Wigan Album

Mr Smith and my Man's brother both hitch- hiked to London to
look for work in the thirties..he told me that himself..he was
a lovely man.

That should have said...my Mam,not my man.

There was something about the old style newspaper stands like this, and the ones(SMITHS, no connection) on railway stations which only sold newspapers and magazines. When I was at school I used to get my copies of WORLD SOCCER and later RUGBY WORLD(Union) from here You never saw these magazines on sale in any other newsagents around town. Wish I had kept them, as at that time you never got any information of Football and Rugby in other countries around the world on the Radio or T.V.

My treat was Sunny Stories which my mum bought me after we had been shopping usually for shoes or a visit to Woolies.

My treat also! I was an avid reader & quickly read anything that I could get hold of. I loved going down this arcade. Thanks.

Nobody ever visited Wigan without having a walk down the old arcade.

I would buy Shoot football magazine from there every Thursday on my way to the Deanery.\the stall had a certain smell of print and paper and little damp which I have never smelt since, yet looking at this brings the smell back

My memory doesn't serve me well so it could be the late 40's or early 50's when I remember my father taking me through the arcade specifically to buy a newspaper from here - he seemed to know Mr Smith - and the memory is a uniquely Wigan one for me together with the weighing machine found close by - I puzzled why we never used it, I assume it was the cost.

Wigwann
I had forgotten all about Sunny Stories.
Thanks for reminding me. I also remember a comic with Mickey Mouse in.

Nostalgia< This scene 60 years ago " Sid" Smith with his cigar the flagstones under foot you've just passed the shop with the pots and pans and Tommy Tins on display, , the smell of Gorners steak pudding and chips and the cushioned weigh scales and then out to the market hall Gone but not forgotten.

I had the pleasure of working for 'dad' smith for over 18 years he was a lovely man

As a little girl in the late forties I would catch the bus from Shevington ,then walk from the Market Square to visit my Great Aunt Frances's in Miry Lane, Where she would have a glass of sterilised milk and a piece of homemade Parkin waiting for me. On leaving she would give me a threepenny bit and I would then walk to the Old Arcade and buy a Sunny Stories for 2d and have a penny left. Happy days and precious memories.

I first purchased Disc and Music Echo from this stall. Late 1969.

My mum and I would go shopping on Saturday,after buying a chicken off a lady called Maureen on the market, our last stop was the arcade where mum would buy me FAB 208 magazine. I think that was the only place it was on sale.

Wasn't there a stallholder called Ali Khan? I remember my mum taking back a pullover she'd bought me and it had shrunk after one wash. At first he refused to refund her until she created a crowd-gathering fuss. Sound travelled fast in the Little Arcade! It had character - and characters!

I remember Ali Khan, and I have a dvd of the Old Market Hall before it was demolished, and Geoff Shryhane of The Wigan Observer interviews Ali Khan on his jeans stall, and you can hear a bit of Broad Lancashire in his otherwise foreign accent!

i used to searchfor martial art magazine here around 1964in one magazine was a report of a fellow called bruce lee he did not impress what did i knowat 17