UP THE SHANKILL
ON A RECENT trip to St George’s
Market I picked up a nice second-hand edition of Up the Shankill by Paul
Hamilton. There are some fascinating stories about the
area and a lot of old photographs. It
looks at the world of work, the Orange Shankill, Shankill shops and trades,
local pubs and churches, sport and recreation and the hard life of children and
women in the early days of the twentieth century. This book was published in 1979 so even the
‘present day’ photos show amazing changes in the Road over the past twenty-five
years. Who now remembers the Golden
Crust bakery shop beside the Chambers newsagency?
In the 1960s and the early seventies, I used to visit the Shankill Road every
Saturday in the company of my mother. In
fact, I was about twelve before I realised that there were other parts of Belfast. We caught the blue bus in Rathcoole and
travelled into Smithfield
bus station where we would go out into Winetavern Street and turn left up North Street, along
Peter’s Hill and on up to the Shankill
Road itself.
The first landmark I recall was the Peter’s Hill Public Baths at the
corner of Peter’s Hill and the Old
Lodge Road. This had a long green railing which
ran down to a small café booth at the point of the two roads. I believe that it was run by the Irish
Temperance League. There are two photos
of this long-gone institution. One shows a pipe band leading an Orange procession past the baths. This must have been taken around fifty years
or so ago. It certainly must be at least
forty years since a pipe band took part in an Orange
parade on the Shankill. Does anyone know
differently?
Unlike today’s wasteland, the road from Peter’s Hill to the Agnes Street corner
was lined with shops and pubs. At that
time I rarely went above Agnes
Street. There
was a big Ulster Bank branch on the corner where the Women’s Centre stands
today. The Co-op had a small supermarket
just a few doors along Agnes
Street.
Coca-Cola had a bottling plant in Rumford Street.
Talking about the Shankill, I have been asked by Linda L, who currently
lives in Renfrewshire, about a primary school in the Hammer area. Linda remembers attending a little school in
the mid-fifties, but she doesn’t remember its name. Apparently it stood somewhere in a wee side
street between Downing Street and Agnes Street. Can anyone out there remember anything about
this school? If so, drop us a line at kerrscorner@ulsteronline.org.uk
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