Onchan - People's Pictures

BOY RACERS

From Ronnie Brew come this picture taken in 1953 at the bottom of Avondale Road from the corner of the Manx Co-op.  During the 1930s there had been car racing on roads around Douglas but coming onto Onchan.  The 1933 Mannin Moar Race saw cars coming down Summerhill Road from Governors Road.  The 1934 Mannin Beg saw a slightly different course and in 1936 the Willaston Circuit was used taking cars from Cronk-ny-Mona down to the Manx Arms then along Main Road and Governors Road heading back to the grandstand.  In 1937 the course changed again with cars coning through the village and down Royal Avenue and Port Jack to the Promenade.

After the Second World War car racing started again but this time on the Willaston Circuit after road widening works at Cronk-e-Berry and from Cronk-ny-Mona down to Mount View Road.  These works are identifiable today by the stone wall with rough concrete topping which is still visible as the outer boundary to the Governors Hill and Ballachurry Estates. 

The races did not however last very long before they were abandoned.  The race itself had become the British Empire Trophy Race and here in Number 52 is Stirling Moss in his Jaguar C type car.  Other cars racing at that time included the Aston Martin DB3.  In the foreground is a wooden directional sign to Douglas, Laxey and Ramsey via the Mountain.  Behind it is a 20 miles per hour speed limit sign, in force at a time when there were very few cars about.

LIKE A PHOENIX RISING

A more recent photograph taken on 9th March 2002 by Allan Blackburn from within Port Jack Glen.  From 1894 The Douglas Bay Hotel had dominated the headland above Port Jack.  It closed in the late 1980s having only just added a swimming pool in 1986.  The property was then demolished and left vacant for around a decade. 

In the meantime nature took over and the headland reverted back to what it had been in the early 1890s.  In 2001 work started on the construction of an office block on the site, far bigger in area then the hotel.  To provide car parking the developers, Dandara, excavated into the rock to place it below ground. 

On 31st January 2003 the building opened as headquarters for Royal Skandia with a firework display and coloured lights trained on the building.  This photograph captures the construction midway with two cranes on site, a temporary arrangement which is soon forgotten.  The first tower crane of this nature to be used in Onchan was in the mid 1970s when the Village Walk was being constructed in the grounds of the former Nursery Hotel.

BOYS' DELIGHT

TT racing bikes have long had a fascination for young lads in the Isle of Man.  The entry of works teams saw the establishment of headquarters for the firms, usually in a local hotel and particularly where there was a garage or outbuilding that the team mechanics could use to work on the bikes.  In Onchan this included The Howstrake Hotel, The Douglas Bay Hotel and The Nursery Hotel.  Now great container type lorries that open out with extending sides serve that purpose.  In the old days boys would hang around the garages not always so much because they were interested in the mechanics of the bikes but in the hopes of getting rider autographs, badges or even an old number plate which in those days were not a self adhesive transfer but a hard oval that bolted to the front of the bike.

This newspaper cutting photo has been submitted by Ronnie Brew and shows local lads looking into the German N.S.U. "workshop".  In reality it was Mr Fred Cockram the local fishmonger's garage and drive.  His shop was in Main Road alongside Mr Kerr the chemist and Mr Wilkinson the fruiterer.  His house, which he only occupied for a couple of years, was 46 Harbour Road.

The lads that can be recognised are, on the extreme left Lionel Cubbon whose father Syd ran a newsagents and tobacconist shop in Governors Road which was demolished in the mid 1980s to make way for the lazy corner roundabout.  Next to him is John McKibbin whose father was a bus driver and at this time they lived in Auburn Road.  Central on the right hand gate and wearing a tee shirt is Michael Edge who had only popped around the corner from his home in Sunningdale Drive.  To the right of the gate pillar with his head turned towards the mechanic is Andrew Binns of Royal Avenue, the eldest son of Jack Binns.  His father was Assistant Clerk to Onchan Village Commissioners at that time but became Clerk in 1960 serving until October 1969.  He passed away in 2009 in his 98th year.

THE CLASS OF '53

From Allan Blackburn comes a photograph of the class he was in during Coronation Year at Onchan School.  Not all the pupils have been indentified so help is requested.

Back row (left to right): Brian Skillicorn, Alfie Lewin, Harry White, Reggie Newton, Allan Blackburn, Edward Edge and Billy Dickenson.

Third row:  ?, Shirley Cain, Jeffrey Bennett, Athol Binns, Michael Williams, Trevor Mitchell, Raymond Langley, Pat Roberts, Gillian Evans.

Second row:  Heather Lewin, Margaret Stacey, Ann Skillicorn, Pauline Jones, Ann Howland, Sylvia Cojeen, ?, Susan Kelly.

Front row:  June Halsall, Margaret Stirling, Carol Creer, Gloria Farrar, Elizabeth Layfield and Linda Cain.

