CHARRINGTON BREWERY MILE END ROAD

Thanks to the eagle eye of a Mr Robert Humphreys, a large collection of pub & brewery breweriana photographic memorabilia, would have been lost forever.

Mr Humphreys worked for Charringtons for over 20 years, as an area manager, came across a skip, where he amazingly found an irreplaceable collection of photos, that archived the pubs, that were once run by Charrington Brewery. A collection of over 3,000 photos, that had been part of a survey, also showed pieces of interesting information, such as how much cask & bottled beer each pub bought, as well as sales of wines & spirits. The photos are now safely kept at the National Brewery Centre in Burton-Upon-Trent. The centre was once the former Bass Museum. This is significant, as Charrington Brewery, was once affiliated to the Bass family, forming a partnership with Bass, when in 1967, funnily the year I was born, to form Bass Charrington Limited.

The photographs, are a priceless recollection of a time, when one of Londons historic breweries, recorded the assets they had acquired over a couple of centuries, through their business acumen, showing either the Charrington name, or that of Hoare & Co, a brewery that Charringtons had bought out in 1933. It is also incredible, especially today, to try & track down some of the pubs, that were amongst those found in the collection, saved from the skip. Unknown to me, before I came across a book, that was published in connection with the collection, I had actually been in some of those pub, photographing them, not realising their historic significance. Some have been acquired, by breweries such as the likes of Sam Smiths & Fullers to help keep them alive still going strong. Even the re-launched Trumans, has an old Charrington pub as its tap room boozer the Newman Arms

The book in question, was one thought of by a group of people known as historypin. The book is called London Local Pubs Past & Present, it has in depth articles on some of the pubs, as well as photographs showing how the pubs looked like in the past next to more recent shots of how they look in more recent times. The historypin website, has the photos displayed on their website this is the link to the page https://www.historypin.org/en/a-history-of-pubs/hoare-co/geo/51.507589,-0.129375,10/bounds/51.238836,-0.433666,51.774766,0.174916/paging/1 

The book was written by Adrian Tierney-Jones, a journalist who specialises in beer, food, pubs, & travel. The books helps give you an insight into how pubs, have meant so much to British society. It tells of one of the pubs, where a famous 1970's rock band Led Zeppelin, made it their base to enjoy a relaxing couple of pints after a long days recording in a recording studio close by. Another story is of going to the bar to get your head shaved, people would be sat at the bar enjoying a pint & a packet of crisps watching another punter getting their hair cut due to the pubs connection to a power supply. I throughly recommend this book it probably has a pub that you have been enjoying a pint in all your life not realising it's past history.

I find this kind of connection blows my mind away, I just love how the pubs looked back when the photos were originally taken. I may be wrong, but it seems the photos are in the correct hands, & if you feel inclined, you can actually buy copies of the photos on the National Brewery Centres website. I might be tempted to purchase a couple.

Being fortunate to have visited the National Brewery Centre in Burton-Upon-Trent, if you haven't been I would throughly recommend a visit. The town has a wonderful history, especially associated to the process of producing high quality beer throughout the centuries, due to its finest quality water.