Not a detailed timeline but we couldn’t pass up the chance that the opening of the new pub on the corner of Heaton Park Road and Shields Road gives us to show pictures of the same building at different points in its history. Most people associate Beavan’s with the building on the opposite side of Heaton Park Road which still bears its name, but this lively street scene shows that it was previously on ‘High Main’ corner and seems to have extended down Heaton Park Road.
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Thank you to Beamish Museum for letting us use this photo. It’s interesting to see the now demolished shops and houses further down Heaton Park Road. And notice that some of the children have bare feet. But can you help us date the photograph? The fashions should give us a clue.
And what about this one, showing Woolworth’s occupying the site? Sometime in the 1960s? Who remembers shopping or working there? Did anyone own one of those sidecars?
And, for comparison, the new pub.
And in case you were wondering where the name came from:
Thank you to Graham Soult for permission to use these two photographs.
There must be lots of people with information or memories of Woolie’s, Beavan’s (even if not in these premises!) or of other shops on Shields Road. We’d love you to post your comments here or email them to Chris Jackson.
I can remember Beavans when it was a departmental store. This is the building now in multiple use opposite the new pub. Beavans was, to me, posh with shiney wood block floors and rows of drawers and cupboards containing thread, wool and huge rolls of cloth. Also, there were clothes, shoes and hats for sale as well as furniture. In the 1960’s it seemed that Parrishes became the No. 1 shop on Shields Rd. and Beavans sort of faded away.
I don’t remember the names, but I’ve read that a murder took place next to this building in Victorian times. The events were caused a dispute between neighbours who lived in the terraces off Dalton St. The culmination of this was that a man was shot by his nieghbour. This happened in Dalton St. next to the junction with Shields Rd. The wounded man staggered over the road and into Heaton Park Road where collapsed into the recessed doorway of F. Beavan’s shop; the two doorways remain as fire exits from the High Main. I think the man died at the scene and the other was convicted of murder and executed. Happily such crimes remain rare.