• 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

Dewdrop Stores

O

O.C.

Guest
Dewdrop Stores were in Alma Street and it was an Off Licence owned by Ansells Brewery
 
down the left Inkerman street with George Davis's betting shop on the left many a time I have been locked up in the yard waiting for the police to move off my grandad Walter Gough out of Parliament street used to be a runner for George, he was a very nice guy always had a tanner for you 
 
Strange how a crime becomes legal at the stroke of a pen John ....and with all the gambling that goes on today.........what crime was committed ? folk have gambled and bet on things since the dawn of man and it could never be stopped, but do ya remember how the bet was wrapped up in the money, like a toffee
 
I often had plenty of time to stare in the windows on the Dewdrop Stores when caught in an awful traffic jam below Six Ways on Alma Street. It brightened up the street and gave me something to look at as the bus crept up the hill to the Six Ways bus stop.
 
strange I had forgot about how the bets were wrapped but the memoy soon ame flooding back even recalling how it felt clasped in my hand with the fear of not losing it and when you think it only held coppers not like the bets they make to, penny doubles and eachway bets most times is was only between a tanner or a bob, I even recalled the yard with it window in the wall and the corrugate iron all round, thanks Cromwell for a nice bit of memory O0
 
NICE ONE CROM ,
UNCLE CHARLES JELF HAD A BOOKING OFFICE DOWN THERE IN ALMA STREET. SO DID  GRAND FATHER  JELF , AT THE BACK OF THE CAFE AT 901 TYBURN RD , WHICH WAS A BIG PROPERTY,
YOU HAD TO WALK THROUGH A SIDE DOOR , INTO THE BACK.AND WHEN HE DIED  CHARLIE . AND IVY TOOK IN ON AND AT NEW CANNAL ST.
I HAVE MENTION BEFORE  IN A THREAD ,ABOUT GRAN DAD AND THE PARIES AT NEW CANAL ST
AND THEY HAD SOME GAMING  MACHINES AND SOME PERSON ON THE FORCE . WOULD TIP THEM OFF WHEN THEY WAS GOING TO BE RAIDED ,
                               
 
Our house in Phillips Street was once an illegal betting office, long before my time though.

What a great name the Dewdrop Stores
 
Your house must have seen a lot of covert action Rod.....You"re right John, the bets were smaller back then but if you lost any one of them you would have never heard the last of it.
My Mom used to say when there was a special race coming up like the Grand National..."Let's have a shilling each way"...the bet went on but I know not where!!
 
We have had postings on betting shops before under I believe "The Magic Window".  My dad had regular small bet's at George Davies in Inkerman Street, and strange as it seems today, he would send me to put them on and I was probably under 10 years old.  Perhaps it was thought children wouldn't be stopped.

My gran and grandad always had a bet 3d each way or something like that but they used Joe Wheeler. My grandad was always a gambler and his occupation on my mother's birth certificate was Commission Agent - I thought this was a posh job for 1900 until my son put me right  My grandad went all over the country to different racecourses in his younger days, and often took my mother to help sell jellied eels etc., for his pal Mr. Hawkins, as she was a pretty young girl and drew the punters in.
 
Was the off licence originally a pub called the Dewdrop Inn?.. my great great grandfather Joseph Armstrong ran the Inn in 1914
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top