Former location of Clock Face, Ashton Old Road. (c) Google 2012. View Larger Map.
Whilst the Clock Face estate pub on Wynne Close in Beswick only closed in the last decade, the original pub that gave it its name was an old Openshaw Brewery then Chesters House situated a short distance away on Ashton Old Road. The Clock Face, or Old Clock Face, sat between Pottery Lane and Gorton Road on the corner of the lost Royal Street, and is pictured at the archives in the 1970s with its clock face, obviously. According to Jim Sharpe at the Manchester & Lancashire Family History Society, before the Clock Face was closed and demolished, it had a brief time as a teetotal or temperance tavern [1].
We lived on Poplar Street a short distance away. When the area was bombed in Ww2 the pub was turned into a mortuary. Bodies were lying on pavement outside and a policeman stopped my dad who was cycling to work asking if he could identify any of them. Later I went to Nansen Street school and one of the lads in my class was George Eyes whose father ran the pub
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