Recent content by Sylvia Willis

For Crossroads groupies, this website has an extensive coverage of all episodes - summaries, complete cast, photos, etc. Even the status of an episode, such as when I was looking at 1964-5, the status of the episodes was: "wiped/missing". I'm assuming that means they can't be viewed anywhere...

Thank you for this! It appears from one of the maps that shows the numbers as odd and even, that 61 was one house in from the Felt Works. Interesting that Thomas Taylor at Number 65 was a marine store dealer too. Many on the street appear to be shops or businesses (likely within their own living...

I wonder if they all appeared in the trade directories? I suppose those that were considered legitimate businesses would be...

Agreed. Lots of threads to look through and look forward to now the days are beginning to close in!!! Enjoy!

Yes Richard, being a Brum I have many ancestors - as I'm sure we all do - who worked in coal mines, as nailers, as servants, boatmen, etc. Just reading about my nailer ancestors in Bartley Green and Halesowen has given me great insight into the hard graft and the subsequent illnesses and causes...

Thanks Lyn. That's so true! We all complain today of little inconveniences, but look what they went through. Large families living in small back-to-backs, long walks in the cold, rainy dark to a shared loo, long days of hard labour in dangerous conditions. I only hope they would feel gratified...

Family story goes that she was married to John McDonough and they changed their names to Mac/McDonald when they arrived in England from Ireland. The Irish were definitely not popular so maybe they thought they could use a name that looked more Scottish than Irish? Great observation that her...

Ta Brian! I see from the map Astoness posted that 61 was one of the small block of houses next to the Felt works. It looks too small to have been a shop, but maybe they had something out in the back. Louisa was listed in the City & County Trade directories between 1876 and 1884 at the Little...

Astoness - thank you so much for the wonderful photos of Little King St. That's the Brum I grew up in!

I just read this latest post before mine. How fascinating, Roger, that your ancestor lived next door to mine! Would love to know if you have any family stories of the people living on the street at that time.

I'm looking for information about the address 61 Little King Street. I have a great-great-grandmother named Louisa MacDonald who lived there in the 1870s and 1880s according to the census records. She was from an Irish immigrant family and was widowed, living there with her children and...

Rachel, did your uncle live in Sutton Coldfield and attend Boldmere Junior School in the 1950's? If so, I was a classmate of his.

Did Paul Hodgkinson attend Boldmere Junior School in Sutton Coldfield in the 1960s? If so, I was a classmate of his.

Malcom, if you have an email you'd like to share, perhaps we can expand the topic there and share more information about our own journeys that might not fit here? Sylvia

! Even though some of us are not living nearby, we still have connections. I have family in Harborne, Sutton Coldfield and the Midlands and have visited often over the years. My birth mother's family are all from Northfield/Bartley Green and Halesowen. At the time of my birth, her family was in...