• 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.
oldMohawk said:
There were quite a few interesting shops in Martineau St, I notice one shop is displaying a large flag and perhaps a car expert could tell us what make the car is.
Click to expand...

Notice the Union Jack has the English flag on the same Pole? Maybe sometime around St George's Day? But what year?

My interpretation, seeing something on the floor by the driver's foot, is that he has broken the door handle and is looking down and thinking Oh S**t!
 
I suspect that somehow, possibly somewhere along the country roads he travelled to reach the city, the car got a scratch. :eek:
His thoughts might be, Oh! golly, gosh, (remember this is a polite, family Forum), how did that happen. :oops: What will his Lordship/Ladyship say?
 
Actually he is about to flick the object on the floor, with his nicely polished boot into the gutter. It looks like a tin of boot polish. By the way can anyone make out what is for sale at 2/8d and can anyone translate the Buy wholesale Save Retail P....... on the banner wraparound the building front. DU is a Coventry registration, can anyone suggest a possible year. The two old dears dress suggests prior to WWI. The tram, I think the number is 218 was built in 1906, there is a difference to the 'tween decks of the two trams. Or is that just adverts that are not showing as they should. Certainly with the number of men in the picture I would hazard a guess at prior to 1914. Also the actual layout and printing of the postcard give it a pre WWI look, after the war there were not so many real photographs and borders began to disappear from the majority of cards - they reappeared in some of the 1930s cards. ....and when I am wrong I'll say sorry. But as a card collector, if I collected Birmingham cards (and I cannot afford them) this is one I would want and it would probably be offered by a dealer in the region of £30 - £40 or even higher.

Bob Davis
 
Here's a start...Roneo became a Ltd Co in 1908

In the 1912 Kelly in Martineau St, either side of Union Passage are 17 Roneo Ltd and 15 The India Rubber, Gutta Percha and Telegraph Works Co.

At 19 and 21 is JOHN Bird Ltd, boot and shoe makers!
 
At 5 and 7 there is a George and William Morton...boot makers.

Just on top of Roneo I think it says S Hanson and Sons, if it is then above would be known as County Chambers (B) and they were wholesale grocers.
 
Just for the record in the 1912 Kelly going upwards on what must be termed the North side we have...

15 India Rubber, Gutta Perca, and Telegraph Works Co
Union Passage
17 Roneo Ltd
19&21 JOHN Bird Ltd, boot and shoe makers
23 Remington Typewriters Co
25 Walter Bros, Tailors
27 Salter Typewriter
29 Nestle and Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Co
31 W Holbrook, milers
33,35,37 Grenville And Co, Artistic furnishes
 
Platform 6 at Snow Hill station in 1962 and that young train-spotter looks slightly sad probably because '5025 Chirk Castle' is pulling the train when he was hoping to spot another 'namer' he did not have in his book. When I was young, I often wore sandals like he is wearing.
Platform6Snowhill1962.jpg
 
The pic has to be dated between 1948 and 1963. Her home sheds were, post nationalization, Bristol (Bath Road), Oxford and the last Hereford. I believe the pic might be when she was at Hereford as she does not appear to be on a 'crack' express run.
Since I retired from paid work I have always worn sandals. I have three pairs. I do have a shoes for special occasions. :D
Sandals keep your feet more warm than shoes in winter I find.
 
"Shall we buy one? that new BBC2 channel has clearer pictures but I suppose we'll need a new aerial".
bristolrd1960s.jpg
The buildings at 814 Bristol Road still exist but small television shops soon went out of business when large stores such as Comet opened nearby in the late 1960s
Capture_814.JPG
 
That railway station pic Alan, I don't think Hereford Station was ever that big, I recall travelling from there back to Brum in the late fifties and I think it was only a small station. (I could be wrong)
 
I notice the shop on the right in the top pic in post 2203 has the word 'Co-Operative' on it's front but the shop does not look like a Co-Op so it must have changed before the 1960s.
 
Eric Gibson said:
That railway station pic Alan, I don't think Hereford Station was ever that big, I recall travelling from there back to Brum in the late fifties and I think it was only a small station. (I could be wrong)
Click to expand...
Hello Eric,
I was not suggesting the picture was Hereford, it is quite clearly Snow Hill. I travelled from Hereford a few times myself. My suggestion was that the time of the pic was when she was shedded at Hereford.
 
