Hi Everyone,
When my family moved over from Ireland in 1957/8, I was just three years old. we lived in a upstairs flat on (what was then) high Street, now Hathersage (?) Road, opposite the shops and the corner of Carmoor Rd. The row of houses were demolished around 1960 to make way for a new convent, which I believe is now student accommodation.
We moved around the corner to Summer Street (11) and lived there until the clearances, we moved out in 1972, one of the last families to leave the street. Mam and Dad and six kids in a two up two down, with an outside loo, and a single cold water tap in the scullery. I remember the cobbled road and flagged pavement before they covered it over with tarmac.
Went to St Josephs at the top of Daisy Bank Rd, and then to St.Pius X. My older siblings went to Stafford House before it closed down. We were one of the 'Irish' families mentioned earlier. Funny, but until just now, I never thought of C-on-M as being a 'little Ireland'...but now I think about it...
Dad worked as a fitter on the Railway (Old Trafford, and later at Longsite), Mam pulled her hair out looking after the six of us. I remember the illegal bookies in a back yard half way down July Street, before the legal bookies opened by the zebra crossing on Upper brook St. Me and my mates hanging around the front door of the Blackstock with our Guy each year....making a packet from the drunks. Trying to build a bigger bomb fire at the bottom of Jun Street then the May Street gang had built at the bottom of their street.
High Street baths everyday in the summer holidays (got in free if you had a pass saying you could swim a length), red eyes, smelling of chlorine, and the hot vimto from the little shop down stairs. Cockroaches in the changing cubicles added to the experience. Glad to see the building has been rescued. I look back on my childhood growing up in Chorlton-on-Medlock with gratitude and great fondness.
Saw Manchester last in 2009 when I returned to see my dying father.....what have they done with the place?
Happy Days!