Spon Street

Hi I am new to this forum and have an interest as my grandfather' family came from the area. I have some relatives living in No.2 Court 49 Spon St in the 1901 census and was wondering if anyone could give me an idea of where this would be on a modern OS map Many Thanks

Do you mean House No.2 in Court 49 behind 176 Spon Street? If so it was directly opposite the Shakespeare Inn where the electricity substation now is. In this very rare picture it is located behind the shop immediately to the left of the barber's pole as we look at it with the entrance between it and the next shop to the left of that one: Hope that helps?

Thanks for the reply I have had another look at the census image and though it's not very clear I am pretty sure it is No.7 Ct 50 Spon Street

In that case the entrance is the archway behind the man in the previous picture and behind the lady in this one: It's still occupied by the electricity sub-station though. Rob has a 'Now & Then" location view of the same archway on this page: Spon Street flood of 1900

I managed to include it in three slides in 1976, now scanned

Brilliant Midland Red, I'm glad someone did. Note the helical ramp to the disastrous Meadow Street car park blocking the view of the Meadow House tower block

Something that has always puzzled me about Spon Street is, why are all the old buildings dotted around and not in any particular order? At the start of Spon Street on your left you have two lovely timber frame houses, just facing the wrong way (I think!) then a gap then more of the old houses winding their way down the street. On the other side of Spon street there's a monstrosity of an electric substation. What is going on? If they spend some time looking at this area, they might notice that they haven't quite finished. What I mean is, if a traveller comes to Spon Street, are they going to be disappointed in what they see, all the beautiful building surrounded by dirty, dated concrete!

Quite a few of the old buildings in Spon Street are not in their original positions. Some were rebuilt piece by piece, and I can recall at least one being moved on some sort of platform to its current location. No doubt someone will know all the details, but I recall it happening over a period of time in probably 60s/70s.

I'm just having a look at Google earth again. The birds eye view of Spon Street and I am standing outside no.180 (where all the graffiti is on some gates) to the right of Fairfax Club. What has happened to the building that stood there I wonder? I can remember it might have been the pub garden to the Tin Angel or Fairfax Club? If you look over the gates you can see a building that seems to be missing its gable end? It faces on to Holyhead Road, if you walk up Holyhead Road away from Spon Street then you come to the Venue (seen better days) next to the tile showroom. What where these, something to do with the pubs? The tile showroom seems modern but the houses behind them seem quite old! I just wondered why they were set so far back from the road. Anybody know?

'Planning blight'. The owner of 183 Spon Street, a Mr Myles, wanted to do things with it. The council claimed it had 'other plans' for the site which they never specified. The same goes for the site of the Plough Hotel opposite, which has remained empty since 1941.

Haven't found the Plough Hotel, google earth can't find it, well it will but its way out of Coventry! I guess they will lay empty until they get burnt down and then knocked down. That's how it seems to go these days, I wonder what interesting things lie buried in the lofts of these old building. Over the years of collecting all things old and rusty (to my mother'sdismay!) I have become very attached to old buildings and the characters and what gems lie around them. The building seems to have disappeared at the front of 183 Spon Street! The buildings behind it seem to be quite old built around 1900? So they must have some "historic value"?

It won't as it was destroyed by a bomb in 1941 and demolished some years later. Northampton Breweries applied to build a mock-Tudor pub on the site in 1953 but were knocked back by the council for no good reason. It's currently the wasteland next to Alexander Edwards mock-Tudor jewellery shop. It was Wyles the butcher's shop from 1924. Many butchers in those days were also bookmakers. In 1961 Wyles applied for a betting office licence but was refused. There's no official record of what happened to it after that. One street directory shows it as being 'Bablake Grocers' up until 1971 but street directories are often wrong.

WHY! I find myself asking again and again and can't seem to get my head round it. I know that after the war there was no money and concrete they thought was the answer. So why would a council turn down an application to have a beautiful building built there in keeping with it surrounding and at probably little or no cost to the council!

I have a vague recollection of something left of the Plough in my earliest memories. Of course, then, there were still a lot of ruined buildings, fenced off (those opposite the Maudslay Hotel weren't even fenced off, just a 'keep out' notice) that were pulled down soon after. I can certainly remember something being next to Alexander Edwards. And on that subject, is Alexander Edwards still there? I remember it as a watchmaker's material supplier, and I thought it had closed down a few years ago. I last had a watch repair done there about 1980. (Long before I did 'em myself!) I have a vague recollection of Bablake Grocers too, but can't recall where or what it looked like. Re: lack of money after the war. Yes, but I don't think that resulted in concrete per se. A lot of bomb sites were simply left as they were until the mid 50s, and I should think that it had more to do with plans being afoot - or believed to be afoot - rather than simply lack of money. And there was another issue, too. Remember there was a whole row of terraced houses in, I think it was St Patrick's Road, that had been bomb damaged, and they stood derelict until the 1960s. The official reason was that the owners had disappeared (all of them???) and the council couldn't do anything about compulsorily purchasing them until 25 years had passed without anyone appearing to come and claim them. That may well have applied to other sites, too.

Yes, the bomb-damaged shell of the building was left standing until the mid-1950s. Edwards wasn't there at the time, it was in the watchmakers showroom next to the Shakespeare which is now a beauty salon. It later moved into the mock-Tudor building erected as part of the Spon Street Townscaping Scheme on part of the site once occupied by the Plough. It ceased to be Alexander Edwards in 2008 but it is still a jeweller's. There was an electrical contractor called "Brady" behind it for many years, arguably in Holyhead Road. I can only ever remember it as a wine merchants. The council rejected almost every application to rebuild war damaged property on the grounds that "The site lies within a larger area which the council has earmarked for future comprehensive development". The owner then had the option of selling the site to the council for its full market value. These sales are marked "Confidential" in the city planning records and were never discussed in open council meeetings.