Front street east building

[stustep]

Hi

 

We are moving to bedlington as we have just bought a property on front street.

The property in question has a blue plaque on the wall outside (Gibsons who i believe were a family who made nails) and I've been told used to be a wholesalers and such over the years prior to becoming a home in the early 2000's, id be really interested if anyone has any old photographs of 36 front street (opposite the Black Bull) prior to it becoming a home.

 

thanks 

Edited April 12 by stustep

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

17 hours ago, stustep said:

Hi

 

We are moving to bedlington as we have just bought a property on front street.

The property in question has a blue plaque on the wall outside (Gibsons who i believe were a family who made nails) and I've been told used to be a wholesalers and such over the years prior to becoming a home in the early 2000's, id be really interested if anyone has any old photographs of 36 front street (opposite the Black Bull) prior to it becoming a home.

 

thanks 

@John Fox (foxy) & @Mal I am assuming the council will have records of the Blue Plaques - do you know who to contact at the council offices?

I don't know if English Heritage are sent all info on Blue Plaques  (to me).

@stustep - I know @Andy Millne added an entry into the bedlington Timeline :-

@Jammy posted in a topic 'Halfpenny Woods' create by @Canny lass and mentioned the iron Works and in his comment was this bit about nails :-  

 Something else that has me thinking. Which way were the completed steam engines moved from the works. I suppose they could have travelled towards the Kitty Brewster or beyond to flatter ground and joined the rail network in the Bates pit area. The furnace bridge is an arch but is flat on the top so the engines could be wheeled/dragged across it with teams of horses. Then there would be the problem of getting them up to the bank top. I doubt horses could pull them up but perhaps a stationary steam engine could pull them up but where would they go from there. There was a rail track from the iron works that ran along the edge of the river towards the black bridge. This track was paid for by the Iron Works and connected with the Barrington pit track that brought coal to the riverside for transfer onto barges. The iron works then had coal delivered directly to the works. I'm not sure if the trains went along that track because it was probably not a standard gauge track and was used to carry tubs of coal. The trains could have been loaded onto a barge though that would be risky and where would they be off loaded. I'm a bit puzzled.

 There is a stone block wall next to the furnace bridge which was probably reinforcing the land behind it and was used to tie up barges bringing supplies to the Iron Works or taking some of the other goods produced at the Iron Works. The Iron works also produced 100,000's of stamped nails that were transported all over the UK and the world.

I'll have a look at the Evan Martin booklet  - Bedlington iron & Engine Wporks 1736-1867' and see if the name 'Gibson' gets mentioned.

[Canny lass]

Hi @stustep and welcome to the forum.

The Gibson nailers get a mention in Graces Guide

https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Bedlington_Ironworks where you can read that:

"During the first quarter of the nineteenth century the splitting mills became disused at the Bedlington works, and soon after that all the nailers shops, apart from one, disappeared from the town.

The last shop belonged to the Gibson family and can be traced back to the beginning of the last century. Mr. Gibson says he was forced to finally pull down the shutters of his shop in 1930. He has since been known in Bedlington and district as "The last of the Nailers".

Hope this is of use to you.

[Canny lass]

PS Have you read John Dawson's topic 'The last of the Nailers' in History Hollow?

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

dosen't give any more info than the reference CL has pointed to but the Northumberland County Council has the 'Northumberland Extensive Urban Survey' document and paragraph 6.7 has :- 

6.7 Chain and Mail Manufacturers and Ironmongers There is an account book for Gibson Bros. of Bedlington chain and mail manufacturers and ironmongers dated 1853-1923. This account book lists orders from customers but does not establish the location of the works, which may have been within the Bedlington Iron Works.

Link to it is :- 

https://www.northumberland.gov.uk/NorthumberlandCountyCouncil/media/Planning-and-Building/Conservation/Archaeology/Bedlington.pdf

[stustep]

Thank you all for this 

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

@stustep didn't find anything in th Evan Martin booklet on the Bedlington Iron Works (but I did just scan through it )

I did a Google of 'Gibson Bedlington nailers'  and there is one directory that shows Ann Gibson as the owner of the nail manufacturing business 

With a bit of maniplation and I extracted, via screen shots, some extracts from the directory and then with a bit of clarting Iclagged some bits together to make a couple of pages, the cover page and page 897 on Bedlingtonshire :-
 

Yon can seen the directory shows the name Gibson Ann twice.

And then I download @Maggie/915's photo of the blue plaque just to show what we have been checking on

Edited April 14 by Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)

[stustep]

Thanks for this that's brilliant, yeah i had read the plaque and that's what initially got me to thinking exactly what was the house used for prior to the conversion... it seems its gone through a few connotations before 2004 when it was changed over.

 

Obviously james Gibson used the premses as her was linked to the provident institute  answering the blue plaques statement of the family being involved with finance.

 

Thank you

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

@stustep I have no idea what changes the building has gone through. I wonder if @HIGH PIT WILMA can remember any?
 

[James]

Very few changes have been made to the building. In the photo, taken early 1900's, the Gibson family property is the first building on the left.

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

@stustep using a B&W version of @James's early 19th century photo I have added some old and new images confirming it.

