Wigan Album

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Really enjoying these pictures Fred. Are you related to the family that had the shop at the junction of Billinge road and Little Billinge Road?

Hi there Freda, yes we had the shop from 1946. My mother and dad ran it first and then Edna and I ran it until 1975 It was first run by old Margit Melling, who was Billy Mellings mother(he who had the shoe shop in Newtown.)Later it was Ben Rollins and then Jack Collier, and Harold Pouncey. Harold joined the Navy and it was clsed during the War and used as a WVS depot.

Hello Fred
My mum's Aunties lived in the 2 houses in Melling Street and some of my relatives still live in Billinge Road. I lived further up past the hospital. My mum's Uncle Jack lived next door to the shop. I am also related to the Sellars family. My Mum's Aunt Harriet used to help out in the bakery. Oh I could eat one of those pies right now!
At the 1881 census my Gt Grandparents lived at this shop along with my Gt grandmother's older brother and their uncle John Wood (born 1815) My grandma was 5 years old then.I don't know what sort of a shop it was in those days.. may not have been a bakery.
Best wishes. Tricia.
PS do you have any photos of up around the hospital etc or the fields at the back of your shop near the railway lines? I used to go there with my dog.

Hi Fred was there once a shop on the corner of Bold St and Lt.Billinge Rd.Did a chap called Tommy Cunliffe own it in the late fifties early sixties.He was earlier in buisiness with Mr Sharrock.They had shops in Billinge Rd now flats and Halfway House Ormskirk Rd now hairdressers.

The shop at the end of Bold Street was taken for a while by Tommy Holmes. He worked for Sharrock and Cunliffe as a manager of their shop at Halfway house. He wanted to buy their shop, as did Bert Derbyshire, another manager, but S&C didn't want to sell, so Tommy Holmes took on the empty shop at the end of Bold Street, and pinched all his former customers! The outcome was that S&C capitulated and both he and Bert got a branch each.

hello fred have you got any more information about the shop on 94 billinge road i now live there and have done for over 20 years

Tricia & Fred, My father William Ardern Mason’s best man at his wedding was Arthur Sellars from Sellars’ Bakery, and Arthur’s mother, Mrs Sellars was a great friend of my grandmother, Ada Mason (nee Jones) from Mason’s Stores, 215a, Ormskirk Road, Newtown.

My Great Aunty Mary helped out in a corner shop on Billinge Road. She lived next door and when the shop got busy the owner would knock on the wall for her to pop round and help serve.