• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team
  • HI folks the server that hosts the site completely died including the Hdd's and backups.
    Luckily i create an offsite backup once a week! this has now been restored so we have lost a few days posts.
    im still fixing things at the moment so bear with me and im still working on all images 90% are fine the others im working on now
    we are now using a backup solution

They Were Caught In Our Old Street Pics...

Status
Not open for further replies.
I like this pic of New St Station on a Bank Holiday Monday in 1961. A crowd waits to catch an excursion train to Rhyll and the lady on the left leans over to make sure she is in the photo. The man next to her seems rather smartly dressed for a day trip to the seaside.
It reminds me of when I went on an excursion train to Blackpool, it took ages to get there and it rained continuously all day, and that was my one and only visit to Blackpool.
CityNewStStationBankHolidayMonday1961.jpg
 
Last edited:
oldMohawk. you missed some great times at Blackpool. I went every year from 1972 to 2002 with a gang of pals (blokes), on the second weekend in October, for what was known as the "Birmingham Weekend" Wonderful memories. So sad to see it deteriorate over the years.
jimbo
 
VE Day_NEW.jpgThis is a picture of some of the residence of Jakeman Road, Balsall Heath, on VE Day, 1945. My Mother is the one with the white spot on her, and her Mother, Emily Yarnold, sadly no longer with us, is just behind her, also with a white spot Does anyone recognise themselves, or anyone else in it?.
 

Attachments

  • VE Day_NEW.jpg
    VE Day_NEW.jpg
    125.4 KB · Views: 87
Last edited:
jimbo said:
oldMohawk. you missed some great times at Blackpool. I went every year from 1972 to 2002 with a gang of pals (blokes), on the second weekend in October, for what was known as the "Birmingham Weekend" Wonderful memories. So sad to see it deteriorate over the years.
jimbo
Click to expand...
Went most weekends during the lights late sixties, what a great time we had in the grand :)
 
Old Mohawk - I have to agree with jimbo and nickcc about Blackpool. I lived there for a couple of years 1959-1961 and had a fantastic time! Have to admit I haven't been back there for many years now though. It must all have changed.
 
I have ended up in Blackpool due my job running 7 bars for a Hotel group i do luv it when we got Brumies in must tell this years intake about this site, Yes Blackpool is a dump less people coming here for hols now the new prom looks like Albert Speer designed it complete with a Flak tower? and the Trams have been replaced with DMU look a likes thanks to the EU anyway with have a Brumie family in tonight so things are looking up.
 
jimbo said:
oldMohawk. you missed some great times at Blackpool. I went every year from 1972 to 2002 with a gang of pals (blokes), on the second weekend in October, for what was known as the "Birmingham Weekend" Wonderful memories. So sad to see it deteriorate over the years.
jimbo
Click to expand...
Fond memories of Blackpool with Nan and Grandad it bucketd down with rain and I wore Nan's rain square. I was afraid someone would see me, Had my 1st ride in a taxi and sat on the little pull down seat. Saw seals in the tower circus and ate fish and chips in a paper in the street. We never did that normally. Nan loved the 'lumernations' Cov fortnight usually concided with the Brummy one in Weymouth and a Leicester one in Yarmouth.
 
I discovered Blackpool through a very roundabout route. Living in Birmingham my mum thought it a good idea to pack me off to my nan in Yorkshire for the school holidays. (Better air!) Yorkshire folk were quite fond of Blackpool, so my nan paid for a holiday for the two of us in Blackpool. We went by coach across the 'border' (Pennines), and had a lovely week in a B & B, near the front. Every time I hear the song 'What's new pusseycat' by Tom Jones I'm right back there on the front with it blaring from the souvenir shops. But it was also here I discovered that me and candy floss just did not see eye to eye. Sick as a pig, right there on the front! Viv.
 
On a final note back in the 60s when i was here as a kid my Nan used to get me up early to watch the elephants come out of tower circus to have soak in the sea it be nice to see that now but our overseers have banned animals from the circus Hey big stars to turn on lights nowdays the public are not permitted to see the so called stars it is for VIPS only and they wonder why the B@BS and the Hotels are empty anyway of to work now in half empty hotel i had to close 5 of my 7 bars.
 
I remember many of our drivers offering a tour of the lights for half a crown per person, this made our drivers very happy but not so sure our company would have been pleased if they'd found out :)
 
When I was at school the teenagers used to sing, W'ere all going to Blackpool" that meant a dirty weekend.
Looking at Old Mohawk's photo of the train platform. Remember when you could jump on and off the train, the last time I did that was trying to get off at Killester Station in Dublin. I couldn't get the door open and I had an old fashioned suitcase. I made it but jumped as it was moving.
When I got out I saw my reflection in a window. I had a cloth cap on with a button, (A Coventry Cap) and the press stud holding the cap down had come undone, I had just come from the early morning mailboat and I looked like a Bisto kid.
 
When I went to the Lickey Hills I remember a long queue of trams lined up to take us back home.
In this pic there is no queue of buses, but everyone standing in the long queue looks patient even the dog !
Little kids chat about the fun they have had, but their bus trip home won't be as interesting as on the old trams with sounds of the bell dinging, electric motors humming, and the swish of the wheel on the overhead line when the tram got up to speed, and if you could sit on the curved bench seat at the front upstairs it was extra fun ....
A thought occurs .... is this the longest bus queue to be seen in the forum old pics ?

index.php
 
Last edited:
Goodness..that photo brings back fond memories,I remember those buildings so well,now was it the 61 bus or the 61 tram from Navigation Street which took us to the Lickeys.
 
It is a nice photo of that famous Snow Hill Entrance and in many of the old city centre photos we see the flower sellers and their trade looked good on that day long ago.

index.php
 
Last edited:
I can only remember waiting for the "Trams" when a boy with my Dad, there were at least 7or8 always at the big terminus at the Lickeys.paul
 
Its Erdington 1956 and the Co Op milkman standing on the back seems to be counting his money, the horse might be on auto-pilot but probably knows where he has to go....
Those Co Op horses were clever and could find their own way back to the milk depot....
Erd1956.jpg
 
6918 said:
Daimler Fleetline 3533 was new in 1965 which means we are seeing Snow Hill in its final few years, such a terrible decision to demolish it......
Simon
Click to expand...
I always liked the Snow Hill Station entrance, it seemed to have class. It was a popular meeting place for young people, as mentioned quite a few times in forum threads, and I spent so much time there it was a wonder I was not caught in an old street pic.
 
I've always liked this 1930's photo in Woodcock St showing a toddler with her mom, and as mentioned when it was originally posted, the smiling old lady in her old fashioned clothes makes it a special old street pic. The old lady came from a generation when everyone wore a hat.

index.php
 
Last edited:
I looked at this forum pic of Erdington High St before it was lost, and wondered why the pavement was so crowded, some people are in the road.
Early 1950's by the look of it and after the drab 1940's, nice things were appearing in the shops so get out early on Saturday mornings and see what you could buy.
ErdHScrowd_1950.jpg
 
Last edited:
Whatever the people are doing they're not rushing to help the lad who appears to have dropped his hat in the gutter cos most of them are walking away.
 
There is one man walking towards it but he had better watch the rough road surface. That vehicle behind the 'hat' looks unusual - wonder what it was ?
 
The car is some sort of shooting brake (as estate cars were called in those days), with the woodwork an obvious forerunner of the Morris Traveller.
 
Yes Paul, a shooting brake. A lovely warm summer day and everyone dressed up to go shopping, not a pair of scruffy jeans or a hole in sight.............. I bet my late mother in law is there somewhere.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top