Restaurants, Cafes, Coffee Bars

I remember the same one, Gosford Rd. baths on the left & the restaurant on the left just after the railway bridge going towards town. If you was sitting on the top deck of a bus you always ducked when going under! Was this built from the dreaded asbestos? What about the steakhouse just off Ford? St. If you could eat 2 of their mixed grills you got them for free john dearsley

Did that building end up as The Arcadia snooker hall?

As there's been talk of the Godiva Cafe on this thread, Jordan Well?

Yes it is Neil

Whereabouts was that bit Dutchman?

Just above the Gaumont Neil. The picture was taken in the mid to late 1960s as the second hand shop is occupying the extreme left of the frame. It's front window featured mainly air rifles and model aeroplane engines. The shop on the extreme right sold some unusual toys including a boxed set of toy soldiers featuring a representation of the ruins of Tobruk and a die cast German armoured car.

Before they were called British Restaurants, weren't they called 'Communal feeding centre'

Yes they were Kaga, well remembered! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Restaurant

Neil, the building on the right of your photo is the one on the left of this painting -

Thanks Helen - I think you've posted that one before. I'm still struggling to locate whereabouts they were in relation to the whole road - which side etc. There are not many images of Jordan Well post-war and before the Herbert/Poly/Uni developments went up.

Does this help?

Sorry Neil, the city is very confusing and I forget it sometimes. Tip - one of the best ways to know the city is by its pubs. Partly because they're often marked on the maps, partly because Real Ale Rambles often lists a street number for them, and partly because quite a few of them survived the war to be captured in the Britain From Above like the excellent one posted by the Dutchman above. The post war aerial photos are very useful because they thin the number of buildings down. Not to mention they are much crisper images. The gaps on one side of roads allow views of the other side that were obscured in earlier photos. It's easier to see individual buildings and get a feel for how they looked and where on the street they were. Then you can look at older aerial shots and locate the ones you already know and/or rule certain positions out. There are still bits of the city unknown but it reduces the mystery. I wish when I'd started, that I'd known about Britain From Above and that when you log in, you can zoom. I also find it useful to use CTRL + to zoom the screen view even further. CTRL - to zoom out again.

dutchman, didn't all those buildings get bombed, I seem to think the cinema stood back a few yards, and a mesh fence ran all the way up to Jordan Well, there was little pavement, inside the fence was a great advert hoarding about ten foot high during the fifties I seem to recall.

That picture was taken in 1953 Kaga and all the buildings on the Gaumont side were still there when I left the area in 1967.

The upper picture - I think I have spotted another clock - on the building just astern of and above the bus being hidden by a lamp standard. I think it marked the office of the magazine "The Aurocar" My wife "temped" for a while for the owner/manager/editor (?) for a while in the 60`s - something like Mr. Delisle (can`t quite remember it) Anybody any ideas? Edit: would it be Iliffe?