Emett water clock...and other clocks


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Watched the Central Tv piece on Vic Centre's "50th Birthday" (including clock) yesterday.

Apparently no-one at Vic Centre knew exactly what day the Centre opened to the public for the first time, so 9th November has been set as the Official Vic Centre birthday.

I'm sure if they'd put out a call to the general public a few people would have come forward naming the exact day that they were the first through the doors.

 

Even if it was a "Soft" opening , no ceremony and ribbon cutting,  just open the doors and let people work out it's opened then I'm sure someone would have remembered and might even have photos.

And I'm sure Boots and John Lewis would have records of the date in their archives.

 

The Official opening by Geoffrey Rippon was 16th March 1973, but they're always later.

 

However Central said it was the Duchess of Kent who opened it, but her visit was to officially commemrate the start of work on 14 October 1969.

 

Nice piece about the clock and it's revival.

5 minutes, total, piece on the Centre of which 35seconds featured our local celebrity.

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Looks like some shops in The Victoria Centre first started trading in the first week of June 1972 . Having said that Boots with the Parliament Street entrance may have opened earlier perhaps even April/May 1972 .

 

 "The Victoria Centre part of which opens this week-end—is in a different class to Birmingham's pride and joy, the Bull Ring. "It is bigger and a lot better. Lower Shopping Level . Superscan Store ,TN Parr ,Jas Smith, Lennards ,Peters Stores , Wigfalls , Etam etc.........."

Friday 02 June 1972 - Stapleford & Sandiacre News 

 

The previous Central Market opened as the Victoria Market 23rd June 1972 according to another report .

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I never particularly liked Victoria Centre when it first opened; the main reason being the lighting which was used on all the walkways and malls. It was a yellowish/cream colour and gave the whole place a shabby, faded look.

 

It was eventually changed in one of the 1980s refurbs which made the place brighter and cleaner, and was a big improvement.

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13 hours ago, Stuart.C said:

Watched the Central Tv piece on Vic Centre's "50th Birthday" (including clock) yesterday.

Apparently no-one at Vic Centre knew exactly what day the Centre opened to the public for the first time, so 9th November has been set as the Official Vic Centre birthday.

I'm sure if they'd put out a call to the general public a few people would have come forward naming the exact day that they were the first through the doors.

 

Even if it was a "Soft" opening , no ceremony and ribbon cutting,  just open the doors and let people work out it's opened then I'm sure someone would have remembered and might even have photos.

And I'm sure Boots and John Lewis would have records of the date in their archives.

 

The Official opening by Geoffrey Rippon was 16th March 1973, but they're always later.

 

However Central said it was the Duchess of Kent who opened it, but her visit was to officially commemrate the start of work on 14 October 1969.

 

Nice piece about the clock and it's revival.

5 minutes, total, piece on the Centre of which 35seconds featured our local celebrity.

 

I'm always amazed that people can't  pin down relatively recent dates. I put it down to laziness.

On the former railway line foot crossing on Hucknall Rd..at the end of Southglade Rd, there are signs supposedly explaining the history of the line.

This first of all assumes that a casual visitor would even know it was formerly  a line. Next they incorrectly state the length of the line and finally they speculate on the history of the line with words to the effect that is closed 'sometime between 1947 and 1960' or somesuch vagueness. 

Thing is that any one of thousands of local rail enthusiasts could quote those dates to the day...verbatim.. We also have something called the Internet.. and in the case of rail stuff, a major publisher of rail literature (Book Law) based within the city.

How hard can it be?

 

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14 hours ago, Jill Sparrow said:

The market was quite good when the place first opened and some of it was in the open air!

I remember when the Victoria centre first opened and my Grandma used to constantly complain that the Vic market was in her words

"not a patch on Central market".

 

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@Jill SparrowGrandma was always right (in her opinion anyway)

I can remember her taking me to Central market a few times on a saturday morning, the place was always packed and as a small child I would be knocked around by ladies with big shopping bags. I also hated the overwhelming smell of fish in there.

But the dish of mushy peas and the bag of broken biscuits she would always buy me more than made up for it.

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If my memory is correct, the Victoria Centre opend in June 1972, certainly not November. I had my first baby May 72 and took him as a newborn to the newly opened centre.

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Boot opened 12th May 1972, but possibly without use of the internal entrance.

Jessops 8th November 1972, but maybe after the Centre had opened.

Victoria Market 21st July 1972  but maybe after the main doors of the Centre opened.

 

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What I think that demonstrates is that there wasn't a specific opening day for Victoria Centre. Various stores opened at different times; and official openings by celebrities/dignitaries are usually not connected to the real world.

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3rd time... I appeared on Notts TV (live from studio with my granddaughter) and BBC East Midlands in June 2015 (same topic).  Still some way to go to amount to 15 minutes of fame though!

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  • 1 month later...

I asked the General Manager of Vic Centre if they were aware (someone shared the Facebook post with me before it went viral).  He said they (management) had spent most of Monday dealing with it, supplying police with CCTV, etc.  I guess it would be classed as theft, though had they worn wellies it might have been 'going equipped'.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I recalled seeing this video before.  Okay if you don't mind the late Dennis McCarthy of Radio Nottingham fame back in the day.

 

 

 

 

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I've just finished watching the said video . It were a nice surprise to see my old stomping ground of Holme Pierrepont at 44mn. I worked there from '77 to '79. Only left because the wages were crap. Rufford rangers were being paid twice what we were getting.

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