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Paisley - My Pics Of Old Or Unusual Buildings Or Places Of Interest.


Sonny

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1 hour ago, faraway saint said:

New Paisley museum, it'll upset some of the old farts but it's for the people of Paisley and the future............................

0_ekr_pde_300620museum_1.jpg

I can’t speak for the old farts but what’s not to like about it?It will breathe life into the west end of the town centre and it will join the Observatory/Oakshaw up with the museum/TC.

The above plus the new TA student accommodation should fairly brighten up that end of the High St.

Would it be too much to get new pavements too?😲

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  • 2 weeks later...

On 4/25/2021 at 8:53 AM, faraway saint said:

Quite an interesting wee piece here....................

High Street - Woolworth
Woolworth's first opened at 14 High Street, Paisley on 17 January 1925. It proved so busy that company bosses were soon challenging the property department to expand or move. It took them ten years to buy the land behind the store and extend it back to School Wynd. After the war it was earmarked for further development, but neither neighbour was willing to move. Because it was opposite Marks and Spencer, and therefore deemed to be at 100% pitch, executives wouldn't countenance moving anywhere else and kept holding out for one of the neighbours to accept the Company's increasingly generous offers for their freeholds. The store's success in the Fifties means that the freehold of No.14 alone was independently valued at £93,000 in 1957, more than twice the value of the store in Stirling, which had already incorporated its neighbour.
I guess the proprietors of the Gibson Tearooms finally decided to retire in around 1967, using a stash of cash from Woolies to top up their pension pot. Certainly the new look store's address was No. 12-14, which means it incorporated the former premises to its left. You'll see a lot of blurb about how it had a special design to match the style of buildings in Paisley and the requirements of the local council. The extension and rebuilding works were completed without the store ever closing, which was typically achieved by building a new shell round the outside of the store first, building the new bit (in the former Gibsons site), then moving into that, and then demolishing the interior of the old store and rebuilding it to match. The grand opening of the 'new Paisley' was on 25 October 1969. It had become the fifth largest store in Scotland (after Princess Street Edinburgh, two in Glasgow and one in Aberdeen), with 21,360 square feet of selling space across two floors, linked by escalator.
When Woolworth was taken over in the Eighties, the new owners (Kingfisher plc) asset-stripped a lot of freehold property, including virtually all of the branches over 15,000 square feet. The five largest stores in Scotland all closed, with the money used to finance the expansion of B&Q into Scotland, and the acquisition of the Comet electricals chain and Superdrug cut price chemists. The Paisley Woolworth's closed for the last time on 9 July 1988, after the building was sold to a development company.
With thanks to Paul Seaton
Author of the Woolworths Museum and 'A Sixpenny Romance, celebrating a century of value at Woolworths'
'A Sixpenny Romance' is available from Amazon http://tinyurl.com/npjbhhs

One of the main reasons Woolies went to the wall at the time was how they marketed their products.

Who else in the prime stretch of the High Street would have counters of sweeties in the first 30 feet. That is where you grab the shopper and show them what they really want to buy, or at least be encouraged to browse further into the store.

Victims of a changing retail world and bad retail layout.

 

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7 minutes ago, Cookie Monster said:

Former, why would anyone want to move from the affectionately known crazy gang practice. emoji16.png

Seriously. I didn't want to. They were my doctors from the day I was born. I actually kept quiet about moving out of their catchment area for a few years.

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Seriously. I didn't want to. They were my doctors from the day I was born. I actually kept quiet about moving out of their catchment area for a few years.
Mine too, my mother stayed with the practice all her days but I changed to my current doc when my son was born so we were all in the same place.

Iirc Dr McGregor was our family doc when I was growing up.
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12 hours ago, salmonbuddie said:

Mine too, my mother stayed with the practice all her days but I changed to my current doc when my son was born so we were all in the same place.

Iirc Dr McGregor was our family doc when I was growing up.

McGregor was my doc from the very start. Though I never used it I was told he was great if you wanted a couple of weeks "holiday".

Edited by stlucifer
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19 hours ago, stlucifer said:

McGregor was my doc from the very start. Though I never used it I was told he was great if you wanted a couple of weeks "holiday".

Dr Bannatyne  was our doc at same practise.  When you entered his surgery, he never looked up, just asked " how many days you wanting off" 

 

  

Edited by pod
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7 minutes ago, pod said:

Dr Bannatyne  was our doc at same practise.  When you entered his surgery, he never looked up, just asked " how many days you wanting off" 

 

  

He was our family Doc too.

My sister was married to one of Dr McGregors sons!!!

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1 hour ago, salmonbuddie said:

Cheers salmonbud 👍🏼 only seen a Daily Record headline about it... came on here to tell Eric Arthur Blair to look out for it.. he's the man for this thread among others of course..  shull beat me to it,  will watch it after the fitba 

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Then and Now

Quite a few years ago I bought a job lot of pictures and paintings from an auction house up in Glasgow just to fill walls. One of the pictures was an old photograph in black & white of nothing I could recognise as it was a scene in the countryside of some trees, but it was a good photo of its time and was sharp and quite scenic.

I have recently moved house and needless to say all paintings and pictures were removed from the old house and then assessed by she who knows best about these things before being put up in the new house.

On the back of this photo was a label from (presumably) 4th March 1907 with the details of the framer etc for 40 High Street Paisley.

What's interesting is the telephone number. I had no idea such short numbers ever existed. It must have been the early days of Paisley having a phone system? Can anyone add anything to this detail?

P1060445_1280x653.thumb.JPG.61514b4bad426b3f944c3e423733a6a8.JPG

The second photo is a screenshot of 40 High Street today on the extreme left of the photo. I think I know which trade I prefer and might make more use of!


1659944403_40HighStreetPaisley-Now.thumb.jpg.9490a73dfb48c1da594766ece13133cc.jpg

 

Edited by The Original 59er
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In fact I have found a little more about Mr Sawers from the entries in the Paisley Directory and general advertiser of that era:

"Sawers, Joseph, carver and gilder, 40 High street; tel. No. 52 y1
— house 54 do."

It appears as though he was born in 1839 and died in 1910. At some time he also worked from 63 High Street and also the company was known as Joseph Sawers and Son. However there is information out there suggesting his son was a "writer"; "Sawers, Joseph, jun., writer, of Young & Martin — ho. 54 High st."

IT'S AMAZING WHAT YOU CAN FIND OUT THERE ON THE WEB! - The world will no doubt be able to catch us all in detail in time to come.

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I saw that picture earlier on twitter, such fantastic detail. Look at the curve in Canal St just after its junction with Causeyside St., much sharper than it is now.

How much the junction of Seedhill Road and Kilnside Rd and Seedhill Rd and Bank St has changed. Kilnside house which became The Talk of the Town and The Cue Ball.

The wee bridge from Lonend to where Morrison's is now and that there was a road bridge between the Mile End mills and the Anchor Rec.

The Lighthouse pub and the garage across the road.

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