General Chit Chat

[Beefheart]

Also, having just been offered a job with a lot of international travel it's probably about time I got myself a credit card. Any recommendations of ones with good rewards so I can make the most of expenses?

[Hoboh]

Did you make them in a cauldron or summat?

Leading question, no?

[Bruce Rioja]

Just walked into Bolton centre to get some lunch and only just realized that Waterstones is now an Estate Agents????? WTF?? I work in the town centre and never even noticed Waterstones had shut down???

Are you sure? I'm sure it was still a Waterstones about a week ago.

And I was in there an hour ago. Wigan - it's next door.

He shit me up though. I was disappointed enough when Sweetens closed down.

[TANGODANCER]

Anybody remember Reeds Bookshop (probably not). It was next door but two or so to what Used to be Ray Parry's newsagents kiosk on Newport Street. My favourite shop in the whole world as a child and yoof. Real old-fashioned book shop.Long gone now, of course.

[Lost Leopard Spot]

In every photo I've seen it looks like Aimee Pistorius has just taken a kick in the groin. The most sour faced young woman on the planet.

[Montreal Wanderer]

Anybody remember Reeds Bookshop (probably not). It was next door but two or so to what Used to be Ray Parry's newsagents kiosk on Newport Street. My favourite shop in the whole world as a child and yoof. Real old-fashioned book shop.Long gone now, of course.

I remember it, Tango - the first place we'd try for books. Sorry it has gone but I imagine most of the
shops I remember have given way to 'progress'.

[TANGODANCER]

Anybody remember Reeds Bookshop (probably not). It was next door but two or so to what Used to be Ray Parry's newsagents kiosk on Newport Street. My favourite shop in the whole world as a child and yoof. Real old-fashioned book shop.Long gone now, of course.

I remember it, Tango - the first place we'd try for books. Sorry it has gone but I imagine most of the
shops I remember have given way to 'progress'.

Most of them have given way to roller-shutter blinds Monty.

[Enoch]

Did you make them in a cauldron or summat?

At times it may have resembled a cauldron, lots of heat and all that.

[wigan white]

Just walked into Bolton centre to get some lunch and only just realized that Waterstones is now an Estate Agents????? WTF?? I work in the town centre and never even noticed Waterstones had shut down???

Are you sure? I'm sure it was still a Waterstones about a week ago.

And I was in there an hour ago. Wigan - it's next door.

He shit me up though. I was disappointed enough when Sweetens closed down.

I think I really need to pick my head up when I'm out

[Worthy4England]

Did you make them in a cauldron or summat?

At times it may have resembled a cauldron, lots of heat and all that.

Fnarr...

[William the White]

Just to join the old gits reminiscence society - I too remember Reeds (a splendid name for a bookshop).

Their greatest triumph for me, when i was in late teens, was getting copies of beat poetry form City Lights Books in San Francisco. They used to take six weeks to arrive, but they always did. I got Ginsberg's Howl and Kaddish and a Gregory Corso Collection whose title I can't remember. It was like magic getting them from America

Decades later we took a California holiday and I made a pilgrimage to City Lights and bought Ginsberg's Collected Poems and Kerouac's The Subterraneans. And remembered Reeds as I did so.

[Hoboh]

Just to join the old gits reminiscence society - I too remember Reeds (a splendid name for a bookshop).

Their greatest triumph for me, when i was in late teens, was getting copies of beat poetry form City Lights Books in San Francisco. They used to take six weeks to arrive, but they always did. I got Ginsberg's Howl and Kaddish and a Gregory Corso Collection whose title I can't remember. It was like magic getting them from America

Decades later we took a California holiday and I made a pilgrimage to City Lights and bought Ginsberg's Collected Poems and Kerouac's The Subterraneans. And remembered Reeds as I did so.

Lost half the punch from the original, shame that.

[TANGODANCER]

My first visit to Reeds with money to spend was to buy A kids novel about Puffin Island. Probably Enid Blyton's Famous Five or Secret Seven adventures ( all of which which I devoured from the library in town and at Shepherd Cross Steet) Years later I won a book prize for a City and Guilds entry and spent the voucher at Reeds. I still have that book, a woodworking manual, somewhere. Happy memories, I can almost smell that unique book odour.

[Bijou Bob]

I've just found out that Douglas Hackings on Ivy Road closed a while ago. Spent many a happy hour in there and bought a couple of bikes off them in the past. With ESB gone as well I believe (?) the town has lost another part of my association with it.

[clapton is god]

^ Didn't know that! And yes, ESB went some while ago. My last bike (Honda 900 F2) was from ESB but before that I was a customer from the shop opposite the Wryton Stadium, I'm sure someone will remind me of their name, run by two bad tempered brothers. And I had a Kawasaki 250 Samurai from the dealers on Bury New Road many years ago.

[TANGODANCER]

^
These are two pics from a family history I'm compiling. Brookfields was a motor cycle shop on Halliwell Road when we were kids. It was next door to the old vicarage (later a service station/garage more or less opposite the Lamb pub and only a hudred yards or so from where we lived. The Toll house fact is interesting: Note the Reliant Robins, the car of the day.









The old Toll House (above), which stands on Halliwell Road at the bottom of Hargreaves Street, used to be a motor-bike repair shop ( Brookfields). Hargreaves Street is on the right and next door on the left used to be Ward’s fish shop. Evidence of the old boundary wall dividing Little and Great Bolton can be seen a little further along Hargreaves Street. In 1813, the Halliwell Turnpike Agreement was passed and a toll bar stood at the bottom of Hargreaves Street until 1877.

[Bijou Bob]

^ Didn't know that! And yes, ESB went some while ago. My last bike (Honda 900 F2) was from ESB but before that I was a customer from the shop opposite the Wryton Stadium, I'm sure someone will remind me of their name, run by two bad tempered brothers. And I had a Kawasaki 250 Samurai from the dealers on Bury New Road many years ago.

I won't upset you by telling you how much your 900f2 would be worth now!

[Bruce Rioja]

I thought that Dougie Hacking simply moved further down C-O-Rd?

[Hoboh]

I thought that Dougie Hacking simply moved further down C-O-Rd?

Friday 4 March 2011
A SPATE of burglaries and the recession have forced a 48-year-old family motorcycle business to pack up.

Doug Hacking Motorcycles, a familiar name to generations of enthusiasts throughout the area and overseas, will close in the next few days, with the loss of five jobs.
The business is solvent but following Doug Hacking’s sudden death three years ago, his family have found it difficult to carry on.

Mr Hacking died in 2007 at the age of 65 and hundreds of people attended his funeral.
Now creditors will be paid off and unsold motorcycles, along with the dealership, will be returned to Kawasaki.

The store’s long association with motorcycle racing will also end.

The business, which moved to Ivy Road in 1997, was originally set up by Doug Hacking in 1963 who traded, repaired and raced motorcycles throughout Europe.

[Bruce Rioja]

Well I didn't know that! Cheers, Hobey.