Sorry Alan, I misunderstood your post, I wouldn't know Snow Hill, don't think I've ever been inside the station, when we were kids we travelled from Perry Bar or New Street and once I think from Moor Street.
 
oldMohawk said:
I notice the shop on the right in the top pic in post 2203 has the word 'Co-Operative' on it's front but the shop does not look like a Co-Op so it must have changed before the 1960s.
Click to expand...

This would presumably have been a TASCOS shop rather than a Birmingham Co-op shop so that would explain differences in style.
 
You are correct David, here is a pic of that Co-op when it was presumably trading.
Tasco on Bristol Rd.jpg
It looks like the shop on the left was not Alex Owen when this photo was taken.
 
The pic in post 2203 of Alex Owen, a tv shop as has been mentioned, is set back from the pavement and looks very much like it is a newsagents. In the pic, post 2210, there appears to be another Co-Op two doors further along the street and even possibly a third two doors further on. The vertical patterned shop names suggest it. It was suggested that they did not look look Co-Ops shops and I have some agreement there, .......................
however, I have since discovered that this style shop name was a modern version of TASCOS shop names and the pic in question is sated as in Selly Oak - see Post 4 of the TASCOS thread. (which has got cluttered with BCS pictures).
 
Last edited:
As previously mentioned the photographs of bomb damage often show people standing on the rubble and in this photo a young lad on the right wearing a baraclava and that lady with the shopping bag must have clambered over the bricks. The place is Elm Tree Road Stirchley at the junction with Charlotte Road where houses were destroyed during a heavy bombing raid on 10 April 1941. Sadly, a father, mother, and their teenage daughter were killed by the bomb.
ElmStreet_Bombing.jpg
image from Shoothill
 
Last edited:
The driver was in a hurry round that island and he's noticed that he has been caught in an old street pic !
bLeaning bus.jpg
 
yes old mowhawk
I have to agrre with the othere three lads whom liked your photograph its a sure cracker brillient lets have more of these photographs
best wishes Astonian Alan,,,
 
Birmingham's buses were always noted in the past of having good springing. It was not unusual to see BCT buses leaning way over especially in suburban areas where there were many roundabouts and "U" turns on dual carriageways. However, we do have some former drivers here so maybe they will clarify my comments. Travelling out of the city on the 29A was always a good ride (well people didn't dine on buses quite the way they seem to today) the Mermaid roundabout, Sarehole Road roundabout and the turn around that very large tree (now gone I believe) as the bus turned into Keddleston Road ( I have known the platform to scrape the road there - yes true!) was always interesting. I believe passengers today might complain! An interesting feature of the island at Baldwins Lane, for buses returning to the city, was the compulsory stop half way around the island. This was to slow the bus (well a compulsory stop meant a stop, even if brief) and of course to give the driver chance to see passing cars which did not use the island.
 
Hi Alan
I have to agree on the sarold round about its a little blinder with its self even today Alan
I come from worcestershire most days aweek to get to the business we run up at kings road tysely
and i come up over the licky hill and down to the big pub by gloverly road thats one as well
i come that way to avoid the M5 , its a real night mare
best wishes Astonian,,,,, Alan,,,
 
I have seen the bus platform scrape the road on the turn from Hill Street into Paradise Street and obviously the bus was not travelling very fast on that turn
 
DavidGrain said:
I have seen the bus platform scrape the road on the turn from Hill Street into Paradise Street and obviously the bus was not travelling very fast on that turn
Click to expand...
In a lot of the pictures of the pre war buses, when looking at the rear view, the platform often has a degree of downward slope on it and yes Hill Street into Paradise Street was a favourite for the scraping platform and of course the 'stick' of commuters leaving while the bus was still going round that corner. I am afraid the joys of bus travel...the run and jump on, the drop off before the stop...have long gone, now you ring the bell (a mortal sin in the 1950s, especially if you were with the fierce but lovely Irish Conductress out of Wellhead Lane on her beloved 1749) and sit, wait until the bus stops, then slowly get off, except me. I still get up press the bell as I walk to the front of the bus and stand behind the demarcation line (of course). That bus is going a fair speed, but isn't it a superb picture?

Bob
 
Morturn said:
Interesting film about testing buses from 1957 here:
Click to expand...

I have watched a demonstration of the tilt test on a bus when they allowed the bus to fall over and then demonstrated lifting it upright again. This took place on a visit that I made to the London Transport Museum Depot in Acton. The only thing that was not accurate about it was that for the purpose of the demonstration they had removed the engine. It was obviously a bus that was due for scrapping and this was demonstration only.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top