[johnnypd]

here's a bit of a puzzle that i myself dont know the answer to - does anyone know where the location of our 'gropecunt lane' was? it was apparently the longest surviving example of many such streets in england, recorded up until 1588, long after other towns had renamed theirs to avoid offence. Political Correctness gone mad?

 

[WilfBurnsFan]

here's a bit of a puzzle that i myself dont know the answer to - does anyone know where the location of our 'gropecunt lane' was? it was apparently the longest surviving example of many such streets in england, recorded up until 1588, long after other towns had renamed theirs to avoid offence. Political Correctness gone mad?

I don't know the answer to that, but one of the (numerous) explanations of the name origin of Fenkle Street was that 'fenkling' was (ahem) intimate contact and that Fenkle Street was therefore, by implication, the prostitutes' quarter.

And there's also Vine Lane - possibly a mutation of Grape Lane, which was the sanitised version in some towns of Johnny's lane.

 

[Newcastle Historian]

here's a bit of a puzzle that i myself dont know the answer to - does anyone know where the location of our 'gropecunt lane' was? it was apparently the longest surviving example of many such streets in england, recorded up until 1588, long after other towns had renamed theirs to avoid offence. Political Correctness gone mad?

I have been able to confirm the '1588' date (online) but that is all. I cannot find a location mentioned.

The two oldest books that I have are Charleton's Newcastle Town (1885) and Henry Bourne's 'History of Newcastle upon Tyne' (1736) . . I am afraid I have nothing prior to then, so I don't think I'll be able to help!

The Henry Bourne book (if ever you get chance to read it, do so) is an excellent (if difficult to follow at times) source of almost 'contemporaneous' information on such things as derivation of street names (see the below example, which is the start of a chapter on Pilgrim Street) but sadly the book was written 148 years too late for Gropecunt Lane!

 

[Godscrasher]

Interesting facts about Newcastle

.
This thread developes into a full-time "QUESTIONS" thread later, but at this point here it contains a lot of FACTS (the thread title was originally "Interesting Facts") about Newcastle and the North east . . .




Please feel free to add to this or make corrections.


Bainbridges was the first department store in the world

The High Level bridge was the first road and rail bridge in the world

Mosley Street was the first street in the world to be illuminated by elctric lights

The Millenium Bridge was the first tilting bridge of it's kind when it opened

Newcastle's Grey street was voted 'The U.K's best street' in 2002 beating London's Oxford street and regent street chosen by voters of Radio 4

St James' park is the biggest inner city stadium in the UK

St James' park has the largest cantilever roof in Europe

Jimi Hendrix was once a resident of Newcastle living in Heaton off Chillingham road.

The ship yards at Wallsend once made 25% of the world ships.

Stan Laurel lived in North Shields, North Tyneside, 10 Minutes from Newcastle and went to Kings School in Tynemouth.

Newcastle's bustling nightlife has given Newcastle the reputation of being the 8th best party city in the world.

In a poll of office workers and students it was voted the best city in England for work and study (i'm sure this was 2008)

The Silverlink has the UK's biggest business park

Newcastle has the most Georgian buildings anywhere in the country outside of bath and - *this needs correcting and updated as I have forgot the whole fact*

Lucozade was manufactured in Newcastle by a pharmacist in 1927

.

 

[Graham56]

Stan Laurel was born in Ulverston
Mosley Street was the first to be lit by electric lights

 

[Graham56]

Lucozade was first manufactured in Newcastle in 1927, if i remember right the factory was in Vicars Lane off Benton Park Road, now a small housing estate.

 

[AngerOfTheNorth]

The story I heard was that it was a Newcastle pharmacist who wanted to create a medicine to help his daughter get through a cold she was suffering. According to the story he originally called it Glucose-aid/Glucosaid/Glucosade (I'm not sure on the spelling obviously!)

