Author Topic: H. Wiles toy shop  (Read 24417 times)

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #15 on: 16:55:26, 12/02/14 »
Adsum,
Being of that era and of working age, did you ever drink at the Lacy Arms (Fatted Calf on Crompton Court) which appears in the film?
I missed that little gem, didn't know it was there until it was too late. I did manage to get into Seftons though. How I missed the Fatted Calf will haunt me for the rest of my life.

Adsum

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #16 on: 18:13:47, 12/02/14 »
Adsum,
Being of that era and of working age, did you ever drink at the Lacy Arms (Fatted Calf on Crompton Court) which appears in the film?
I missed that little gem, didn't know it was there until it was too late. I did manage to get into Seftons though. How I missed the Fatted Calf will haunt me for the rest of my life.


No I don't think so. I used to drink all over town back then. I know of the Lacy arms but I can't honestly say I drank in there. Working in the building trade in the early 60s I tended to drink in the Shakespeare on Fountain St. It was where the building trade met up if they had been working out of town or were looking to hear if there were any new jobs coming up. I went into Seftons a couple of times but it wasn't one of my regular haunts.























We are all lying in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #17 on: 19:34:06, 12/02/14 »
Adsum,
The Fatted Calf was down the side of Seftons on Cromford Court. They called it the Lacy Arms in the film and changed the location. This little pub had a lot of history, especially with the newspaper industry which I was part of. It was all sadly demolished when they built that heap of crap called the Arndale. I was an under age drinker at that time (1968-9) and just exploring the city centre pub scene. I missed it by a whisker. One of my first pubs was The Garrick on Fountain Street, also just a memory.

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #18 on: 20:03:02, 12/02/14 »
My apologies. It was Cromford Court and here is a pic.
It would seem the Wiles stories have dried up. There must be more people out there who have special memories or even pics they would be willing to share?

Adsum

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #19 on: 20:10:56, 12/02/14 »
Adsum,
The Fatted Calf was down the side of Seftons on Cromford Court. They called it the Lacy Arms in the film and changed the location. This little pub had a lot of history, especially with the newspaper industry which I was part of. It was all sadly demolished when they built that heap of crap called the Arndale. I was an under age drinker at that time (1968-9) and just exploring the city centre pub scene. I missed it by a whisker. One of my first pubs was The Garrick on Fountain Street, also just a memory.


In that case I may have been in it. I went into the Cromford club a few times and I went  into a pub there once or twice. My memory isn't what it was, I'm going back nearly 60 years.  :-[

You may have answered a question that's been puzzling me for years. Was the Garrick in the middle of a terrace where you could enter either from Fountain St. or Mosely St. The toilets were downstairs? I used to go in a pub on fountain St in my teens with my mates and it was ages before we realised most of the smartly dressed business men were actually gay. This was in the days when homosexuality was still illegal.  :o
We are all lying in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Adsum

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #20 on: 20:15:46, 12/02/14 »
My apologies. It was Cromford Court and here is a pic.
It would seem the Wiles stories have dried up. There must be more people out there who have special memories or even pics they would be willing to share?



I have stated before on here. When I was a youngster, Lewis's arcade between Wiles and Lewis's, used to be lined with women. I remember thinking this would be a good place to meet my girlfriend when I was old enough to have one. I remember staring at one when she said to me. "Go away little boy. Come back in about 10 years, and bring some money with you". It was only later that I found out these ladies were "working girls waiting to pick up punters.   :-[



Hell is a City Trailer. 



http://youtu.be/z20Kdo8af7M
« Last Edit: 20:18:55, 12/02/14 by Adsum »
We are all lying in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #21 on: 22:54:35, 12/02/14 »
Adsum,
Not sure about the two entrances or the toilets. There is a good possibility it did go through to West Mosley Street (not Mosley Street). You have to remember that I was under age and keeping a low profile. My mate was over six feet tall and he used to go to the bar to get served. By the time I was confident enough to go the bar myself I had moved on to bigger and better things and the next thing you know - The Garrick has disappeared. The pic might help jog your memory.

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #22 on: 23:05:45, 12/02/14 »
Thanks for the trailer. The alley where the robbery took place was the entrance to Cromford Court off Corporation Street and the building on the right was Seftons.

Grahalle

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #23 on: 20:58:11, 18/02/14 »
I used to go into Wiles on the way home from school. I got off the bus in Piccadilly and walked up  Oldham Street to catch the next bus home. I regularly bought arrows downstairs, we lost them quite often because we didn't always aim at the straw target!! All the chemicals were downstairs too, and the magnesium ribbon which we seemed to buy quite often, cant see that about to often in shops these days. Strange how the letters for Wiles and Lewis's would seem to spell each other. Cyril Washbrook worked downstairs in the sports shop, I still have a signed cricket bat which would have been bought around 1959.

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #24 on: 23:27:11, 18/02/14 »
It would seem that Wiles was a mecca for budding archers. Fortunately, for the local community, my bow and arrows, along with the straw target, were confiscated and then traded for something less lethal. What did you do with the magnesium ribbon, tie it to the arrows and light it?
Most of my memories of 'downstairs' was when you got to the bottom of the stairs you went back on yourself and there in front of you was an Aladdins Cave of Hornby Train sets, Scalextric layouts and a cornucopia of Airfix and Ravell modelling kits. Cyril Washbrook was a bit before my time but may have still been working there for all I know. So just in case ... Thanks Cyril.
For all those who did not know Cyril, here is a picture of him in his hay day ...
« Last Edit: 23:37:02, 18/02/14 by davo »

Grahalle

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #25 on: 14:49:45, 19/02/14 »
We obviously think along the same lines, magnesium ribbon was quite combustable..I also traded my bow and arrows and the straw target in at the Sport Exchange, which was out of town, I think it might have been somewhere near Princess Road along with a load of model railway , which probably came from Wiles. I made a hole through a garage door at a friends parents newly built house in Broadheath, Altrincham which speeded up the disposal!!

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #26 on: 15:35:29, 19/02/14 »
You can't imagine selling bows and arrows to kids today with health and safety breathing down your neck all the time. We did improvise though and used to make throwing arrows and spears. We would flatten 4 and 6 inch nails under the wheels of trains on the local railway line and they made the perfect points when tied to canes. Those throwing arrows used to fly some.

davo

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #27 on: 16:39:45, 19/02/14 »
Adsum,
More on the Garrick and why it may have attracted people of a certain pursuasion.

http://pubs-of-manchester.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/garrick-fountain-street.html

BassOne

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #28 on: 22:12:20, 17/10/16 »
My mother had a Saturday job there in the late 1950s, earning £1 for the day.  She made lifetime friends of Dolly Bighouse and Florence Grimshaw(?) who also worked there.

Parky

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Re: H. Wiles toy shop
« Reply #29 on: 12:47:44, 18/10/16 »
My sisters boyfriend at the time worked at wiles before he joined the fire brigade he sometimes bought me aircraft kits to make these were a bigger scale than the airfix kits and to me were always better that would be around 1964/65 it was an alladins cave in there to a youngster (and no doubt dads).