Heywood & Hopwood May 2019
Heywood & Hopwood May 2019
Heywood & Hopwood May 2019
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Joining the business in 1958, Anthony Senior<br />
carried on the family tradition of producing<br />
quality clothes. By 1960 the company expanded<br />
and to meet the fashions of the day set up a<br />
ready-to-wear department on site. However,<br />
by 1999 the menswear department which had<br />
been at the heart of Seniors closed down and,<br />
on Anthony Senior’s retirement in 2001, so too<br />
the ladieswear section.<br />
Redman’s<br />
Situated on Yorkshire Street, Redman’s<br />
was one of the main grocery competitors to<br />
James Duckworth’s although its provisions<br />
were distinctive and different. A large store,<br />
Redman’s seemed to be specialists in cooked<br />
meats and that smell was the first thing that<br />
hit you as you entered the shop. It was a smell<br />
which was carried through the store and into<br />
a large café that was a meeting place for many<br />
shoppers in Rochdale.<br />
But Redman’s had certain products for sale<br />
that other shops didn’t have. I remember there<br />
being wire baskets containing what were<br />
promoted as ‘continental foods’ where you<br />
could find such strange delicacies as<br />
chocolate ants (goodness knows what they<br />
were !) and frogs legs which came in small<br />
sardine-type tins and which tasted of chicken.<br />
Haworth’s<br />
One of the most prominent spots for a shop<br />
in Rochdale was on the South Parade just<br />
around the corner at the bottom of Drake<br />
Street. Owned by three generations of the<br />
same family, Haworth’s operated from this<br />
site for many years with the first Haworth,<br />
Edwin, opening ‘The Toggery’ in 1896 to sell<br />
menswear. Edwin was joined by his son<br />
Alfred in the company, expanding the shop<br />
over the years by taking over adjoining<br />
premises and setting up new and different<br />
departments – even launching a popular<br />
ladies hairdresser’s. The store sold both<br />
men’s and women’s clothes and at their<br />
height was the place to go if you wanted<br />
quality clothes in town. Geffrey Haworth<br />
continued the business after the war but<br />
Manchester shopping in the 1960’s and<br />
the rise of a new youth culture with which<br />
Haworth’s never really kept up, led to the<br />
shop’s decline. Haworth’s was eventually<br />
sold in 1984, falling between two stools in<br />
terms of its size - it was neither big enough<br />
as a department store nor small enough to<br />
maintain trade as a local specialist retailer.<br />
With the prospect of an ever-bigger shopping<br />
centre at the heart of Rochdale and the rise of<br />
on-line shopping, it could be said that the days<br />
of the independent family store are over. That<br />
might be the case, only the names remaining<br />
of a town with ‘local shops for local people,’ a<br />
phrase that has sadly become only a sit-com<br />
joke. However, let’s hope for distinctiveness,<br />
style and shops that reach out to Rochdale<br />
with our future new shopping centre.<br />
If you have any memories or comments<br />
about these old stores (or any others)<br />
in Rochdale, I’d be delighted to hear from<br />
you and add them to a growing Rochdale<br />
archive on the subject.<br />
Please contact Gary <strong>Heywood</strong>-Everett<br />
at garyheywoodeverett@yahoo.co.uk<br />
or leave your comments by text or by<br />
recorded message at 07745201263.<br />
Visit our website www.streetwisemag.co.uk for all the info about the Streetwise magazines<br />
39