 

[johnnypd]

fairy liquid was also created in newcastle, over 100 years ago.

and john james fenwick who established the dept store bearing his name, created the Trilby hat for a stage production of the play of that name.

and the first dog show ever held was in newcastle in 1859.

 

[Talisker]

I think the cooperative warehouse, which is now the malmaison, is either the oldest or first reinforced concrete building in the world.

 

[johnnypd]

it wasn't the first. the first was a building in paris that used steel and concrete together as an early attempt at using the material.

however william boutland wilkinson created what some see as the first reinforced concrete building in the world (using wire ropes to bind the concrete) on Ellison Place in Newcastle in the 1850s. it was the oldest reinforced concrete building still standing when the council decided to demolish it in the late 50s.

i imagine malmaison would be a very old example of the material, as is the forth banks depot.

 

[Geordie Ahmed]

It was voted Britain's friendliest city by the Readers Digest in 2005

 

[Geordie Ahmed]

The current Prime Minister of Thailand, Abhisit Vejjajiva, was born in Newcastle Upon Tyne

 

[Newcastle Historian]

MOVIE STAR CLARK GABLE LIVED HERE IN NEWCASTLE . . .

In the Kenton Bar area of Newcastle there is some very old grafitti which says "C G woz ere". "C G" stands for CLARK GABLE, the 1940s American film star, who (legend has it) lived here in Newcastle for a while!

No, there is no grafitti . .

But during the war (World War Two) Clark Gable was stationed in the underground complex at Kenton Bar. It is a very VERY large underground war-complex, and is full of the type of underground control room you see in old 'Kenneth More' type WW2 films, with girls moving 'P for Poppy' around on charts, etc.

I went down this tiny spiral staircase to get to it in the 1970s, when I worked at Kenton Bar and we were trying to get it re-opened as a 'Sports Club'.

In the 1970s the building with the spiral staircase in it was right in the middle of some 'Government Buildings' all built (exactly like some others at Broadway West and the big-un at Longbenton / The Ministry) as low-rise single-storey blocks, designed in "hospital ward style" to be used as that in emergencies like wars, etc.

Now (in 2010) this small building (just an 'entrance to the underground comples really) is the ONLY one remaining, as the Government Buildings have been demolished to make way for all the new houses on the Ponteland Road / Kenton Lane corner, near The Crofters Lodge pub.

As I say, it is now the only one left . . where (I kid you not!) CLARK GABLE was stationed underground, for a while during the war. It is now a bit 'overgrown' surrounded by all these new houses, but at least this little bit of Newcastle Wartime History (Newcastles WW2 underground control bunker) has, so far, been PRESERVED . . .

 

[WilfBurnsFan]

Gladstone Adams (1880-1966) of Whitley Bay, pioneering motorist and WWI aviator, invented the windscreen wiper (patented 1911); and with his brother invented the 'trafficator' (early type of vehicle indicator lamp) and the sliding seat used in racing rowing boats.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladstone_Adams

 

[johnnypd]

charlton heston 'lived' in newcastle for a bit too. rented a flat in jesmond over a summer while he did research into his family tree, tracing many of his roots back to northumberland, durham, tyneside. he also visited the city after that on plenty of times to visit people he knew.

 

[Graham56]

Butch Cassidy`s mother- Anne Sinclair Gillies was born in Brandling Village 1849.

 

[maxtoon]

How can we forget dart's legend 'Jockey Wilson' who used to live in Wallsend :cheers:

 

[hollow man]

Im sure the pedestrian tunnels wooden esculators were the longest in the world at somepoint.

 

[hollow man]

Facts about Newcastle Upon Tyne.

The Silverlink has the UK's biggest business park

Isnt that the Cobalt?

 

[Paul D]

Stan Laurel was born in Ulverston
Mosley Street was the first to be lit by electric lights

Ulverston is in the Lake District which is in the North West of England.Liverpool makes the claim that it has more Georgian buildings than Bath.