Old Wheatsheaf, London Road

In the shadow of London Road station and opposite the London Road Market and its 12 stalls selling meat, fruit & veg was the Old Wheatsheaf. Today the Bulls Head on London Road straddles Fairfield Street and Granby Row with the old London Road Fire Station across Fairfield Street. In 1849 the Bulls Head was not yet in existence and the row of premises extended north, as Fairfield Street was yet to be extended this far. The Old Wheatsheaf stood where the south east corner of the Fire Station is today and the later 1800s was run by John Salt [1]. This grand old building will once again contain licensed premises as either the Britannia Hotel group who own it turn it into a hotel, or more preferably, the council compulsorily purchase it from the low-brow hotel chain and sympathetically convert it into something worthwhile.

1. Manchester (London Road) 1849, Alan Godfrey Maps (2009).