ANOTHER RAILWAY IN ONCHAN

Around 1934 houses were constructed on Whitebridge Road, mainly by Jeffrey Brothers and these included a large detached house at the side of the hill coming into Onchan from the Whitebridge itself.  This was owned and occupied by Mrs Etta Jeffrey who named it Woodlea on account of its proximity to Groudle Glen in the valley below.  In 1942 Mr Arthur Tranter took up occupation of the house which he then purchased.  He was a bank manager with Barclays having come to the Island, possibly from Birmingham.  He had many hobbies; these included photography and he was an early member of the Isle of Man Photographic Society.  He developed his own pictures and magic lantern slides.  He was also interested in model engineering and set up a model railway in his enlarged garden which ran out behind his house.  He named it Woodlea Light Railway and periodically in the summer months would open up to a limited number of the public for rides behind the tiny locos.

The track was elevated above the garden level using a framework of shuttered concrete, in some places the garden paths went under the structure.  In this 1950 photograph, provided by Allan Blackburn, we see Allan sitting on one of the specially constructed carriages behind his father Percy on such a sunny summer Sunday afternoon.  On the concrete bridge and the running board behind Mr Blackburn's ankle can just be seen the initials W.L.R standing for Woodlea Light Railway.  In the mid 1960s Mr Tranter moved to a bungalow on Clay Head and took the track with him to erect on a second building plot which he had purchased.  This was never to happened.

In the rear garden of Woodlea was one of the five 1897 Jubilee electric lamp standards that were put up to commemorate Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee.  The particular standard had at one time stood at Lazy Corner outside Kelly's the bakers shop.  It has been converted into a gas lamp for a number of years but when electric lights were once again installed in Onchan it was taken down and became a ventilating shaft to the new sewer running behind the houses in Whitebridge Road.  In 1997 it was taken down and erected outside Welch House in The Butt in the same form as it was when converted to gas in 1905.

ROUND THE ISLAND TRIP?

A photograph from Allan Blackburn taken before he was born.  The location is the bottom  of Royal Avenue where it meets Royal Drive and Royal Avenue West.  In the centre of the picture is Craig Mount a property with frontages to Royal Avenue and Royal Drive, occupied by Mrs Bryce Nivison and subsequently one of her daughters, Maggie.  It was run as a guesthouse as were so many properties in the area.  Later it was occupied by Mr and Mrs Tattersall and run in similar fashion. 

To the right is a Manxland bus; it is a Massey bodied Leyland Lion, one of a group brought to the island in 1928.  Manxland Bus Services was formed in early 1927 by Cumberland Motor Services who saw the potential for buses in the Isle of Man.  There was however competition with other small companies.  In February 1929 the Isle of Man Railway Company bought out Manxland as they bought out the other companies.  In 1930 the railway company formed a subsidiary Isle of Man Road Services Limited to run all the buses.  As the Manxland buses were new they were not repainted in the new Road Services livery so this picture could have been taken anytime after 1928.

Notice the gas lamp is positioned in the middle of the road on a traffic island which seems to be of earth without a kerb.  It is not known if the buses turned around the island or not.  There is no bus shelter at the top end of Port Jack Glen in this picture.  Plans for a part glass part cast iron shelter were drawn up for IOM Road Services by R.H. Cain the architect and approved by the commissioners in July 1935.  That scheme however did not proceed and a revised scheme was approved in November 1935.  The new shelter was a timber frame covered with metal laths and cemented over to give the appearance of rendered brickwork.  It had a hipped roof with a small window in the rear wall.  Both sets of plans showed a lamp standard beside the telephone kiosk so the one in the traffic island had been moved by 1935 and had become an electric street light.

The telephone box is of interest for it is made of concrete panels and was a K1 kiosk but regrettably the G.P.O records in Liverpool were lost so it is not possible to establish when the box was installed.  That type of box was manufactured between 1922 and 1927.  Some years later it was replaced by a standard K6 red telephone box which in turn was replaced in 1960/61 when the commissioners revamped the glen.   They demolished the 'bus shelter and built a much larger one which had two shelters facing the road and a further two facing down the glen.  At either end of the building was a lean-to roof with a cubical fronted by a K6 telephone box door.  One was indeed a phone box but the other was a tool store for the maintenance of the glen.  In time this too was swept away to be replaced by the present Millennium Shelter in 2000.  At that point the 'phone box was dispensed with altogether.

There are no houses beyond Royal Drive.  C.H. Gill obtained permission for the first four houses in the terrace at the bottom of Sunningdale Drive in November 1932 and they were erected in 1933 -4.  The picture was taken therefore sometime between 1928 and 1932.  On the extreme right the white shape is Hart's Café Royale on King Edward Road, now The Water Margin.

VAMPIRES IN ONCHAN

Two photographs from the collection of an Onchan resident showing the property in Main Road immediately opposite the top of Royal Avenue.  This had been the site of one of Onchan's oldest public houses which had several names over the years including Cheshire Hunt and Appleby's after the landlord and the Nursery Inn.  This was once the nursery garden was established behind it by the Isle of Man Nursery and Seed Company in 1839.

