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Hi Maria, Glad you were pleased! I am fairly sure that this is a grave inscription, the gravestones have been moved but the remains will most likely have been left and grassed over. Have you tried looking on any of the online maps...the ones where you can "walk" down the street? I don't know if you can access them in Spain. Smethwick postcode is usually B66. Try it for Poplar Avenue, B17. Yes, I know it well, the houses are huge, not like the one was born in!!
The later burials you mention will probably be in The Uplands Cemetery, the Library have them on microfiche and may make a small charge to search, they are very helpful.
Hope this helps.
rosie.
 
Hi yogimon, Aitken House was named after Dr. Aitken, his Surgery was on Cape Hill opposite the Brewery. He looked after our family when I was baby!!!
rosie.
 
Hi Maria, I have a friend that attends Holy Trinity Church Smethwick and is part of a team that do a lot of work there. I have asked her to see what she can find out about tour relations. I'll get back to you as soon as I hear anything. Carol.
 
This was where my Father was born. It was knocked down before I ever got to see it. ( Wills Street ). Thankyou
 
Hi Rosie,
Thanks very much for all your help, yes of course I have been down Poplar Ave. and all addresses on census & certs. that I have come across so far related to my family in Birmingham with Google map with street view, the sad thing is I never knew I had a connection with Birmingham until a few years ago when my father passed away, why I will probably never know but I'm so happy to have come across this wonderful site & all you great and kind folk who are unveiling my past little by little!

Hi Carol, also a very big thanks to you for your kind offer, I will be really looking forward to hearing from you.

With every best wish & kind regards,
Maria
 
Hi My Dad Victor Frederick Ball did his apprenticeship at what became how Hope too, he ended up foreman, I think he started in 1941 at 14 but may have been factory boy before he was apprenticed, love to hear any stories of the site, during this time his family were bombed out and had to move into a prefab,
 
".........Interestingly Smethwick now gets regularly mentioned on "Flog it" and some of the other antique programes as it was the Home of the Ruskin Pottery. I must admit I had not heard of it until a year or so back but its wares are highly sought after being of ceramics coated with various compounds then fired at a high tempreture and forming some amazing colours. The pottery is marked "West Smethwick" and I assume this is more towards the Oldbury end of the town...."

I was trawling through this old thread as a former Smethwickian and thought my input here may be of interest. The site of the Ruskin pottery is now marked by an unadopted industrial road - Ruskin Place, which is 200 yards West of the junction of Spon Lane/West Park Road and Oldbury Road - according to Wikipedia, numbers 173 and 174. I was born and lived for 16 years in No. 285. Oldbury Road, almost opposite. The house had been occupied during the early 1900's by the Taylors, who were the founders and owners of the Ruskin pottery. At the bottom of the garden was a brick outhouse, which had contained a kiln and I believe experimental firings were carried out there. The garden soil was alliterated with test pieces of the Taylors' work - small oval, round, square and heart shaped tiles (approx 1.5"), which were unearthed evey time the soil was turned. Inside the house, in the front room, was a slate fireplace decorated generously with Ruskin tiles of various shapes and colours. I wish I had that fireplace now - it would be a real collectors item, and probably unique.

Whenever Ruskin pottery is mentioned on one of the antique programmes, I get feelings of nostalgia for the old house but not enough to make me want to live in a draughty old Victorian place again - with half gas lights and half electric, lead pipes and an outside loo prone to freezing in the winter:crushed:
 
".........Interestingly Smethwick now gets regularly mentioned on "Flog it" and some of the other antique programes as it was the Home of the Ruskin Pottery. I must admit I had not heard of it until a year or so back but its wares are highly sought after being of ceramics coated with various compounds then fired at a high tempreture and forming some amazing colours. The pottery is marked "West Smethwick" and I assume this is more towards the Oldbury end of the town...."

I was trawling through this old thread as a former Smethwickian and thought my input here may be of interest. The site of the Ruskin pottery is now marked by an unadopted industrial road - Ruskin Place, which is 200 yards West of the junction of Spon Lane/West Park Road and Oldbury Road - according to Wikipedia, numbers 173 and 174. I was born and lived for 16 years in No. 285. Oldbury Road, almost opposite. The house had been occupied during the early 1900's by the Taylors, who were the founders and owners of the Ruskin pottery. At the bottom of the garden was a brick outhouse, which had contained a kiln and I believe experimental firings were carried out there. The garden soil was alliterated with test pieces of the Taylors' work - small oval, round, square and heart shaped tiles (approx 1.5"), which were unearthed evey time the soil was turned. Inside the house, in the front room, was a slate fireplace decorated generously with Ruskin tiles of various shapes and colours. I wish I had that fireplace now - it would be a real collectors item, and probably unique.

Whenever Ruskin pottery is mentioned on one of the antique programmes, I get feelings of nostalgia for the old house but not enough to make me want to live in a draughty old Victorian place again - with half gas lights and half electric, lead pipes and an outside loo prone to freezing in the winter:crushed:

I too have a bit of a fascination with the pieces made there, in fact a few years back we bought two pieced of Ruskin at an auction in Stourbridge, a large fruit bowl which is used for it's intended purpose and matching small vase which is slightly chipped , I can't remember what we paid for them but it was not an earth shattering price. Ruskin pieces had the year of manufacture on their bases which I think is a nice touch and the date is clearly to be seen on the fruit bowl. The small vase does not carry a date and this did made me slightly suspicious but it was sold with the other piece and is an exact match in colour ect so perhaps they were fired together?
 
I worked in the office of hopes heating from 1954 to 1955 I worked in the typing pool with mrs berry
I remember the canteen meals they had syrup sponge neatly every day, I couldn't resist it.
Valerieexbrimmie
 
Does anyone remember the Radio Rentals control room next to the bus-stop in Waterloo Road, Smethwick? It was the earliest form of cable, I suppose. A bloke sitting on public display, operating the dials, would pump out the programmes for the town.
Other places at the top of Cape Hill - Marsh and Baxters, with sawdust on the floor, Wrensons (posh) and Fosters, or its predecessor, with those wired cash canisters zooming around the ceiling.

I do indeed remember the Radio Rentals control room and Marsh and Baxters (complete with sawdust) where my mom used to get her meat, Wrensons,
George Mason (had a lovely welsh lad as a boyfriend who worked there). I lived in Woodlands St opposite Charles Carr (foundry) - anyone remember that? Also I remember Rowleys grocers just diagonally opposite where I lived. I went to school at Shireland Rd for girls. I also remember shoe shops in Spring Hill and so many other shops - the names of which now escape me. Also the Gaumont Cinema - which was quite expensive compared to others in the area. The Smethwick markets were always an exciting place to shop with Teddy Carr's seafood always a favourite.
 
Post removed as the person it was addressed to is no longer a member of the forum and they last posted January 25th, 2011.
 
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I don't remember Teddy Carr seafood but did you mean "Bill & Den the Shellfish Men"?! Dennis is still around doing voluntary work at City Hospital although his health is not good.
Teddy Gray was the sweet stall, my favourite!!
rosie.
 
I don't remember Teddy Carr seafood but did you mean "Bill & Den the Shellfish Men"?! Dennis is still around doing voluntary work at City Hospital although his health is not good.
Teddy Gray was the sweet stall, my favourite!!
rosie.




Hi Rosie. Yes - you are quite correct about Teddy Gray being the sweet stall guy. I had got a little confused with who was who, but then having been away from Smethwick for 45 yrs the memory can sometimes play little tricks. Thanks again for the memory jog. I seem to remember my mom getting green shield stamps from one or two of the shops and also something similar from the co-op. There was also a school clinic located on the corner of Raglan Rd and Durban Rd where I used to visit the school dentist etc. and also (if my memory serves me well) a music shop selling LPs and 45s about halfway down Windmill Lane on the right hand side.

(Newfoundland)
 
An update on some Smethwick and Bearwood Pubs,
Two Brewers has been demolished and redeveloped,
Londonderry demolished for redevelopment,
Queens Head damaged by arson,
Thimblemill derelict.
Red Cow refurbished.
No news yet about the Waterloo.
A new Pub has opened on Bearwood Rd. in an old Bank building, it's for "real beer".
rosie.
 
There is an article in the local paper saying the Thimblemill is to be demolished to make way for a Care Home. I imagine there are a few that would prefer to leave the Pub and build the Care Home around it..perfect retirement!
rosie.
 
Most. Certainly Rosie because it is known drug dealers den and notorious characters who frequent the pub
From almost every where in brum and I can tell you even out side brum do
For many years back I can recall the pub it was well known in thimble lane for the crimms and stolen goods then years later
The druggs came and stayed and as time went on it was the harder druggs that came in
It took over where the pub on dudley road was finally closed down along with a lot of the shabeen houses was cleared out of the house
Where these supplyers was operating from and certain shops these people have long gone since the 70,
Early years of the fortys and fifties it was a nice area but towards the end and early sixties that's when it slowly started to change
I knew that area very well indeed right from there right up and through Winson green
So the care home should be better for it the thimble was known through the pub trade to managers as a chequered history pub
And the brewery as I was part of the team best wishes Alan,, astonian,,,,
 
The 'Waterloo' .....Bobby Fields ran it for a while bless him. Public conveniences in Windmill Lane, pock marks visible from the bullets of the German plane that straffed the lane and killed a young chap outside the toilets. Anyone know his name? Dad told me about it as a kid, seems they thought the market was a small factory too and tried to bomb it. A rogue lone aircraft it seems....anyone know any more?

I know that this is an old thread, but I've just come across it. I am Smethwick 41 as well, Devonshire Rd with grandparents in Bowden and Dibble Road. I remember the chip shop in Silverton Road, cooking with beef dripping over a coal fired range. I remember the little row of shops down past St Alban's Church: was the first one Butterly? Then it was Norris the butcher, Jochins the chemist, Harrods, yes Harrods, a grocer, then a Mr Round the green grocer and the Bray and Bailey, another grocer.
My schools were Devonshire Road infants, George Betts, in its second year of being open, and then Holly Lodge.
But what drew me to this thread was The Waterloo at Cape Hill; it sold at auction a couple of years ago, but is it still empty? What a gem of Victorian design that pub was, especially the downstairs grill bar.
 
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