A Road that Had Everything - Mansfield Rd


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There are a lot of those passageways all the way up Mansfield Road which have survived. Unfortunately a lot of Sherwood Street has been demolished and redeveloped; so the original entrances still exist on Mansfield Road but they don't come out on the other side in the way they used to.

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I found a dead body on Mansfield Road once. It was in the early’70’s – times of great industrial unrest with three-day weeks, strikes, persistent power cuts and such.   It was a Saturday, mi

This thread had a lot of photos which were ruined by Photobucket's ransomware. I've just repaired most of them.

A quick run through PTP brought out a few examples from the 70s / 80s.    

I do know that where Sandfield House is on the corner of Peachey st.- once sat a very modern theatre/music hall with a special timber floor..apparently it was a fire hazard and was demolished.

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Nice pic. IAN.............Ya Dad looks like Sam Costa remember him ?...........and whats he doing wearing MY Dads mac ?

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Thanks for the pics of Fulforth Street Cliff Ton and lovely history NonnaB thank you

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

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On the Nottingham Facebook page someone has posted a couple of photos which fit this thread. From a guy called Glynne Hather, so I hope he won't mind them appearing here as well.

 

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Not very often you see a Datsun 120Y these days.

 

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Two lovely snaps taken from the corner of Major Street.'77-'78?

On photo.2 more example of camouflage by use of poster hoardings,covering the tunnel below.

Didn't keep us out- there was a small gate on York street that opened out to a grassed area above the tunnel arch.Is that a dreaded Alpine or an FSO turning into York House Service Station?

Cheers Cliff.

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'The Road That Had Everything ' is actually a bit of a misnomer, as the road STILL has everything. You've just got to go up as far as Redhill, that's all. There's the initial bit as far as Forest Rd, which sadly has seen better times, but still has much to offer. Then there's the bit from The Grosvenor up to Woodthorpe Park which is currently one of the most vibrant and interesting areas of the city. Brimming with an eclectic assortment of cafes, pubs and restaurants.

You've then got the bit from just before Valley Rd up as far as Redhill, which contains almost all one would require without having to travel to town, or even venture into Arnold.

So really, it still has everything. It's definitely the best road in the city.

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It's a recycled bean can which ever model it was.

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Perhaps Nottstalgians can help me with this memory I have from my childhood.

As a child,I attended a ballet class at the Nottingham co-operative arts theatre which was run by Patricia James. It would have been around 1966 or 67 that we had a visit from Max and Joyce Bromley who were movers and shakers in The Little Theatre which was well known in Nottingham. They were staging a performance of Dylan Thomas's Under Milk Wood and wanted to borrow two or three young children go play the parts of young Welsh children who appear in a couple of the scenes in the play. They were simply walk on parts without any dialogue. Max and Joyce were friends of my ballet teacher and I believe they had asked her if she could recommend any of her younger students to fulfil this role. Mine was one of the names put forward and I know for a fact that I was still at primary school at the time.

This meant that every night for a week, my mother had to take me to The Little Theatre and I remember that we walked across a strange looking Footbridge which must have been somewhere near the clock tower of what is now the Victoria Centre. At the time, I believe the Victoria Station was undergoing demolition.

We walked across this structure, going in at the Mansfield Road end and coming out on the other side and my overriding memory is of being in what looked like a completely different world. As we walked along to The Little Theatre early in the evening, I recall seeing children playing on the cobbled streets. Most of them wore no shoes or socks and looked extremely grubby. I remember the buildings as seeming huge and very old and, most of all, I remember sensing my mother's apprehension at having to take me on this journey every night and bring me back again, usually after it was dark.

To me, of course, it was nothing more than an adventure and I would only have been around 8 or 9 years old at the time.

I believe the Little Theatre later changed its location, probably due to the demolition of the entire area where it had been.

I have absolutely no idea where I would have been going every evening that week and wonder if anyone can remember the Little Theatre at this time or has any photographs of where it was. In my memory, it seemed like a walk through Dickensian England because of the apparent poverty of the people who lived in that area which has obviously long since been destroyed.

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The Little Theatre became the Nottingham Playhouse in 1948 apparently. Perhaps folks still called it its old name afterwards?

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It's a long time ago, Ian. The covered-in footbridge definitely ran at the side of the Victoria station. There were a number of members of the Bromley family, including a Philip Bromley but I don't recall a Janet. I had far more to do with the cooperative arts theatre. This was just a one-off experience.

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This meant that every night for a week, my mother had to take me to The Little Theatre and I remember that we walked across a strange looking Footbridge which must have been somewhere near the clock tower of what is now the Victoria Centre. At the time, I believe the Victoria Station was undergoing demolition.

We walked across this structure, going in at the Mansfield Road end and coming out on the other side and my overriding memory is of being in what looked like a completely different world. As we walked along to The Little Theatre early in the evening, I recall seeing children playing on the cobbled streets. Most of them wore no shoes or socks and looked extremely grubby. I remember the buildings as seeming huge and very old and, most of all, I remember sensing my mother's apprehension at having to take me on this journey every night and bring me back again, u

Going through the footbridge from Mansfield Road and coming out the other side means you would have arrived on the edge of St Ann's. In fact you almost confirm it with references to grubby, shoe-less children playing on the streets. The Little Theatre must have been in something like a church hall or community centre, somewhere around Northumberland Street or Union Road in St Ann's.

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That's it!!!! Gosh it's amazing what people can find on this site!

Brings back memories! It did seem very much like stepping back into the world of Dickens. The area was not known to me but I've never forgotten the place. Wonder what's there now?

Thanks everyone!

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My street was like that Jill,urchins on Bonk!!

tar bombs,dogs stuck together- rump to rump,moonlight flits,her at the top on the game!,hungry kids...a Gorbals family lived on peas on bread,split and hissing lead pipes,rows and fights and a fish with bits under a Bob!!

Jeremy Kyle???? Only if we had 2/ shillings for the slot TV.

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As I said, I spent a lot of time as a child and teenager at the Co-operative arts theatre, studying dance and as part of the Junior and senior Theatre groups. The Nottingham Theatre club building which Cliff Ton has kindly posted for everyone to see, seemed very basic compared with the Co-operative arts theatre and I realise now the reason why. It had been adapted from a building that had previously had a very different use and would have been much smaller than the Co-operative arts theatre which was itself adapted from a building that had been a Particular Baptist church and was Georgian in origin.

Some years ago, in an edition of, I think, the Nottingham Evening Post Bygones supplement, there were some fascinating photos taken during the conversion of the Baptist Chapel to the Co-operative arts theatre which was undertaken some time after the war, mainly by volunteers.

I wish I could find that particular Bygones Edition but it seems to have disappeared amongst all the various photographs, newspapers and junk that I hoard, to do with the past!

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