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Then & Now

Back to Hawthorn Road, Kingstanding, looking at shops I visited as a child. Foster Bros was a place I was once taken into for a school uniform. Think I only had one from there, they were expensive and it was cheaper in other shops.
FosterBrosThen.jpg

Today Big Johns is where Foster Bros used to be and Lloyds Bank has taken the place of Cross's Stores. Scrivens Opticians (the name) is still there after all the passing years and for our modern life these days we need lots of street furniture.
FostersNow.jpg

Have a scroll look around.
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Google Maps

Find local businesses, view maps and get driving directions in Google Maps.
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oldMohawk said:
Back to Hawthorn Road, Kingstanding, looking at shops I visited as a child. Foster Bros was a place I was once taken into for a school uniform. Think I only had one from there, they were expensive and it was cheaper in other shops.
View attachment 137307

Today Big Johns is where Foster Bros used to be and Lloyds Bank has taken the place of Cross's Stores. Scrivens Opticians (the name) is still there after all the passing years and for our modern life these days we need lots of street furniture.
View attachment 137308

Have a scroll look around.
goo.gl

Google Maps

Find local businesses, view maps and get driving directions in Google Maps.
goo.gl goo.gl
Click to expand...
My mother also tortured me with a visit to Foster Brothers for a school uniform the one in Northfield.
I remember wood floors and the place being some what dingy and old counters with pull out shelves
Then of course the vacuum tubes through our the store

I see in a lot of now pictures pull down shutters on shop fronts, sad sign of the times I suppose, does take the life out of the street no window shopping waiting on a bus.

How I remember reading the for sale adds in newsagents waiting for a bus, took me forever to figure out Rogers made drums, and it was not some guy named Roger trying to sell a drum kit.
 
Carolyn Walker said:
Love this nostalgia,do any of you remember The Pleck Park Road i was born there in1947 and lived there until I married in 1970.
Click to expand...
Perhaps you are thinking of Peck rather than Pleck. If so have a look in the thread 'Bomb Pecks' ... click link below ...

Bomb Pecks

Thank you BazzM. I have managed to find an old photo of my nan & aunt together. Hopefully this will help. Great photo michael. I hope this jogs someone's memory on here for you. Good luck.
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
Also there are lots of discussions and lots of images about Park Road on the forum.
:)
 
Prior to its mention on here the only "Pleck" I had ever heard of was a district of Walsall. On looking up the definition of pleck I found it was an old English word meaning plot of ground. With this in mind I took a look at the maps concentrating on Park Roads in Birmingham. I found an area alongside the railway track on Park Road Hockley just by the bridge called The Pleck with a premises to the rear of this called Peck Scrap Metal Works. This has to be what Carolyn was talking about, but only she can answer that.

The Pleck.JPG
 
I found this comment on the History of the Onion Fair
"By 1875 the Birmingham traders got their way and the show people moved to The Pleck, we know this area now as Burbury Street Park before finally moving to the Serpentine Grounds behind Aston Parish church".burbury street park.JPG
 
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hello rob as far as i am aware the onion fair was never held on burbury st park..it started on the walmer recreation ground just off newtown row before moving to the serpentine ground...below is the thread which confirms this..

lyn

fair ground at new john street birmingham

hi all can anyone help me im looking for any info regarding fair ground people who lived in caravans in new john street birmingham around 1938 upwards kind regards kc:fat:
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
 
Astoness said:
hello rob as far as i am aware the onion fair was never held on burbury st park..it started on the walmer recreation ground just off newtown row before moving to the serpentine ground...below is the thread which confirms this..

lyn

fair ground at new john street birmingham

hi all can anyone help me im looking for any info regarding fair ground people who lived in caravans in new john street birmingham around 1938 upwards kind regards kc:fat:
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
Click to expand...
You can read it here (4th Paragraph down)

aston Brook Through aston Manor - Preserving the History of aston

community website for aston history and nostalgia. containing digital pictures of old aston, aston people and aston Industry
www.astonbrook-through-astonmanor.co.uk

