We hear today many convincing stories regarding the centre of town being plagued by rats in the 1940’s and 50’s. Now, as I have mentioned often before, I was born close to St Peter’s Church which seemed to be the centre of all activities during my childhood. To hear a tale […]
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New Year 1904 – Wolverhampton’s First Number Plate
The Motor Car Act 1903 The Motor Car Act 0f 1903 came into force on 1 January 1904. This required all motor vehicles to enter an official vehicle register and to carry alphanumeric plates. The Act came to pass so the government could trace any vehicle in the event of an accident or […]
Read moreA Grand Design
The Grand Theatre the only surviving theatre in the Black Country today in 2013, designed by eminent architect Charles J. Phipps, and constructed by Wolverhampton builder Henry Gough in the splendid location of new Lichfield Street, in 1894. It is today considered by many as the finest theatre in […]
Read moreA Site for Sore Eyes
Now spectacles or glasses as they’re commonly known, have been a concern of mine for as long as I can remember. In the first instant my great , great grandfather William Howe appears in the 1835 edition of Pigot & Co’s Commercial Directory. as a Spectacle and Tobacco box maker […]
Read moreHair Care, 1940s Style as I recall it.
THE BARBERS! A pre-war child’s definition.. A shop or front parlour, where a parent (usually father) took a boy to be almost scalped, and to indulge himself in a masochistic act of being singed across the back of the head with a flaming taper. This practice went on at least […]
Read moreSign Of The Times, The Writing’s On The Wall
They have re-designed the set, the Old players have left, the World I once lived in, is once more bereft. When this picture was taken in 1974, as well as the shadow cast by the sun, from above the new subway, a shadow of doom had already been […]
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