Wrexham County Borough 24 - Wrexham /Year 2 Day 1/ A trip down memory lane /is there a holiday in sight ?

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Who would have thought it? Year 2. Day 1. We have gone beyond the first Covid anniversary. An anniversary we choose to forget . Year 2 - Did we ever expect to get to 365 days of Covid lockdowns ? Probably not . Year 2 Day 1 - a time to look back and a time to look forward . Perhaps a time to forget. What will year 2 of Covid present us I wondered as I parked up on the Llwyn Isaf carpark in Wrexham town centre . I had often parked there and today it was free to park . So that was a bonus . This car park on a quick glance round looked much the same as I had always remembered it . I felt nothing was different . The huge trees that surrounded it were still there . The boys grammar school in its distinctive Ruabon red brick was swallowed up by the much larger concrete and glass edifice that was Cambria College. The old hall of the boys school was possibly there covered up by the new extension . The Snake a path that used to wriggle its way from our school to King Street Bus station had long gone . a That too swallowed up into the new college grounds . What had happened to the stone sculpure of a human face that once graced the walls of the boys school . Was it there kept for posterity in the school or had it been thrown in a bin unloved .

I walked up into town and it was empty. Very people had ventured in . We were still in lockdown and urged to stay local . Regent Street where I stood once housed a church, a church hall and a music hall. The Majestic still had signs of being an old music hall/cinema despite being converted to a Wetherspoons Pub . I cannot remember it being a cinema apart from a vague memory of seeing Goldfinger there and then sitting inside when it was changed to a Wimpey Bar . The girls from our school went there for a coca cola after school . Hiding their hats under the table and hoping a teacher did not walk by and issue detentions like confetti . On the corner used to be Cranes Record shop. The inside full of 45's and LP's all alphabetically filed . Guitars and violins hung from the walls and drum kits were on offer. The shop no longer was there . Neither was Lloyd Williams . Downstairs full of clothes patterns, materials of every colour and fabric and everything you needed for sewing at school. Upstairs school uniforms . We went there to buy our gymslips, school hats , blazers and ties . Summer uniforms and gabardine coats . If we couldnt buy what we needed there then a trip to Wrights Corner provided the rest . The smell of fish and chips cooking permeated the air .

I meandered up and down past the Horse and Jockey a closed pub and down Hope Street . Mother care gone , Clarks Shoe shop where we purchased winter practical shoes and blue summer sandals . The Talbot - a pub downstairs and a cafe upstairs . My walk brought me out on Queens Square . There used to be small shops along the street - all gone . The General Market where we could stand in Padgetts Disc Shop and listen to music on headphones in booths . On a sunny day my thoughts had left Covid behind and I was being transported back to a Wrexham of the 1960's. The Market had long gone pulled down by an unenlightened council . What was left was the Old Library . A lovely building which gave me memories of wandering around picking up books off the musty dusty shelves . Librarians tip toeing round and putting their fingers to their lips uttering the words ssssssshhhhhhhh. A spriral staircase went upstairs . Wrexham had had a few library builders but the books outgrew the buildings and an appeal was made to the Scottish-American philanthropist Andrew Carnegie which resulted in a grant of £4,000 to build and £300 to furnish a new library. The Mayoress, Mrs Birkett Evans, laid the foundation stone on 1 January 1906 and Sir Foster Cunliffe of Acton Hall opened the new Library in Queens Square on 15 February 1907. More than 100 architects submitted plans for the design of the new library: the successful architect was Vernon Hodge of Teddington (London). The building was constructed of Cefn stone and Ruabon terracotta facing brick. Many of the buildings in Wrexham were built with the distinctive red shiny Ruabon red brick and tile . The front roof was covered with Westmoreland slate and the back with Bangor slates. On the ground floor was a Ladies Room to seat about 20 readers, a reference room of the same size, a general reading room to seat about 50, and a librarian's office. These may have long gone when I visited the Old Library but my memories are getting vague

I headed for the High Street . If I had stood in the same spot in the 1940's I would imagine looking down the street towards the Wynnstay Hotel things wouldnt look that much different . The hotel frontage had been left intact and the modern hotel latched on behind out of sight . The doors to the Meat Market were to my left . Mum used to go there to buy tripe from the tripe stall and visit the butchers who all had small shops around the market perimetre. Each held a small counter and a fridge . A well used butchers block, sawdust on the floor which was always mixed with blood . There was a distinctive smell and the carcasses of pigs lined the walls . Mum always bought her lamb chops all prepared to her exact specification . Kidneys were ripped out of the pigs carcass . I imagined the young being offended seeing all of this going on in front of their eyes . The final market was the Butter Market .

Looking backwards the view was very different . Town Hill the oldest part of the town once was graced with the Town Hall. Sadly in the 1940's the motorcar came along in greater numbers and the Town Hall got in the way. Now the area would be pedestrainised and the Town Hall protected by a one way system . In the 1940's it was knocked down .

I felt strange walking round , some things were bringing memories back . Whitleys where I took my tennis racquet to be restrung or bought tennis balls for school . Now a jazzy nail bar . Woolworths with its pick and mix stall , Ladybird clothing and fish counter all closed and replaced by a Spanish Tapas bar . J C Roberts where every bride to be went to buy up Pyrex dishes and plates and everything she needed for her bottom drawer . How odd all these memories coming back to haunt me .

And so it was that I headed back to the car . My visit over - the smell of the fish and chips had got to me . I had to go in and buy some to bring home to enjoy. Day 1 of another year just starting and it seems we might just get a tour to France in by June .

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Comments

[Home and Away]

Hope springs eternal...
I hope you do get to travel again in June. We are flying to the east coast at the end of April to visit family in Pennsylvania and Connecticut...and ancestors in that area. Scotland at the end of August. I enjoyed reading about you reminiscences!

[JenGog]

hope
Plans we shall make them and see what happens . Hope your trips across the states works out and we dont get locked down again . August sounds a possibility for Scotland . We are possibly opening up slightly in mid April and then see what happens . We are missing travelling so much . The only consolation of not travelling is that we get to do work on the house .