In the mid 1890s the property belonged to the Douglas Bay Estate Company who let it as a house to various tenants until it was finally demolished in August 1906.  The site was purchased by W.J. Nivison (father of the late Jack Nivison onetime commissioner, MHK, MLC and Captain of the Parish).  Mr Nivison has at various times been an engineer, car mechanic, owner of a chauffer driven car hire firm, a charabanc driver and a builder.  In 1904-05 he built what is now called Royal Buildings at the top of Royal Avenue as a shop and house for his brother Alex Nivison, a butcher.  Later it became Martins Bank, then Barclays Bank and for a while Harley Moore Travel.

W.J. Nivison had plans prepared by the same architect, Armitage Rigby, for a new shop/house building on the Old Nursery Hotel Site.  The building had decorative barge boards, a canopy over the house doorway and a different window pattern to what existed in its last days as seen in these photographs of 1979.  The building was complete and occupied by mid 1907.

Initially the ground floor was divided into a single shop and the ground floor portion of the house.  The shop was on the left and shows in the photograph with double windows either side of a recessed door.  This was a grocers shop occupied initially by George Sharp.  To the extreme right was intended to be a sitting room but this became Onchan's first chemist shop run by George Horne who lived above.  In 1914 the centre section of the ground floor changed from being the kitchen to the house and here Alf Hawley started his barber's shop which only lasted a short while possibly due to the outbreak of the Great War. 

In 1919 Henry Christian set up here with his boot makers shop.  In 1921 Mr Horne's chemist shop closed and Benjamin Shackleton moved in as an ironmonger.  Chemist services for Onchan were now provided at Port Jack by the young Frank Fargher.  William Christian took over the boot makers in 1922 and by 1924 Benjamin Shackleton had decided to become a stationer rather than ironmonger.   Randal Joseph Mottershead took over the grocer's shop.  The following year Mr Shackleton had expanded to become a newsagent as well.  Then in 1930 Herbert Mills took on the grocers shop, Thomas Callow became the boot maker and Benjamin Shackleton added Post Office to his services taking over from the business which had been run at the top of Summerhill Road.

Another change in 1934 when Ronald H. Johnston became the Post Master and things remained like this for a few years although Billy Mills became part of Herbert's business and in 1938 Miss Connell ran a ladies hairdressers business from what had been the boot makers in the centre section of the three shops in Nivison's building.  Following the end of the Second World War Mr Johnston moved the Post Office into the space occupied by Miss Connell and kept the right hand shop as a newsagents, stationers, sweet shop and tobacconists.  This was in 1946 but by the following year persuaded his friend Harry Mather who had been a member of the Wirral Fire Brigade to move with his family to Onchan and run the newsagents as he could not do both.

Harry Mather then became a village institution much as Billy Mills.  Harry's paper boys kept their bikes in the space between the gable of the property and the war memorial site.  It was here also that a pillar box stood until sometime after the Post Office moved to its present location, at the top of Kelvin Road, in fact that particular box has subsequently been replaced by a larger box that once stood on Bucks Road.

It was in the top bedroom above the shop that a pop group was born.  Harry's youngest son David and his cousin Stan Hughes of Victoria Avenue used to practice, Dave on drums and Stan as bass guitar.  Soon they were joined by Trevor Ball of Ramsey as lead guitar, Mike Sharp also of Ramsey on rhythm guitar and Colin Harrison, whose parents ran the Bridge Inn on North Quay, Douglas, as lead singer.  The year was 1961 and they called themselves The Vampires.  Soon they had bookings all over the island.  They even had their own fan club with 13 year old Onchan girl Rosalind Russell as Secretary.

They appeared on Border television in the Cock of the Borders talent competition but this was at a time when most of the island were tuned in to Granada and therefore only those in the north of the island were able to see them and other Manx acts including singer Shirley Curry, Tom Kelly on his musical saw and The Meteors harmony singing group.

After that they turned professional and were renamed The Manxmen.  No more vampire capes but they had postcards produced of themselves on board the Steam Packet boat Manxman.  This was now mid 1964, Stan gave up his full time job with Ramsey Laundry and the others gave up their jobs as well.  They travelled around England performing but split up at Easter 1965.  Dave joined The Cheetahs and Stan went with the Ray Norman Combo who played at the brand new Palace Hotel on Douglas Promenade.  The Main Road property was eventually purchased by Onchan Village Commissioners to facilitate road widening.  They had already purchased other shops along Main Road where Elm Tree House was built and opened in 1978.  Ladies Hairdresser Harry Clucas moved into Mills Shop, the Post Office had been empty since 1969 and Harry Mather's business was being run by Jack Quirk who had successfully run The Crescent Hotel on Douglas Promenade for many years.  In the shop to the left, which was not part of the Nivison building, Robinsons started their first out of town fruit shop.  This building had previously been run as Onchan Electrical and Radio Services Ltd by Mr Kenworthy and was owned by his father-in-law Tossie Clucas of Clucas' Laundry fame.

People's Photographs: Gallery 1 | Gallery 2 | Gallery 3 | Gallery 4 | Gallery 5 | Gallery 6