[threegee]

Didn't one of those on the left used to be Wemyss (sp?), the wholesale confectioner, back in the mid 1950s?  I can remember carting an unstable load of empty crisp tins there on my bogey as an infant.  Yes, those packets of crisps with the little blue bag of salt used to come in oversized biscuit tins to keep them fresh.

My motive was purely economic - to pocket the deposit on them.  Mr Wemyss, however - god rest his soul - wasn't prepared to cough up the going rate, likely embossed on the tins, and all I got was a pittance (or maybe a few sweets) for my trouble.  The sweets are long forgotten, but the bitterness lingers on - such is life!  🤣

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

Hi Folks,Wemyssies was a confectionery wholesaler when aa was a bairn livin doon Hollymount Square from 1947..as a got ti aboot five yrs aad,me aader Brother,who would be eight yrs aad,[taakin aboot 1949 noo!],used ti tek me aroond and up Bell's Place,and aroond the corner..and we used to gaze in the windae of Wemyss shop,at the piles and piles of big sweet jars of sweets of aal description..we kids had nowt..me mutha cudnt gie us a jam sammidge in the afternoon when we hungry between meals..so we used ti drool owa the sight of aal these big sweet jars..we used ti watch vans coming and gaanin,loading and unloading whacks of these jars at a time and wondered what was gaan on..we didn't knaa wat the words "Confectionery Wholesaler" meant!..we were pitmans kids..a still wasn't at school yit..[a started in the Autumn term at the Bedlington Village Infants school in 1949].In later years,some of the Millfielders broke in and stole jars of sweets,the same ones broke into the Clayton Ballroom..they got caught and fined..it was a big crime scene in them days..hearing of local lads being taken to court..Bedlington was a quiet peaceful little village!!..It seems that building hasn't changed much owa the yeors...but Bedlington sure has!! Cheers!

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

The aad photo of the shop is hoo aa remember..broon painted shop front..roller shutters in later yrs,probably after the break-ins..the war hadn't been owa just four yrs prior ti my first seeing this Aladdin's cave..the only sweets I ever got at that age was when me Mother tuk me ti Doctor Hickey's Surgery,at Choppington,just up the bank from where a lived in Storey's Buildings,doon aside the Willow Bridge at Choppington Station..Dr Hickey aalwis kept a big tin of sweeties on his table at the side,and every kid who went to see him,even if it was their Mother who was the Patient,they got a sweetie..that was the way to befriend the kids and allay any fear aboot gaan ti see him!![dinna forget..we didnae hae the drugs we hae nooadays..us kids picked aal sorts of infections up..!!

[Tonyp]

I put a photo on the website it was taken in the late fifties on picnic day my brother grandmother & the Herons who lived in Hollymount it was actually taken outside the the that HPW mention the photo is still there 

[Tonyp]

Miners picnic 1957

[Tonyp]

I used to have morning paper round for hollymount in the mid seventies I remember the shop having coffee vending machines in there so it might have been a supplier to factories etc I might be wrong as it was a long time ago 

[threegee]

1 hour ago, Tonyp said:

I used to have morning paper round for hollymount in the mid seventies I remember the shop having coffee vending machines in there so it might have been a supplier to factories etc I might be wrong as it was a long time ago 

Yes, there was a vending machine company on Front Street East at some point.  Something Vending prominently displayed there.

Back to Weymss: the snacks for the Market Place factory came from there.  Also, I've got a vague memory of taking boxes of something like KitKat bars (though maybe they were Penguins) to the Mechanic's Institute for them to sell, that may well have originated from Wemyss.

[threegee]

I'm going to offer Conal Robinson (or maybe Robertson) for Tony's late vending company.  Maybe someone can improve on this, or point out my error?  Anyway, I'm thinking that this was the outfit with the legendary "temporary shopfront" that over the years became a standing joke.  Yes, they prominently and permanently painted "temporary shopfront" on the signage, and this remained there for many years!

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

@stustep as you can see we have gone off track from your original query on your property with the Blue Plaque.

Haven't been able to turn up any more info on who had lived in that property through the years. 

I wonder if @Maggie/915 has any info via the Bedlington History Society?

stustep - if you are on Facebook then you could join their group and ask :- 

 

[Canny lass]

1 hour ago, Alan Edgar (Eggy1948) said:

@stustep as you can see we have gone off track from your original query on your property with the Blue Plaque.

Haven't been able to turn up any more info on who had lived in that property through the years. 

I wonder if @Maggie/915 has any info via the Bedlington History Society?

stustep - if you are on Facebook then you could join their group and ask :- 

Coming soon! This is an interesting family and I've been researching them this week. I'll post soon, probably on John Dawson's thread The Last of the Nailers. It will probably be long so it may need a few posts.

[Tonyp]

Hi Alan don’t think anyone has gone off track what’s wrong with giving a new member information to there question we are just trying to help about the area where he’s new house is I would be interested never mind 

[Tonyp]

Just saying 

[Maggie/915]

Sorry I cannot add anything to this story . The Gibsons were a local family.

My family knew someone of that name but right now it is too late to ask the relevant questions .

Sadly we never ask the right questions and time defeats us all in the end .

A track we love starts with ‘ Will these city streets remember us we walked them long ago ! Torn apart by a bitter wind that took us far from home ‘  

 

 

 

 

 

[Tonyp]

I think stustep appreciated it