Thatched House, Market Street

 
Thatched House, Market Street. (c) jazzworld.
 
Pictured here in 1805, the original Old Thatched House was demolished in 1823 to be replaced by the Thatched House pub, which itself lasted until the 1972 to make way for the Arndale Centre.  The original building was used as a post office as well as its main function as a watering hole.  It originally faced onto Market Stead Lane, which later became Market Street.  In the vaults of the new Thatched House were discovered tunnels dug into the sandstone bedrock, leading off towards the Cathedral one way and Spring Gardens the other [1].  The old Guardian Building stood right in front of the pub as seen in 1955, so it was not surprisingly a popular haunt of thirsty Evening News and Guardian staff.  The Guardian Building was pulled at the same time as the rest of the area, as seen here in 1972 (Thatched House on the left down the alley).


Thatched House, Market Street. (c) Manchester Local Image Collection. Click here to view full image.

This image shows the Thatched House from the site of the now-gone Guardian Buildings, looking back towards Market Street.  The pub is seen in happier days in 1970 with a Guardian truck motoring around the corner.  The punters of the Thatched House further back in the past may also have had happy times, as the pub was known as a hangout of prostitutes: "living then in Market Street, I had opportunities of seeing the hookers swarm about the doors of the Thatched House, the White Bear, and similar inns every morning, besieging the head waiters with the view of ascertaining who had arrived overnight [2].  In the 1950s the pub was a popular jazz venue, and a photo of the Crescent Jazz Band playing in the Thatched House is shown above.

1. Underground Manchester, Keith Warrender (2007).

2. Reminsces of Manchester Fifty Years ago, J. T. Slugg (1944).