I thought you meant the “Bell & Bear”You beat me to it !
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I thought you meant the “Bell & Bear”You beat me to it !
Isn't that in the Birmingham suburb of Blackheath ?I thought you meant the “Bell & Bear”
I spoke to Rocky in the Bird in Hand just over a year ago.
He hasn't aged at all.
Yes, and I've never thought to ask his opinion of the pubs in Crewe. The Hop Pole was the highlight of our day out there 3½ years ago.That's cos he was 58 back in the 80s.
Now Rocky can tell you what a "proper" pub is and it isn't the coach
Not everyone flocks to areas for the bloody pub
Up ‘Anley duck in the early 70’sIsn't that in the Birmingham suburb of Blackheath ?
Now can we please get back to discussing Stafford shops ?
He also used to frequent the Railway and the Castle.Stafford Arms was a great pub and I also knew the bloke from crewe that used to travel to Stafford to go to the pub and get the last train back. He did that every week, odd but true.
Long bar, about 40 differerent draught beers, think it's gone now.there was the Travellers Rest on a left hand bend in the road, also a good pub.
At the risk of digressing from the subject of Stafford shops, when did "Duck" as a term of endearment spread from the East Midlands to the Potteries ?Up ‘Anley duck in the early 70’s
The Travellers Rest on the A53 near Flash with about forty keg beers ?Long bar, about 40 differerent draught beers, think it's gone now.
Different Travellers Rest?The Travellers Rest on the A53 near Flash with about forty keg beers ?
Now can we please get back to discussing Stafford shops ?
At the risk of digressing from the subject of Stafford shops, when did "Duck" as a term of endearment spread from the East Midlands to the Potteries ?
I don't think so as it was near the Roaches that Bob mentions.Different Travellers Rest?
Now The Knight's Table (at The Travellers Rest).The Travellers Rest on the A53 near Flash with about forty keg beers ?
Bob,I dream every night, mostly about Stafford turning into a 'boom' town. Maybe they'll discover oil or something !! I remember some decades back they discovered a coal field laying under the town and were proposing a mine somewhere around the Hopton area. This caused much protest from the residents of that area and the plan was abandoned. Also apparently the coal had a high sulphur content or something which reduced it's quality. I then heard a plan to get to the Stafford coal from the mine in Cannock, but nothing came of that. Cannock' mine is now long gone so I'm told. All of this was before Climate Change and pollution was the issue it is today, although 'acid rain' was a very topical problem, especially for the Scandinavians.
So nothing came of the mine, the once booming factories have thinned out to a shadow of what they were ... yet the town is twice the size it was when I was a kid. Having that mainline railway must have something to do with that.
Thanks for that explanation.It is said to find its origin in the Saxon word ducas which was meant as a term of respect; similar to the Middle English duc, duk which denotes a leader, commander; from which comes the title Duke and the Old French word ducheé - the territory ruled by a Duke.
From these origins it became a greeting and then a term of endearment.
Mercia
This use of duck as a greeting is not restricted to the Potteries; although the use here is very common. It is still used an many parts of what was Mercia.
Even though they have very different dialects from the Potteries the greeting is used in the Black Country, in Derbyshire, as far east as Warwickshire and Nottinghamshire. In Yorkshire the main term of greeting is luv but in Sheffield, which is close to the Yorkshire Derbyshire boarder the greeting Ey up mi duck can be heard.
In A Midsummer Night's Dream, Shakespeare uses the phrase O dainty Ducke: O Deere! as a term of endearment.