Coventry gambling (Casinos, Betting Shops, etc)

I wish I knew. I guess this could remain in my head as just a memory.

I think you're wrong there mate. Whether Ladbrokes used to be there or not, Greyfriars Walk or City Arcade has a much more modern look now compared to how it used to look.

I'm trying to find where I can get access to a 1998 edition of the Coventry Yellow Pages. That should do the trick!

It's looked the same for at least 20 years apart from the usual 'cosmetic' attempts to make it look semi decent. I'd hardly call it modern looking. It doesn't look that different from how it looked in the 1960s, just tattier and more run down and depressing.

I'm almost certain that there was a betting shop (Ladbrokes?) that faced onto the market from the first floor level of the surrounding shops. I would guess somewhere around the back of here. IIRC, Patricia's hairdressers was on the other side of the opening.

Is it the one that I'm thinking of where you had to climb up some old steps? It was a fairly old area and yes I was thinking of before the Greyfriars Walk was done up about a decade ago near the market. I mean, I can remember not going to Coventry at all between 1999 and 2005 and when I did return in 2005, my beloved Ladbrokes shop where I once won the Tote Jackpot was gone forever, pretty upsetting it was. And yes, it was on the first level but above those old steps. Could it really have been the one you mean?

It could be. IIRC there were outside concrete steps leading up to it. I think there was (is) a market plant/garden stall close by.

Concrete steps leading up to it, yeah. Anyway, I'm waiting for a reply from yell.com. They will be able to give me all the Ladbrokes addresses in Cov city centre in 1998.

First betting shop I knew in Coventry was in Spon End, mid to late fifties possibly.

Interesting..

First legal betting shops didn't open until 1961. Up until then it was the 'local bookie' with his runners.

Midland Red, Ok, around 1950 it was illegal to bet unless you visited the track, except you could have an account, believe Littlewoods and Vernons were the only two in those days, I had an account with Littlewoods, they sent you betting slips and envelopes, but you had to have them time stamped by hand at a post office, so some days I was in and out of there like a busy bee. Worse you didn't know the results until the Telegraph came out, think they printed different time editions, so I bought a paper and say the 2.30 result was published, I would then buy another paper half-hour later for the 3.00 result published in the stop press on the back page. All good clean fun for the kiddies as the saying goes. Yes, thought I might be wrong about the betting shop, I lived in Barras Lane through the fifties, then I left in 59 but returned for a few months in 61, so that's when I visited in Spon End, had to be. But mainly I visited the tracks, think I must have bought Red House Motors.

You're absolutely correct Kaga. Technically it was a "betting office" and owned by Jimmy Cleverly. It was somewhere near the corner of Hearsall Lane and Broomfield Place. Cleverly later moved to a public betting shop in Upper Spon Street.

dutchman, thanks, but how easy is the name for me now. I think I got to know Coventry the hard way, what with street signs covered up or missing, along with the blackout, as a kid I just found my way about until I was familiar with what led where, on the other side of Pool Meadow where the Midland Red stands were, was a real nightmare, in the evening, pitch black no kerbs, cinder underfoot you had no guide, when you managed to find the bus, it was like the dodgems until the driver got straight on Ford Street, I loved that part.