The Corner Shop - TrustNews Dec 10
Corner Shop
A phrase rarely used these days is “just popping round to the corner shop”. The reason is very simple: proprietors of businesses such as grocers, newsagents and butchers, who ran the shop on the corner, or those sometimes referred to as “the handy store”, cannot compete with modern day mini-markets and supermarkets which are expanding so rapidly throughout the country. The BBC TV series of the 1980s Open all hours featuring Ronnie Barker and David Jason was a good example of those halcyon days.
So, let me take you back in time and reveal a few of these gems which no longer exist in Winchester. There are too many to mention here and I leave you to do your own research discovering the rest! Unless otherwise stated the following shops have now been converted into private dwelling houses and you can see the newly installed brickwork where the shop windows and the entrance door once stood. I have taken these shops from Warren’s street directory of 1953.
The residents of Fulflood were well equipped with four corner shops the first being on the corner of Stockbridge Road and Cranworth Road. It is still in existence but not as Hugh Hughes the grocer, trading instead as Greenbanks Homecare “the people who care”. The logo is painted on the side brick wall for all to see. This was the practise for some shops which made good advertising of their trade. Further down Cranworth Road, on the corner of Fairfield Road, was E.A. Thompson, butcher and greengrocer, whilst on one corner of Stockbridge Road and Western Road the dairymen Collis Cobb & Harrison had one of their branches.
The premises are now occupied by Direct Denture Care. The shop on the other corner was, for many years, The Omega Wine & Spirit Stores latterly taken over by the Thresher chain. On inspection last September I found the property empty and understood from the decorators that a “speciality cake shop” was “on the cards” for opening shortly.
The occupiers of North Walls properties were also lucky to have three corner shops in close proximity of one another. W.J. Ponsford & Sons, bakers and confectioners, had several shops in the city, one of them being on the corner of Parchment Street. On the next corner with Upper Brook Street Mr. W. Coates ran The General Stores. Three signs are still visible painted on the walls advertising Nestles Milk. The final one, appropriately called The Handy Shop, stood on the corner of Park Avenue, the proprietors being F.G. & L. Dawson.
Some corner shops served a dual role one of which was on the corner of Egbert Road and Danes Road where William Bullen was sub-postmaster and grocer at the premises. Painted on a decorative board attached to the brick wall are the words The Old Hyde Post Office which apparently closed about 5 years ago. The property has now been tastefully converted into two flats. F.G. Croft & Sons, grocers, whose main shop was in Jewry Street (now Prezzo restaurant) had a branch on the corner of Clausentum Road and St. Faith’s Road. The occupiers of houses in St. John’s Street didn’t have far to travel for their fish and chips as Ken’s Fried Fish Shop stood on the corner with Bridge Street.
There is, however, one corner shop still “going strong” to my knowledge in the city. This is situated on the corner of Hyde Street and Hyde Church Lane known simply as Hyde Newsagency. In the 1953 street directory it was run by Leonard Best as a confectioner and newsagent. The present proprietors of the business are Diane Duckett and Norman Roberts.
Finally, the shop now converted into a private dwelling on the corner of Alswitha Terrace and King Alfred Place was for several years run by George Lovelock, the baker. In the window was a large notice stating “No burnt cakes sold here”. George obviously had a sense of humour!
Another lost corner shop on Northwalls and Park Avenue