M
Mike Regan
Guest
I'm looking for information on my family. My family from some generations ago. My great great grandfather, George Greening, at one time owned a tavern by the name of "The Talbot Inn" I'm told that it was located at 55 Highgate in Aston. This of course was some time ago, in fact the business failed and he and his family moved to Canada in 1887. Some or all of his children returned to Aston for at least some amount of time as my great grandfather Albert Greening married Nina Jarvis who lived on Conybere St. in Aston. After marrying the lived on Dymoke St. From what I can tell, these streets are all in the same neighborhood.
If anyone can help me, I would love to know of any Greenings or Jarvises still in the area, as well as any information on that area of Aston. What's it like now? What might it have been like then? Any help would be most appreciated.
If anyone can help me, I would love to know of any Greenings or Jarvises still in the area, as well as any information on that area of Aston. What's it like now? What might it have been like then? Any help would be most appreciated.
Hi Mike I grew up in Dymoke St and had friends who lived in Conybere St from 1950 - 58. Around 1959 all the old Back-to-Back, houses were pulled down as part of the Birmingham re-development and the invasion of what is now known as 'Spaghetti Junction Motorway'. The years that I was living there it was a very 'Poor' part of Birmingham and was known more as being in Balsall Heath (I think even Highgate had abandoned us as being part of their area). The houses were in the most part were what was known as Two-up-Two down, meaning a sitting room and kitchen down stairs and two bed rooms up stairs. In many cases there were very large families living in these small homes(our neighbour had 9 in the family).There were also what was known as 1/2 houses in the Court next to us, these only had one room down stairs and one bed room up the first flight of stairs and another very small what again was known as a 'Box room' up another flight of stairs (my friends family live in one and they had 9 in their family too). These 1/2 houses only had three windows, one in each room as the other 1/2 house backed on to them and there was no space between them and the next door house a very overcrowded area). There were lots of factories in the area and we lived at both 14/46 Dymoke St and 46 we only had 5 in our family and 46 had four bed rooms we were lucky in that way, however both houses being next door to some sort of Metal producing factory which had large machines operating day and night our house would vibrate at times and the noise well. I have not lived in England for a long time, but am told there were some new houses built after they demolished the back-to-backs and the area is still industrial. If you go to 
Thank you for your quick response. It was indeed very helpful. My grandfather was born after his parents returned to Canada but his older sister was born on Dymoke St. in 1895. What was really helpful was your description of the half houses, as her birth certificate lists their address as 64 Dymoke St., Back, which leads me to believe they lived in one of the half houses that you described. Must have been very tight conditions to live in with a family of nine. Makes one wonder how you managed to produce 7 children with so little privacy, but that's another story.
, not Angela St (Angela is my daughter's name) :lol: