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Courtyards and yards of brum

Astoness said:
morning celia well all i can say is you are very lucky to have a photo of your old house complete with moms washing on the line:)...just in case anyone is wondering what photo we are taling about here it is again...st helens passage..

lyn

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Thank you so much Lyn, I was so thrilled to see it, Brought back so many Memories , Good & Bad , But was able to show my family of my Beginnings haha X Celia
 
Yes it must be great to have a pic of the house you was born in, I have pics of the houses I have lived in, in Sheldon, Shirley, Erdington (using street view) and overseas but not the one I was born in at Queens Road Aston. Eric
 
Court 4, Lawford Street ... the outhouse has an interesting window frame.
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shoothill
 
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The outhouse window brickwork suggests it might have been done that way to incorporate the metal framing. No lintel just a keystone so it was cheaper I guess.
The exterior plumbing is a bit dubious! The down pipe seems to be accepting water from the three house roofs. I guess the folks living there knew that and gave it a wide berth when it rained. However on warmer days it might be a great place to stand either to take a cold bath/shower - no bath indoors I suspect. The other larger, square shaped stack goes to ground so there might be some indoor facilities there.
Never having lived in such properties I am also curious about the three small openings adjacent to the doorways. I am of the opinion that they might be what was known as a meat/food safe with a mesh instead of glass and being high up from the paving were less prone to theft by animals or thieves.
The first house has a delightful family who look clean and well fed and an age range from very young to middle age. No men there of course, they would have been at their place of work. Was the end house empty or did it have a young couple who were both at work?
 
lovely photos kath....they were the wrong way round so i have turned them round and re posted them for you...i had ancestors in heneage st in 1841 and 51

lyn
 
Line of wasing in a back to back yard..png
I do not know where this one is/was but it is something you do not see so frequently these days.
 
court 17. Hospital St..jpg
Because I am doing several things at the same time I may post something that has already been displayed by someone else. If that is the case will a mod please delete my post, thank you.
 
Think the photo in #856 is at the Back to Backs museum. Looks like a staged scene for the photograph.

Stitcher, don't worry if they've been posted before. We've found that revisiting these images gives much pleasure and can spark further memories. Thanks for your hard work. Viv.
 
Vivienne, that is certainly modern, new window frames, new window sills, new slates and down pipe and colour photograph !! Compare it to posts # 852 and #858. I have lived in a back to back in the 50's and it was nothing like that
 
Houses 1, 2 and 3, Court 2, St James' Place.
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only visible if logged in, it is a link to a forum pic in another forum thread click/here
 
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Houses 4, 5 and 6, Court 2, St James' Place.
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only visible if logged in, it is a link to a forum pic in another forum thread click/here
 
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cottage baths..jpeg I remember posting this one a few years ago but it may be missing now so here it is again. My Mom and Dad were rehoused from Brearley Street to Acocks Green where I was born in 1940.
 
Houses 1 and 2 in Court 6, Duke Street. Unusual use of old mattresses on the right.
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image from the Shoothill collection.
 
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That picture of Duke Street is exactly how I remember my aunt's place in Coralie Street Hockley, the door with the arched top was the lavvy, I got seriously shouted at for drumming on the tin bath that hung on the wall in theirs when I was about eight years old. :)
 
Ah the old "Bath on the Wall" we had the spare bedroom converted into a bathroom in the early 1950's. Mom and Dad went 50/50 with the lady owner of the house we rented under some government home improvement scheme. It must have made a big improvement in our lives and I wonder what became of the old long zinc bath. If I had been younger I may have memories of playing with it as a boat or such.
Cheers Tim.
 
hi alan my garden has quite a few old quirky things in it....would love one of those old tin baths...would most likely plant it out:D

lyn
 
There was an old sandpit in Jerrys Lane, Erdington. We used to slide down the hill in an old tin bath
 
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