Victoria Street by Bill Curtis

After demolishing many of the small old streets the town planners, flushed with success, looked around for something else to demolish and their eyes fell upon Victoria Street.

That, they argued, would have to come down to give access to the car park in Custom House Lane and to enable them to build the new Cherry Tree Row complex.
On the west corner of Victoria Street and North Albert Street was the General Post Office with the sorting office at the back.

The sorting office closed first and then the Post Office, with the counter service, went next to the new modern building at Ash Street on what had once been the football ground.

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The Steamers

At the time we were contemplating our move to North Albert Street there were strong rumours that the Isle of Man Steamer service was to be discontinued at the end of the season in 1961.
Apparently the berthing quays were in dire need of repair and the British Transport Commision, who were in charge of the docks and the quays, thought the Manx people ought to foot the bill of £75,000, but as the Manx people had, not too long ago, paid for a large expensive shelter outside and alongside the railway station they felt they had done their share and objected to being asked to pay for repairs to Fleetwood quayside.

After all, they paid their berthing fees didn’t they? And they felt the repairs ought to come out of those, so they said no, they would discontinue the service first.

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THE END OF THE LINE….

In 1965 the Railway dropped another bomb.

Not just on the shop tenants this time, although it did seriously affect them, but it also concerned the whole town. Dr Beeching, a man previously never heard of, suddenly announced that in the interests of economy, many railway lines and stations were to be closed, the only ones left would be the main line stations in the big towns and to everyone’s annoyance Fleetwood did not come into this category.

Petitions were raised and signed, and we wrote personally, pointing out that the line had historic claims as it was the first coastal railway link in the world, but either Dr Beeching was impervious to any historic claims or he didn’t even see the letter – and I suspect the latter as we received an acknowledgement, but no reply to our letter.
Many traders in the town either did not believe it was going to happen at all or that if the railway did close it would not really affect them any more than they had thought the loss of the I.O.M boats would affect them, until the boats did stop and then they began to realise what a loss to the whole town it was.

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LAW AND ORDER

IT WAS not long after the demolition at the west side of Victoria Street that the police station came under the bull-dozers, along with the old prawn shop.
The police station was transferred to a new building in Claremont Terrace behind that monstrosity of a magistrates court.

It may look very nice inside, I haven’t been in to look around, but the outside of the building is absolutely dreadful, and I bet some architect thinks it is the bees knees, and who on earth thought of putting it on a prime site on promenade?
Before the station in Victoria Street came down I went inside to photograph the interior and was struck by the completely Victorian atmosphere of the building, it really should have been preserved as an encapsulated piece of police history of nearly 100 years ago, and would have fascinated and possibly served as a salutary lesson for today’s youngsters.

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Fleetwood North

We had been thinking for some time about opening a shop in the town and started looking for suitable premises.

Sixteen years previously there had been plenty of empty shops to choose from but now there were very few.
It had once been the famous Cleggs fish and chip shop. Looking through an old almanac recently dated 1925 I found an advertisement for the very same shop, then known as the Central Restaurant, run by a Mr J.R. Law and in addition to fish and chips, Mr Law claimed to be noted for his high quality tripe, heels and trotters.
But when we were searching in the early sixties it had recently been opened by Miss Joan Hudson and her brothers for wools and materials. We found the Hudsons friendly and helpful, and Miss Hudson particularly was a very charming person with a great sense of humour. Although very energetic she said she wanted to retire and so a few weeks later we moved in and opened our second camera shop.
We viewed our new neighbours with interest.

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Fleetwood

 In the sixties, apart from losing the Manx steamers and the railway, the town itself was undergoing a metamorphosis – or to put it another way, someone was mucking about with it, and not, in many peoples opinion, for the better.
Much to the disgust of many residents, Fleetwood Council decided to demolish many of the well-known, and much loved, streets in the old part of the town.

Streets where most of the old Fleetwood families had been born and bred, knowing all their neighbours and being part of a close knit community.

They were uprooted and consigned to patures new, and they were not all pleased about it, I can tell you.

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THE CHANGING FACE OF LORD STREET

Lord Street was not initially called Lord Street but was called West Street and East Street.

It was West Street from Ash Street to Warren Street to Albert Square, and the change was made before the last war.

But when the town was first built this road was not intended to be the main street as it is now. Neither Sir Peter or Decimus Burton incorporated any sort of shopping area or centre in their town plan (neither did they include a graveyard for that matter) .

but I later found from the Hesketh diaries that Sir Peter did have ideas of making London Street the main street when completed it was to be like Lord Street in Southport, with high class shops and arcades, and it probably would of looked very nice indeed.

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Eating Out in the Fleetwood of Yesterday

Whenever we have visitors one of the things I always insist on them doing is to have some of our (Fleetwood’s that is) fish and chips. And preferably to eat them drenched in salt and vinegar in the open air from a newspaper, they are packed in a plastic carton which does not enhance the flavour in quite the same way that newspaper used to. Nevertheless, they still taste better outdoors eaten with fingers than indoors on a plate. Although you can still enjoy very good fish and chips suppers in almost any Fleetwood chippy.

One popular place in the sixties was the Ferry restaurant owned by Billy Greenwood and run with the aid of his brother Harry – a happy, amiable man who was imposed on by all and sundry and never seemed to grumble, and Billy’s mother who indefatigably stood in the minute kitchen all day cutting and buttering bread and carving the various meats. To keep down the mice Mrs Greenwood had three cats in the place and while they certainly did see to it that there were no mice they were the canniest cats I ever met. When Mrs Greenwood was carving the meat or portioning fish one cat would hold her attention in some way or other while the other two would manoeuvre enough fish or meat on to the floor to keep the three of them busy for the rest of the day. Mrs Greenwood used to blame the staff for shortages and no one knew who the real culprits were.

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Mary Isabella

The incidents related here are taken from the book “The Ramsey Lifeboats 1829-1991” by W.N.Seybold of the Isle of Man.

We turn the pages of history back to the last century for the first story which concerns the last Ramsey Lifeboat service of 1899. Read more

Davara

Within days of the declaration of war four Fleetwood trawlers had been sunk by German submarines.

In six days in September 1939, the Davara, Rudyard Kipling, Arlita and Lord Minto were lost.

All four crews – 51 men – were saved. And so Fleetwood was plunged into war – her fishing fleet sailing into unknown perils.

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