved to Birmingham in 1741 - and become the town's only newspaper.[2]
Viv.
Birmingham Gazette
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Birmingham Gazette, known for much of its existence as Aris's Birmingham Gazette, was a newspaper that was published and circulated in Birmingham, England from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. Founded as a weekly publication in 1741, it moved to daily production in 1862, and was absorbed by the Birmingham Post in 1956.
[edit]History
The Gazette was founded as the Birmingham Gazette and General Correspondent by Thomas Aris, a stationer from London who had moved to Birmingham in May 1740 and started a bookselling and printing business in the High Street. The first edition was issued on 16 November 1741, just under ten years after the town's first known newspaper, the Birmingham Journal.[1] By 1743 it had absorbed its rival Warwick and Staffordshire Gazette - which had been founded in London in 1737 and moved to Birmingham in 1741 - and become the town's only newspaper.[2]
Viv.
davidfowler
Exiled Brummie
Thanks everyone, I didn't go to SpecSavers!
Hi David, your article mentions the Post Office. This is the place - a lithograph by Thomas Underwood in 1865 (but the view portrayed is much
earlier). The PO was on the other side of New St. Your article tells us it was quite humble; simply an archway capable of accommodating 4 customers at once. It had a worn, stone flag floor. And letters were posted through an 'aperture'. For more complex transactions you had to tap on a wooden pane for attention! What a contrast to the later PO. Viv.
earlier). The PO was on the other side of New St. Your article tells us it was quite humble; simply an archway capable of accommodating 4 customers at once. It had a worn, stone flag floor. And letters were posted through an 'aperture'. For more complex transactions you had to tap on a wooden pane for attention! What a contrast to the later PO. Viv.
Two drawings of the Queens visit to Birmingham in 1858 from the London Illustrated News. Viv.
W
Wendy
Guest
Some wonderful pictures on this thread a real look into Birmingham's past. Thanks to all contributers.
H
harborne
Guest
Brilliant pictures, what a treat! It's hardly recognizable now - and in a few years' time it probably won't be recognizable to now!
Chris
Chris
Great photo Keegs of the Society building. Hard to believe this was once on New Street. Here's a not so 'new' New Street view from The Graphic in 1883. All those people crowded onto the balconies! Viv.
I posted this drawing on the King Edwards School thread as it shows the school to the right. But it also relates to this thread, an unusual early view of New Street looking towards High Street (possibly 'High Town' at the time of the drawing?). Swan Alley must have been somewhere in this view too. Sorry, I don't know the date of the drawing. Viv.
B
BernardR
Guest
David I love this photo and article for so many reason. One thing though strikes me; and is particularly pertinent given the changes taking place in the City and the nostalgia for what went before this illustrates it well:
Fascinating that one constant is that we hark after what has gone.
Fascinating that one constant is that we hark after what has gone.
Thanks Mike. It's such a simple sketch, but tells us so much about how New Street developed.
Bernie. Agree all generations seem to hanker after an earlier time, regardless of the fact that many of these buildings would have been badly built, were damp and poorly ventilated. My interest is in what the buildings tell us about the place, the people and the time. We can glean a lot from a simple sketch like this. I like the fact that there's the hotel, dominant and prominent in the Birmingham society of the time. Then there's the much older building next door (is it part of the Guild/Gild hall?) connected to King Edwards Grammar/Free School. Finally there's the view down towards the High Street/High Town, where eventually you would have come to a tollgate/courtroom/prison building. Can't quite work out where Swan Alley would have been on the drawing, but it's a thoroughfare which has long disappeared. All these features would have been the first impression of Birmingham as a vibrant and bustling town to the visitor arriving in Birmingham via Digbeth. Viv.
Another not quite so new New Street view. I notice a Pattison's to the right and the Theatre Royal to the left. The site was sold to Woolworths and the Theatre was demolished in 1956. Sorry no date but looks 1920s perhaps? Viv.
Wow, the floodgates have opened. Well done. I particularly like #17. A better sketch of the first dedicated King Edwards building and it's tower. I wish it went a little further to the right...ah well. All of the maps seem to show this building as being not as long a street run as the later and last King Edwards and there seems to be houses between the right end and Peck Lane; whereas the later building seemed adjacent to it. Anyway a great view of the small building in between King Edwards and The Hen and Chickens (sans portico) There was another building very similar to the small building to the right of King Edwards, which was demolished when The Exchange was built. My understanding is that the Guild Hall was demolished to build the first dedicated school so maybe the two small buildings were there before this event. Funny, where that little building was always seemed to be a lost corner even when the later Albion hotel was there.
The buildings further along come to the side of one that sticks out and at that point is the intersection with what was Swan Ally that ran down to Worcester Street. Later it was widened and became Worcester St. all the way. Beyond the 'sticking out' building was a shallow crescent and some maps show that the Swan Inn had a pressence on New St. at one time; latterly closed in to the consternation of Charles Dickens who found it too confined and changed his patronage to the New Royal I believe, on subsequent visits to Brum. Anyway, it is all...only what I have read but it makes interesting conjecture.
The buildings further along come to the side of one that sticks out and at that point is the intersection with what was Swan Ally that ran down to Worcester Street. Later it was widened and became Worcester St. all the way. Beyond the 'sticking out' building was a shallow crescent and some maps show that the Swan Inn had a pressence on New St. at one time; latterly closed in to the consternation of Charles Dickens who found it too confined and changed his patronage to the New Royal I believe, on subsequent visits to Brum. Anyway, it is all...only what I have read but it makes interesting conjecture.
