Beer And Pests In Bailiff Bridge

Two hundred years ago a new inn was built in the West Yorkshire village of Bailiff Bridge. It was a lucky location, a few years after the Bailiff Bridge Inn was built the new Bradford - Huddersfield Turnpike Road was laid-out at its doors. For the best part of that two hundred years the pub prospered - and at some stage it changed its name to the Punch Bowl Hotel - attracting customers travelling along the new road and from the mills which were built at the intersection of two important roads. Behind the pub were stables and at one time the hotel shared the premises with Greenwoods Shaving Saloon. The Shaving Saloon closed many years ago, as did the stables and now the pub has gone the same way. The building remains, it is the headquarters of a pest control company. But that seems a sad end to what was once a thriving local inn.

The Anchor Inn, Brighouse.

The Anchor Inn - A photograph I took in the 1970s before its change of name

There has been a pub next to the Anchor Bridge over the Calder and Hebble Navigation in Brighouse ever since the canal was constructed in the 1750s. For most of that time, the pub was quite reasonably called the Anchor Inn, but for some reason it was decided that it needed a new name for the twenty-first century and it was rechristened The Bridge. The current building dates back just over one hundred years and is the third on the site : the original 1750s pub was rebuilt first of all in 1859. The Anchor has a long association with music : in the early years of the twentieth century the police tried to close it down because it was guilty of "habitually employing professional female musicians". I remember the pub best in the 1970s when Rod Marshall was the Landlord. He was a gifted jazz musician himself and succeeded in attracting a host of local - and in some cases - international jazz musicians to play at the pub. And, if the police would care to take note, I recall that a number of them were women!

A Century Of Progress?

For some two hundred years, one of the most renowned names in Yorkshire brewing was that of Joshua Tetley. The Tetley family were connected with brewing in the Leeds area as far back as the 1780s and in the 1820s they started brewing at Salem Place in Hunslet. Over the next 180 years this became one of the most important breweries in the county - until brewing there ceased in 2011 and production of Tetley Beer was transferred to Northamptonshire. My picture comes from the 1923 publication "A Century Of Progress" which marked the 100th anniversary of the brewery. The caption is as follows:

LOADING UP AT THE BOTTLE BEER DESPATCH DEPARTMENT

Tetley's continue to use horse-drawn vehicles for that part of their business which comes within a few miles' radius of the brewery. This is a daily busy scene, just before 8 o'clock in the morning. Loading up is almost completed and the carts and drays are just about to leave.

Feast And Famine And The Age Of Social Sterility

The following is reprinted from my News From Nowhere Blog -

The world of beer and brewing is going through odd times : times. on the one hand, of feast, and on the other, of famine. I am mainly talking about Britain, but I wouldn't be surprised if the changes don't extend to a number of other beer drinking countries as well.

First we have the feast : and the feast currently on offer to the discerning beer drinker is the sheer number of different ales and lagers available to them. The last ten years has seen an explosion in the number of microbreweries producing and supplying a glittering selection of real ales - on draught and in bottles - to thirsty drinkers. Not since the seventeenth century, when each individual pub would brew its own beer, has there been such a bewildering selection available : pale ales, golden ales, bright beers, dark beers, hoppy and mellow, light ales and heavy ales. The variety - and in the vast majority of cases - the high quality of these products make sampling a delight and raises beer drinking well above the status of thirst quenching.

But then we have the famine : and that is the developing famine of pleasant places to drink this golden array of brewed delicacies. Yes, yet again, I am moaning on about the decline of the British pub. During a depressing drive from Hebden Bridge to Halifax the other week I think I counted more closed pubs en route (and by closed I mean permanently closed) than open ones. 

It would appear that if we are entering a new age of the super-abundance of different types of real beer we are also entering an age in which we will drink them in the social sterility of our own homes. Which, to me, is a great shame.

The Wheatsheaf, Ewell : Dogs and Beer Lovers Welcome.

THE WHEATSHEAF

34 KINGSTON ROAD, EWELL, SURREY, KT17 2AA

This rather nice local pub is nowhere near Yorkshire, but one of the advantages of making the rules is that you can break them whenever you want. We found ourselves staying with a friend in Ewell, and Amy - our soft-coated wheaten terrier - was with us. We were on the lookout for a pub that was dog-friendly, beer-friendly, and people-friendly : step forward The Wheatsheaf which ticked all the boxes.

There has been a pub on this site on Kingston Road for a good few hundred years, but the present building dates from the mid nineteenth century. For many years it was tied to the Middlesex based Isleworth Brewery. During the twentieth century the ownership of this brewery changed hands so often that it must have been an almost full-time job changing the pub signs. The Isleworth Brewery was taken over by Watney Combe Reid & Co, which became Watney Mann, which was taken over by Grand Metropolitan, which was taken over by Guinness .... and onwards and onwards until the music stopped. Luckily, by then, the pub had lost its' tie - and retained its' original fine etched glass Isleworth Brewery windows.

If you are a dog-owner, there is a delight in finding a decent pub that positively welcomes your dog. At the Wheatsheaf, there was a fine relaxed atmosphere and several of the canine clientele would wander around from table to table, making new friends and sniffing new smells.

During several visits I was able to sample a variety of local real ales. All were well-brewed and well-kept, but particularly memorable was This England from the West Sussex Hammerpot Brewery. I suppose it can be called a pale ale, but a pale ale with a rather rich and fruity body. Which, by some strange coincidence, is exactly what a West Highland Terrier said to Amy in the Snug Bar!