Between bakery and dairy

In the previous post we met builder Herbert Skelton, who was also a developer.  He purchased the rights to build the four shops to the east of Blandford Road, with Jacob Reynolds' Blandford Road lying behind.  This was in 1912, over a decade since the first attempts to develop Hatfield Road as a residential street, only to discover that they were commercially better as shops.  Mr Skelton had built a portfolio of homes further east: two terraces which lay between the former J B Rollings house and his wholesale warehouse, and Glenferrie Road.  He got started on these much earlier, 1902, and managed to retain most of them as cottage homes for almost ten years.

The shops – and two homes between Clifton House (see previous post) and Glenferrie Road.

These are two almost identical terraces, with attractive boarded gable ends.  Their current condition reflects the difficulty of carrying out maintenance on this part of a building  The first terrace of four, 119 to 125, consisted of houses.  Indeed, two of them are still private residences, each with their narrow front walled gardens.  When first built all of the properties were homes with porched doorways and ground and first floor bay windows.  That would have been an impressive lineup for the first few years.  The photo below marks the major change in use.  

This image was created in 1911 from outside Clifton Road looking eastwards to Glenferrie
Road, along a still-narrow road.  Here is the bakery in the only year it was managed by William
Davies, followed by the two houses.  Shop blinds reveal the presence of newly-converted
shops.  No parking problems – bliss!
COURTESY HALS, FORMERLY ST ALBANS LIBRARIES

1911 is the first year in which most of the homes became shops, with the removal of the ground floor bays and installation of shop display windows and a door giving entrance to the shop and the existing front door retracted to become an internal access to the first floor from the shop.  They were narrow properties.  We know the photo was taken in 1911 because number 119 became a bakery, losing its little garden in the process, and it was run by Walter Davies.  He only remained for one year, the census year of 1911, and by the following year Mr Freeman Cornwell had taken over.  119 has always been a bakery; even in modern times when it became a pizza specialist.  The carriage house, an earlier form of garage, cart house or workshop lay along along the side entrance and was used for flour storage, although not for the first few year as Mr Skelton and his family were living there.  The workshop is still there at the far end of the sideway. Some present residents of the district will recall a fire at the shop which effectively put the bakery out of business for some time.  During the 1950s the author was fortunate in having the owner's elder son as a friend, and it was to the shop, his home, we gravitated to after school to mop up any stale buns Mr Schnabel was unlikely to sell before closing time.

The bakery shortly after the fire.

In the first terrace, number 125 at the other end, was another shop recalled by the author.  Although in its first few years it was John Schaper's hairdresser, the majority of its life was spent as a confectionery, managed by Mr O'Dietschi and then by Mrs Fowler.  Ice cream and pop were the young customer's regular requirement!  From the 1970s it became a charity shop and is now a small art gallery exhibiting on behalf of a small number of today's artists.

A traditional view of a confectioner's shop.  How could a child avoid
making regular visits to Fowler's!
COURTESY FLEETVILLE DIARIES

It is lovely to note the two intervening terrace homes between the two shops described above.

The first two shops in the second terrace, 127 and 129, also small homes to begin with, served Fleetville residents with a wider range of products: bookmaker, a bazaar, milliner, government surplus supplies and hobby stores – most of these are variations on a theme! Today it is a nail bar.  Next door today's popular Fleetville Kitchen cafe was preceded by cooked meats and carpets (but not at the same time!)

The final three shops:  Santino's which is now Fleetville Larder; an insurance business which is
now a firm of solicitors; and Cleveland Glass, which now seems to have moved online.

A shop trader well known in these parts between the 1950s and the early 70s was racing cyclist Stan Miles.  He took over from a children's outfitter, and his shop, clearly a converted living room with its fireplace still in position, attracted a large number of teenagers who aspired to own a new cycle they could hardly afford.  Above the fireplace hung the "cycle of the week" which was beyond our reach in more than one way. He later moved his trade to the south side of Victoria Street.

Glenferrie Stores managed by William Lupton between shortly before
WW1.  Could the bikes be fore the delivery boys?  Typically, two shop
windows crammed with inviting products to purchase.
COURTESY IAN TONKIN

We have now reached the next corner, the one with Glenferrie Road. This is where the two terraces differ.  At the right end of the second terrace, this was always going to be a better commercial location for a corner shop, and number 133 never was a house, opening as a grocer in 1903, and among its early tenants was William Lupton, grocer.  He began here in 1906, before moving to number 63 on the corer of Laurel Road until 1914 and closing in Fleetville permanently in 1916,  For much of its life it became Brown's Hedges Farm Dairy and Express Dairies.  Until recently it was also Cleveland Glass.

