RE: C. Kunzle Ltd. Garretts Green Lane Birmingham - 2

As long as I got something stronger than milk in my bottle I wouldn't care. There again I'm a big fan of the natural way.

Phil

Volty old chap have you tried googling Kunzles cake Factory. There is quite a lot of info there. SB

Compared to some of you folks I am in the nursery, especially as I was born in the latter half of the last century.
What's it like, I wonder, to be able to claim one was born in the first half of the last century? Must feel like an episode of Antiques Roadshow.

SB...I did google it but only after Phil and signman had set me off. Google is my first resort for eveything but I think the drugs must have slowed my brain down.
Anyway it doesn't make for much of a thread does it? "Hi guys what do you know about ??????? .......Oh don''t bother I just googled it and have all the answers, The END."

I think a bit of peronal local info is bit more like reality than incorrect newspaper cuttings twice recycled then shoved through Wiki something or other.
Speaking of newspaper cuttings, all this nostalgic stuff has reminded me of my old Old Birmingham folder. I have just dug it out and found it is stuffed with cuttings and books and postcards. This means I am going to read it all and get very (morose?). Whatever the word is the Portuguese call it "Fado", a longing for what was or could have been without actually knowing what was or could have been. It really gets one down as there is no solution.

I have spent quite a number of hours trying to find reference to the old mausoleum type building in Phil's quiz. We must have two dozen books full of photos and stuff and I still haven't found it. I've even taken a mild interest in Balsall Heath, where all the poor people used to be kept, because odds are on that Phil grew with this building in plain sight, but thats another thread for another day.

So SB the answer to your question is yes.

Voltman

Voltman

It's no good keeping all those interesting clipping to yourself get them sorted out and get them on here. If nobody else wants to see them I certainly do.

The other thing is, we may have been poor and unable to pay for the horse cab fare or the tram fare but we were given feet and we learnt from an early age how to use them and we walked miles. That at least was free, as long as we kept out of the posh areas.

Phil

Phil,

I have found a photo in a newspaper article by Carl Chinn which he calls Chestnuts Farm.
It is the same as your GG Farm but there are named people in the picture with a horse and cart.



Voltman

Voltman, Like Phil says get that stuff on here , don't keep it all to yourself we are all interested, unless it's shown we'll never know what's out there.

Voltman

There you are, another prime example of what I always say. That is that some of these people who make a lot of money from publishing books of photos do not do enough research on the photos they put in books or publish to newspapers.

In this case because I have no knowledge of these places (I'm too young) I can't say which version is right. Perhaps both are, it could have been known by both names.

Don't think that because the illustrious Professor Carl Chinn says so his version is right because I can show you several times where he gets things wrong.

I think the subject will need more research and confirmation.

Phil

Though I know that there was a farm in the Garretts Green area I don't remember hearing the name Garretts Green Farm. There was I know a fairly big house called The Chestnuts, I think which of course is where the name for the Chestnuts estate came from. Followed by The Chestnuts the pub and then in 1964 by the new pub The Chestnut tree which we both knew rather well.
There was an old Cottage on the "Cornies" the fields which came to be the Garretts Green Trading estate. This I am guessing was round about where Granby Avenue turns into Valepits Road. The family that lived there, my wife thinks was the Ashfords with their son and daughter Mary and Derek. They used to have a small green tanker lorry at the side of the house, and they sold paraffin. My mom used to send me round for paraffin now and then. I remember this lovely little cottage well. I am sure its not the Chestnuts House.
The Roads for the Garretts Green Industrial estate were laid round about 1966-7. SB

SB,
Carol's dad remembers the house that wasn't a farm, I'll have to ask him, if he remembers the parrafin sales.


There are some Birmingham planning applications for the Chestnuts PH and I assumed this was lazy typing in the planning department, these referred to the pub that was put up in 1949. I had no idea until I found those applications that there had been a temporary structure before the existing building. I had no idea until 2 minutes before typing this that the temporary structure was called just The Chestnuts.

Everything starts to fall into place.

Phil has already said that the big house called The Chestnuts was on the site of St Thomas's Church, and I believe that is correct.
The other farms are yet to be sited but they aren't really relevant to my original quest.

There is a good chance that the farm shown with a road sign in front of it is at the junction of Garretts Green Lane and Hollyfaste Road before the traffic island was cut into them, this would have formed a T junction just before you get to a crossroads formed by Sheldon Heath Road and Garretts Green Lane. It is also then probable that Hollyfaste was redirected slighty to make it join the island, I think it may even have run straight and was originally joined to what is now Meon Grove. There is no logical reason, that I can see, for the existence of Meon Grove, which is a patchy bit of road that now goes nowhere.

As to the names of the farms, as Phil says, just because these authors publish photo's in their books doesn't mean they have access to accurate information about their contents.

In fact I have found that whenever you know the real truth about something first hand and then you read about it in a newspaper it becomes obvious what a load of inaccurate guess work gets put into print.
It is, therefore, logical to assume that everything else one reads in a newspaper is similarly inaccurate.

Voltman

Meon Grove existed because there was a double row of prefabs going down Sheldon heath Rd. With a pathway between them Meon Grove was there for access to the back row. It was always a cul de sac.
Did you know the Garretts Green Island is or was the biggest in Brum. We all know of Five and Six ways but G/Green has seven exits. SB

Sorry about the typo's I'm on Blackberry

SB, I apologise for mine....I'm on Rioja.

I couldn't have failed to notice the number of exits at that island but I don't remember ever making any comparisons to elswhere.
It would be difficult to get any more wouldn't it. At least nobody can park on it, there aren't any spaces just pointy bits of pavement.

There was a planning application refused for a petrol station to be built at the back of The Nuts, this must have been just before the flats / maisonettes were built.

Look what I found....

http://www.macearchive.org/Media.html?Title=791

The rest of the site has loads of ATV reports, just search for West Midland, Titles with Video.

Voltman

Blimey VM how did you find this, it was a real blast from the past. The lady in the video was Kathy Dunn she was the Shop Steward and a great friend of my mom, she came to our house many times, my mom used to go to the Bakers union conferences with her.
I once looked after her dog Jet for a month when she went to Canada. She lived somewhere around the Willclare Road area.

I rather expected you would know someone.

I was just casting my net on the internet for something else and was offered a video clip of it, I've forgotten what it was now.
Anyway the clip was on this MACE site so I did the search I mentioned and got down to 380 ATV videoshorts for news items,
including the Kunzles item.
There is loads of stuff on there, countrywide I think but I just trawled through all the Birmingham stuff. There's some really
intersting stuff that I had never even heard of as well as footage of places that are long gone.

It was quite a lucky find.

Voltman