Red Lion, Rochdale Road

Red Lion, Rochdale Road, Blackley, 1993. (c) Alan Winfield with permission.

The Red Lion opened in 1858 as a fully-licensed pub on the new Rochdale Road which bypassed Middleton Old Road through Blackley.  Stopford's Brewery took over the Red Lion in the early 1870s, before it passed the Palatine Bottling Company, Walker & Homfray then onto Wilsons Brewery, as pictured below in 1952 and here in 1958.  These two photos from 1968 show the Red Lion and next door, now clearly part of the pub, and not much had changed by 1971 and 1972.

Red Lion, Rochdale Road, 1952. (c) Roger Hall [1].

In the 1980s the Red Lion was still described as a 1960s-style pub that had recently undergone modernisation and was particularly popular with younger drinkers [1].  Since closure - I guess in the mid-2000s - the Red Lion has been converted to private dwellings, and it's hard to tell that the buildings were ever a pub at all.

Former Red Lion, Rochdale Road. (c) Google 2014. View Larger Map.

 

1. The Pubs of Blackley, Roger Hall (1980).