By: Terry Allsop

Terry Allsop — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 20:36:21 +0000

Hi Wendy. You are right about the gasometers (gasholders) the one shown on your photograph is the one from which I took the “aeriel” photographs in my book. I don,t know if you have now got a copy but the gasometers are shown on page 10 and it is the one nearest to the river. Regarding the redevelopment, there are some historical references in the Foreword by David Cliffe and in my Introduction, particularly in connection with the public houses! There is a section in the book devouted to them. A coincidence about Simonds Brewery is that I joined the Architects Dept in about 1960/61 around the time of the Courage takeover. I haven’t many photographs of the brewery but will (try to) forward a scanned copy of one taken from Dukes Bridge by e.mail which you may find interesting. One other fact about the houses on Kennetside is they have 2 postal addresses, (up to Rupert Street), apparently it was to enable the postal/delivery services to gain access from the “back side” of the dwellings as Kennetside was very restricted in width. Terry.

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By: wendy

wendy — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 16:45:08 +0000

John, the Gas towers you refer to are on the South side of the Kennet – they are still in use. This one is on the North side of the Kennet – nearby but definitely not in use.
The Original Brewery that lead to the Beer, Bulbs and Biscuit phrase was Simonds Brewery (17985) – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simonds_Brewery which appears to have been on the Oracle site for some time. Simonds merged with Courage in the 1960s

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Comments on: Newtown in a new century – 1900 through to 2000

By: Terry Allsop

By: wendy