This is a good opportunity to mention that the property numbers are those in use today.  Until 1932 the numbering was mere guesswork as so many plots had not been developed.  Many of the early buildings erected as homes can still be found in the street directories with their house names.

The Skelton investment

In our exploration of the properties lining Hatfield Road eastwards from The Crown, Rumballs land agents had enabled Horace Slade to acquire Great Long Field (or Long Field East as it was also known).  The hedge separating Long Field from Long Field east met Hatfield Road just before the line of Blandford Road, so when Frank Sear first purchased the land for his nursery and its shop and house it was on the east side of the hedge and in Long Field East.  But Jacob Reynolds of Heath Farm expressed an interest in part of St Peter's Farm and purchased a strip of land on each side of Blandford Road.  He was clearly only interested in residential development,  not main road development.  His purchase had not included Sear's future Ninefields Nursery, nor had it approached the main road on the east side of Blandford Road.

An early plan of the land purchased by Joshua Reynolds.  The road names
have not yet been agreed, but the land is on either side of Blandford Road.

In stepped Mr H Skelton, a builder from Luton who purchased an interest facing Hatfield Road when development first began in 1899.  On this land he straightaway built two terraces of four houses each.  There will be a closer look at these in the next post.  For now, that land accounted for only half of the Hatfield Road frontage in his ownership.  From Blandford Road he was content to leave a sizeable plot vacant for a full ten years.  As for living close to the job, he, his wife, son and daughter, occupied four different properties, at least two of them – and maybe all of them – he had been responsible for building.

Mr Skelton's purchased land east of Blandford Road.  The first building, consisting of four purpose- built shops was not developed until c1910.  On the far right, the building beyond Asker's awning is where J B Rollings ran his wholesale confectioner's business.  The rectangular clock is fixed
to the first floor front elevation.
COURTESY ST ALBANS MUSEUMS

The ornate balustrading hides the view from the street of the second-floor windows, which are
nevertheless visible from the more distant view shown in the top picture of this pair.

In 1910 the design for a terrace of four at the plot-in-waiting at the Blandford Road end was agreed and proceeded with, and would certainly have made a greater impression than his earlier gable ends further along the road.  Those who only look down or ahead when walking along the road may not have noticed.  Neither is it obvious to many of us that this terrace is triple floored.  Above the ground floor, which was intended to open straight onto the pavement rather than via a slim six foot garden space, the first floor has residential squared profile bay windows and adjacent ancillary rooms with a flat window.  Except the corner property, which only has a longer bay window, which is angled; no flat window for another room.  The reason for this becomes clear when we look around the corner.  These appear to be more than tiny flats and all four extend some distance to the rear.  Number 109 has two windows overlooking Blandford Road, a benefit not available to the other three properties; it is therefore probable that the internal layout is different.

The third level attic room windows are mainly hidden behind an ornate stone balustrade with the roof drainage fed downwards from pipework below balustrade level.

Since 1922 number 109 has been a home of St Albans Co-operative Society grocery department.  The author only remembers it from the 1950s, when it was already self-service, except for the delicatessen counter. Home delivery, so popular once more, was also a feature back then; the customer handing in a notebook, with requirements ticked if supplied, and the assistant calculating the cost.  Even "subs" were taken into account if the exact product wasn't in stock.  Today it is still part of the Co-op as Funeral Care.

Next door at number 111 it took until 1938 for the Co-op to open its butchery, which previously had been an independent shoe shop and a gents outfitter.  The shop front was fairly impressive, with the lower facing panels having a black stone grained finish, and heavy glazed doors with shiny metal edgings.  When the Co-op opened its supermarket its little local shops closed.

The third Co-op shop in the row, number 113, was its greengrocery and then Society Dry Cleaners, but only from the early 1950s. Before then the sign above the door welcomed young people to the Carlton Club, while the fascia stated Bishop's Stores.  The shop attracted a number of young people and one of the activities which came out of these comings and goings was a very successful football club.  To this day, a detail page on the St Albans City Football Club's website carries photos of the teams of young people from the immediate post-war period.

A 1945 Carlton team pictured at Clarence Park
COURTESY THE GORDON JAMES COLLECTION

Number 115's first occupant was a trader which later became well known for its delicatessen shops in Victoria Street and Chequer Street, Saxby Bros, but by 1930 A Asker had taken over what had previously been a watchmaker's and then become Fleetville's pawnbroker's shop.  Today it is a cafe.

Mr Skelton's purchased land facing Hatfield Road between Blandford and Glenferrie roads is
boxed in orange. The properties in this post are numbers 109 to 115, and number 117.
MAP COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

And finally, in this post ...

