Birmingham 1969-73

[Limes]

St George's in the fields by Thomas Rickman (whose tomb in the old church yard is the last thing left standing)
picture dump

 

[Richard Dye]

Same area as my first pictures above, but taken aerially in 1945, prior to the slum clearances of Lennox street and Wheeler street etc

When wa# Wheeler St cleared?


Thank you!

 

[Limes]

When wa# Wheeler St cleared?


Thank you!

Slightly before my time, but I do believe it was 1968-1969

This is Lennox Street in 1968 and it still extends all the way up to New John Street.

 

[Astoness]

Slightly before my time, but I do believe it was 1968-1969

This is Lennox Street in 1968 and it still extends all the way up to New John Street.

thanks limes but i posted this photo and the ones on post 361 some years ago under the appropriate thread titles

lyn

 

[Richard Dye]

Slightly before my time, but I do believe it was 1968-1969

This is Lennox Street in 1968 and it still extends all the way up to New John Street.

Thanks…. I left at the end of 19(2 and Wheeler Street was alive and well.

 

[Mark Tooze]

Clearing out my late father's old drives, saw these that I'd never seen before.
The slums of Newtown being cleared out and the area redeveloped, photo of Geach tower B19 being built and then a photo from the tower, looking north toward Lozells and Aston.

View attachment 198520

View attachment 198521

The colour photo is amazing as it shows clearance of Wheeler St, Guildford St - in fact most of Newtown. Few odd buildings still standing - first few new buildings going up - looks like a bomb has dropped - just as I remember it from when we moved out of Guildford St in the late 1960s. Thank you for posting this one!!! Please post any more if you have them!!!

 

[Alf Rogers]

According to UK Housing Wki website, Geach tower was built in 1965 (it doesn't say whether construction started in '65, or was completed by that date). The photo of Wheeler Street, taken from Geech Tower, has also been difficult to pin down when it was taken! I think that is Hodgins Tower on the right side, under construction?
If I'm right, then Hodgkins tower was completed, according to the same website, in 1971; which would date the photo to 1970.
Please correct me if I'm wrong!
Phew! I need a cuppa now!
All the best! Alf.

 

[Alf Rogers]

This is my 100th post! Do I get a Crackerjack pencil & pen?!!

 

[Donbogen]

Sadly a kid i used to knock about with fell down a unfinished lift shaft in one of those towers l was raiding biscuits from workers huts at the time

 

[Limes]

According to UK Housing Wki website, Geach tower was built in 1965 (it doesn't say whether construction started in '65, or was completed by that date). The photo of Wheeler Street, taken from Geech Tower, has also been difficult to pin down when it was taken! I think that is Hodgins Tower on the right side, under construction?
If I'm right, then Hodgkins tower was completed, according to the same website, in 1971; which would date the photo to 1970.
Please correct me if I'm wrong!
Phew! I need a cuppa now!
All the best! Alf.

I'm pretty sure it is indeed 1970.
My parents moved into Hodgson tower in 1970 and it's just about to be built in the photo, (it must have gone up quick!) - so it could be late 1969, but likely spring 1970, with the wheeler street shops already complete and the maisonettes on Guildford drive present, though they were among the first things to be built.

 

[Dionysius//88]

great people pic mike...man looking out of cafe and woman with baby in pram...those prams take me back a bit...like the advert for the new decimal coins...

lyn

Yes those prams I went to pick one up from a shop at Perry Barr shopping centre in 1978 and walked back to Aston with it after my daughter was born

 

[Jent]

so sad to see pictures of Mount Terrace, my grandmother lived there probably from the 1920’s until the 70’s. I was born there in 1950. I remember my grandmother calling us into the house when the blues football matches finished as the terrace was crowded with supporters going home. She lived in a back to back terraced house and I remember her toilet was in a communal block halfway down the terrace. There was a block of 4 toilets shared by several neighbours.

 

[Astoness]

There was then a gap in the houses, a result, I think, of wartime bomb damage. The next view shows the remaining buildings on the west side of the street down to Balsall Heath Road. At the far end can just be seen the building which was once Fosters, shown in post 62,
Close to it some shops, judging by the shop blinds, are still occupied. They would have been at 1/2 C. H. Beasely & Son, tailors, next to 3/4 Harris Bros, grocers, previously in the 1940s a cycle dealers.. At no 6 was a ladies outfitters, at the end called Mary's, but previously Lelis Frank Bradbury. Towards the front of the picture can be seen Kalyal Co Ltd, drapers at no 11, previously in the 1950s a greengrocer, while before WW2 a newsagent. The building to the left of it at no 12 was a restaurant/csfe. the last occupant being called the Anglo-Pak Restaurant, but the previous owner was A. Miah with dining rooms.

hi mike if no 4 is showing could you put an arrow where it is please..thanks

lyn

 

[waxy]

Cox st west
Photo 14
Carrying on from a few months ago at #106, we turn the corner from Clevedon road into Cox St West. At the left is Royce car hire, though directories of the time list it as Bones private car hire, which can be seen better in the last shot in # 106. It is part of no 48, the first use of which recorded is as part of a glass warehouse . By the shape of the pavement in the 1890 OS map it was in fact probably an entrance at that time into which vehicles came. This has now been filled in to make an office. Just before WW1 no 48 was a mixture of a brush maker and Cox St West social club, while after the first war it was used by a printer, a cabinet maker and around 1967 the building was shared with a turf accountant by two tailors, Scotowicz and Betker. The four houses to the right were almost certainly built for residential purposes, although the one on the right (no 44) was used for a time as a shop. The left hand one (47) at the turn of the century housed a cycle enameller and a fishing tackle maker, while no 46 was used by a painter and decorator. On the far right Lincoln Street Motors (39-48) was a relatively new building built around 1960 on a site that had always had an industrial use, shoe rivet making being the most recent, this developing from horseshoe-making when the demand for these diminished. An iron kettle maker and a chandelier maker once also occupied part of the site.
Photo 15
When the photo was taken no 39 Cox St West was partly listed as being part of Lincoln St motors , but also by joiners Bowen & Deeley and a French polishing firm. In 1956 it belonged to physician & surgeon, but, for most of its life seems to have been a private residence.
Photo 16
To the left of the picture is a space. No 38 Cox Street West was destroyed by bombing in the war. The Solid Brass Ring Co. (no 37) had been doing business since the late 1940s, first describing itself as a curtain ring manufacturer and later a brass chain manufacturer. Around the time of the bombing which destroyed its neighbour it was a wholesale upholsterer and earlier, together with buildings either side, a garage run by William Hatfield. However, earlier incarnations had been the home of William Dawkins (1890-97), who first described himself as a photographic frame manufacturer, but later expanded this to photographic apparatus manufacturer, and from the end of WW1 up to 1932 no 35-37 were the home of Blackhams, brassfounders., and a part of this previous to this was Lycett & Co, brassfounders. Houses immediately to the right of it held many trades, often only for a year or so, including whip maker, window blind maker, leather boot lace maker, tinplate worker and tortoiseshell folder maker.

Thank you Mikejee,

I'm just having a bit of an Ancestry moment and my Grandfather Leonard Meakin did indeed live at number 46 Cox Street West, working as a painter and decorator. Your knowledge is amazing!!

Best wishes, Joelle