A lion escaped while at The Pleck, Burbury Street Park, 30th September 1899

Escaped Lions

Does anyone remember the year the lion escaped from the circus at The Onion Fair next to Aston Church? Mum used to tell me about it so it would have been before the nineteen thirties or thereabouts. Thanks, David Weaver.
birminghamhistory.co.uk
 
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hi rob ...we did some research on this the results are on the link i posted...i will try and find time though to double check it and search the newspaper archives...

lyn
 
Ned Williams, in his booklet "The Birmingham Onion Fair" does not claim Burbury St Park as the site, and says that "the Old Pleck" was a general area between Aston Road and Newtown Row
 
thanks mike think we deduced that the info rob refers to was most likely a missprint...the newspaper article on below thread confirms that the fair was held at walmer st recreation ground after being bannished from the city centre...it then moved to the serpentine ground aston...walmer st changed its name to newtown row..

fair ground at new john street birmingham

hi all can anyone help me im looking for any info regarding fair ground people who lived in caravans in new john street birmingham around 1938 upwards kind regards kc:fat:
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
 
The old photo suggests the late 1940's, judging by the 'new look' ladies coat. I see a bus, it appears to be a West Bromwich Corporation one.
 
A lot of us will recognise this image for different reasons, there will be those gents who purchased modern up to date apparel from there, then those who learned to dance at the Laura Dixon School of dance, but I think it will be mostly remembered for the Whisky A Go Go club that was housed there in the 60's.

City Hill Street -Navigation Street.jpg
 
I've just joined this site as is was looking for old photos of my road/house which I've just brought on orchard road erdington. I love looking at old photos and I really love my new house. Victorian architecture and fittings are a treasure. Does anyone have any old photos or info about this area?
 
Perry Barr in the 1950s and Wellington Road to the left, see the traffic lights. At rush hours the traffic jams could stretch a quarter of a mile each side of the crossing.
PerryBarrthen.jpeg

The old photo must have been taken from a first floor window, the modern view from a lower level. The pavement in view follows the line of the original. The Commonwealth Games event will presumably cause large changes in the area.
PerryBarrNow.jpg
 
oldMohawk said:
Perry Barr in the 1950s and Wellington Road to the left, see the traffic lights. At rush hours the traffic jams could stretch a quarter of a mile each side of the crossing.
View attachment 137836

The old photo must have been taken from a first floor window, the modern view from a lower level. The pavement in view follows the line of the original. The Commonwealth Games event will presumably cause large changes in the area.
View attachment 137839
Click to expand...
Amazing how much traffic there was on the roads in the old days, compared with the empty modern roads, which are also so well lit.

Bob
 
Phil said:
Looking along Stockfield Road Acocks Green / Yardley from the canal Bridge adjacent to Amington Road toward Warwick Road.

View attachment 137831
Click to expand...
Thanks Phil, Our first home after our wedding just along there on the left. I worked at WB down Amington Rd all of a five minute walk! I notice that Kilmorie Rd is not in the old picture but the council houses have been built on the LHS of Stockfield Rd and the old farm had been demolished.
 
oldMohawk said:
Perry Barr in the 1950s and Wellington Road to the left, see the traffic lights. At rush hours the traffic jams could stretch a quarter of a mile each side of the crossing.
View attachment 137836

The old photo must have been taken from a first floor window, the modern view from a lower level. The pavement in view follows the line of the original. The Commonwealth Games event will presumably cause large changes in the area.
View attachment 137839
Click to expand...
Bakers on the left in the old photo is a butchers shop. I used to work for the one on Soho Rd after school and full time in the summer. Every once in a while I would go help out at the Perry Barr store, I used to deliver meat on a trade bike...…..I hated that traffic in the afternoon which was when many people would call and ask for their order to be delivered!
 
Richarddye said:
Bakers on the left in the old photo is a butchers shop. I used to work for the one on Soho Rd after school and full time in the summer. Every once in a while I would go help out at the Perry Barr store, I used to deliver meat on a trade bike...…..I hated that traffic in the afternoon which was when many people would call and ask for their order to be delivered!
Click to expand...
Another view of Bakers and no traffic ... must be Sunday !
Bakers.jpg


Where Bakers was ...
BakersNow.jpg
 
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