Mr Skelton had a plot of land left between the 1910 development we have explored today and the two terraces of houses to the east and which we will find out more next time.  Around 1920, and because of the small amount of extra width he allowed a shop for Mr John  Blackmore to run a drapery business, with residential accommodation to the side rather than above or behind.  However, for whatever reason Mr Blackmore sold up within a couple of years in favour of a man well-known in Fleetville, Mr John Bradbury Rollings.  He was living in a small house in Brampton Road and in charge of a small wholesale business.  The urgent need to expand brought him to buy number 117, which he named Clifton House after the house he had previously owned in Finsbury.  As he did not need the attached house for residential purposes, this, along with the shop, became the new warehouse.  The top photo, taken in 1964, shows the property – it is the one with the rectangular clock attached to the frontage.  Compare it with the picture taken in 2012.  The right side which was the original shop received a significant change, both to the frontage and to the roofline.  In the 1960s, further expansion forced the company to move into a warehouse at the top of Camp Hill, number 117 eventually being the home of a popular computer accessories retailer called Beebug.

Add caption

We have seen a considerable range of traders moving into this growing party of the city, and either staying because they were successful, or moving on after a while to try their luck elsewhere or in the search for larger premises or more popular locations.  This week Saxby's, Rollings and the Co-op did just that.  Next time we'll see how Mr Skelton's terraces of homes fared.

 

Ninefields Nursery

We have nearly completed our exploration of Hatfield Road shops between The Crown and St Paul's Church.  There is one more to go, and the clue was probably spotted in the first photo of the previous post.  Today that shop is not there, and hasn't been there for sixty years.  If you walk along that part of Hatfield Road you will find instead St Paul's Place.

Frank Sear outside his shop, plants in pots above the fascia showing off his trade. The picket
fence and gate protecting the private house.  The houses in the background are those in
Clarence Road.

To start from the beginning, Frank and Elizabeth Sear moved to St Albans in 1899 and purchased a detached house in Hatfield Road. Because of his trade he did not simply need a house, but land on which he could continue as a nurseryman and florist.  The red outline in the map below (from 1924) indicated the extent of the site he acquired and that included the corner area on which St Paul's Church was later built, and the wedge shape between the rear gardens of Clarence and Blandford roads.  When the St Peter's Mission Church in Stanhope Road planned its next move it purchased its Blandford Road site from Frank Sear, not the developer Horace Slade.

The shop is circled; the red lines mark the boundary of the nursery.
MAP COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

Until the new Hatfield Road buildings went up it wasn't easy to state where you were, but there was a commonly used named for a group of fields between Sandpit Lane and Hatfield Road: Ninefields.  Frank Sear therefore chose that name for his nursery.

Post WW1 photo; the fascia now displays Sear & Carter; the wooden picket fence has now
been replaced by railings.
COURTESY MARK CARTER

It is not clear whether Sear commissioned the house or whether he purchased the finished building.  If the latter, it was the only detached house along the road.  In recent posts mention has been made of the narrow front gardens, but so far this is the only example of such a building with its front picket fence separating the garden space from the public footpath.

By 1910 Frank Sear was deeply embedded in his business, and had teamed up with Gere, a Monumental Mason who had a section of the plot to the left of the house.  Useful because Sear's was opposite the cemetery, and special floral arrangements could be created for the chapel and for wreaths.

In 1911 or 1912 Thomas and Ada Carter moved from Lincolnshire to St Albans.  Thomas was a nursery foreman, and he and Frank Sear created a business partnership and the nursery trade expanded as Sear & Carter.  Thomas was instrumental in searching out spare plots of land nearby, including The Dell in Sandpit Lane, which was used as a trial ground.

Ada and Thomas in 1934, showing the severity of Thomas' injury (corrected date)
COURTESY MARK CARTER

The Carter passion for cars on show outside of the shop.
COURTESY MARK CARTER

Because of the nature of his work Thomas managed to avoid volunteering or conscription until early in 1918, and he was not sent to the front until a matter of weeks before the armistice – unfortunately just in time to sustain serious injuries.  Thereafter, the people of Fleetville would be used to seeing him around as shown in the photo.  Thomas and his family continued to run the shop and nursery with its greenhouses until 1960 when St Albans Council put a claim on the property and compulsorily purchased it for the construction of flats and elderly persons accommodation via a new access road called St Paul's Place.

A 2012 photo of the former Ninefields Nursery and shop, now the accommodation at
St Paul's Place.

The business transferred to Smallford and continued under the existing name before being acquired by Notcutts Garden Centres.

So, sixty years have passed without Sear & Carter's shop and the Ninefields Nursery, a real family business.  In fact a business of two families.