Seen here in 1959 as a Wilson's house, the Crown stood where the new Spinningfields development is rising on the west side of Deansgate. The Crown was run by Ethel Hamer in the 1930s and was known as Top Hamer's and later after she'd died, Tommy Hamer took over. The beerhouse is described as being popular and very old-fashioned, with a lobby and a vault on the right for darts which had sawdust on the floor. To the left were two best rooms, the larger one with a piano [1]. The New Theatre Hotel stood opposite the Crown on Hardman Street.
The Crown was the most popular boozer in the area with Opera House players and patrons, and at the interval there would be an exodus from the stage door as stage hands and band members would rush over - it was known as "the Opera House stage door" locally. Pints were lined up on the bar and folk tended to have a couple each despite the interval only lasting 10 minutes. It was also a popular haunt of the Daily Mail journalists who took their dinner hour at 9:30pm and they would dash down Hardman Street for a pint or four [1]. This 1947 shot shows Byrom Street just past the Crown when the area was a busy shopping and residential part of town.
1. The Manchester Village: Deansgate Remembered, Frank Heaton/Neil Richardson (1995).
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