Bread in a wrapper

Here we have the M&SE promoting their bread. I like the use of the word propaganda. This is 1929 and before the word became tainted by political and military conflicts of the dictatorships of Europe. But a cart clopping down the street with a pretend extra large loaf is hardly the dark forces of propaganda.

The term wrapped bread is stressed to promote the hygienic production and handling. This was a fairly new way of retailing by putting loaves in grease proof paper. The days of the unwrapped bread would be seen as old fashioned. Though people apparently survived for centuries and centuries by buying loaves not in paper.

However there was a further development just on the horizon. Sliced bread! Invented in the USA and the date usually quoted is 1928. The slicing machines had been developed a lot earlier it was holding the slices together in suitable packaging that was needed.

One of the pioneers in marketing sliced bread in Britain was R.Sharrock & Sons here in Manchester. They had bakeries, or scientific plants as they called them, in Chorlton-on-Medlock and they introduced the "Tip Top" loaf. You got 22 even slices in a 2lb  loaf.  Their display adverts gave instructions. "The Tip Top wrapper opens at the end, the loaf is boxed in a tray, which has been hygienically treated. The tray slides out and you simply take the number of slices required - push the tray back and tuck in the ends." All this for 4½d. The rest you know....it's the best thing since sliced bread.

Credits : M&SE Herald 1929. Display advert Manchester Guardian 29th April 1930

Arbitrators 1859

When the Manchester & Salford Equitable Co-Operative was founded in 1859 they appointed a body of men called arbitrators. Don't know if they ever did any arbitration. But they were invited to the members' meetings and would have lent patronage to a newly founded commercial venture. Interesting five names from radical, non-conformist chapels all well known to the members of the Manchester and Salford co-operators. We are reading articulate middle class, mostly teetotal and vegetarians. They have an interest in democratic reform, free libraries and improvements for the working classes. Then there is Abel Heywood who was buried in the grounds of his home and has his statue in Albert Square.....

Samuel Pope, barrister, aged 33. Secretary of the UK Alliance for the Suppression of the Traffic in all Intoxicating Liquors. This was a prohibitionist organisation and he stood on this ticket for Stoke 1857 and as Liberal in Bolton in 1859. Didn't win but was re-elected Councillor for Seedley Ward, Salford in November 1859. Henry Dow, one of the instigators of the "Maine Law" which made that state dry (alcohol banned) visited England in April 1857. He greeted him on arrival in Liverpool.

Rev. Thomas Gardner Lee, pastor, aged 59. His church was the New Windsor Chapel (Congregationalist), Cross Lane, Salford. He'd been preaching there since 1843. Responsible for publishing the second edition of Henry 'Box' Brown's Narrative in 1851  It describes Mr. Brown's escape from slavery to Philadelphia in 1849 by being posted in a wooden crate. Supporter of the Union & Emancipation Society in Manchester, the anti-slavery campaign which had two local co-operators J.C.Edwards and Edward Owen Greening as Secretaries.

William Harvey, Mayor of Salford, aged 70. President of the Vegetarian Society, it started in Salford. Active in the Bible Christian Church, Salford. Founder member of UK Alliance for the Suppression of the Traffic in all Intoxicating Liquors, the first meeting was at his house in Acton Square, Salford. Vice President  of the Anti-Tobacco Society. Campaigner for Parliamentary Reform.





Abel Heywood, publisher, bookseller and Mayor of Manchester. Aged 49, and best described as Mr. Manchester of the 19th Century. We know of his radical politics, a former Chartist and three convictions for defying the tax on knowledge - selling newspapers without stamp duty. More to come on Alderman Heywood and his support for co-operatives and connections with the M&SE Co-Op.

James Gaskill, aged 58, Bible Christian minister chapel at Queen Street, Hulme. Lived at 340 Stretford New Road. His occupation is listed as a Cotton Spinner, possibly a spinning business, but when elected to the Chorlton Board of Guardians he is described as a schoolmaster. Well he did this later with educational institutes set up by the Bible Christian Church. A director of the Manchester Mechanics' Institute. Also a teetotaler and vegetarian. Years earlier he presented a silver star and chain to Henry Anderton the teetotal poet in a ceremony in Manchester.

Thanks to Andrew Simpson at Chorltonhistory for help with this research. References to "A Guiltless Feast" by Derek Antrobus 1997 which is a good account of the Salford Bible Christian Church and the rise of the modern vegetarian movement.

Smile Tour 2012

Managed to get to the Museum of Science and Industry, or MOSI as it re-branded itself, to see the visit of the Co-operative Camper Van to Manchester. It's all this International Year of Co-Operation promotion. It is a genuine old fully restored VW Camper fitted out with seats and a table at the back. I was expecting it to be in red livery but there you go.

One for the scrapbook then.
Smiletour

Cost of Living

The free newspaper South Manchester Reporter drops through the door everyweek. There is a bit of news squeezed into it between the advertisements, and then you get more glossy colour leaflets with it too. No wonder people are conditioned to buy food on price alone instead of value and quality.
Notice the current style of pricing at a pound. Not like the old days of 2p or 3p off.

Earlier post : Cost of Living 1948

Shutters are down

If you've lived long enough you can remember when shops didn't have steel shutters lowered over the windows at the end of the trading day. Come on, it wasn't that long ago. But in urban areas from the high street to the little parade of outlets it is now the norm. Sometimes you walk through a street of shops and you don't know if they have gone out of business or are simply not open that day.

Hardy Lane co-op store shewn here in the livery of the United Co-Operative Society before the refurbishment in 2009, but after the merger with The Co-Operative Group in 2007.

Early Mergers

I've touched on mergers of Co-operative Societies in earlier posts. The trend has always been one of reluctance to give up independence. Too few and too late and conceding when trading conditions forced such moves.

The Manchester & Salford Equitable made its first amalgamation in its first year of trading in 1859 when the newly formed Openshaw Industrial joined the Society. It was another 41 years before the next takeover when the small and struggling Didsbury & Barlow Moor Industrial Co-op was taken over in 1901. Full story to follow soon. The Hulme Pioneers another one store co-op joined in 1906. But there had been in merger talks in 1860 and 1871 which came to nothing.

When the Pendleton Co-Op Society merged into the M&SE in 1963 it was the start of the snowball, albeit a very slow rolling snowball to create one organisation for Manchester and Salford. It was hailed at the time as the way forward for the co-operative movement. Now the M&SE was actually in both cities - previously it had only a couple of shops west of the River Irwell.

But it wasn't for the lack of attempts to end overlapping and competition between societies. The issue that surfaced many times over the decades. Here is a list, not comprehensive of attempted mergers to create a Manchester co-op society on the lines of London and Birmingham (neither of which covered all those big conurbations).

1922 M&SE and Droylsden plan a merger but fails to obtain the three quarters majority vote at members' meetings.

1938 M&SE, Beswick, Blackley, Denton, Droylsden, Eccles, Failsworth, Pendleton, Prestwich, and Stockport in discussion. No result.

1956 M&SE, Beswick, Blackley have a plan to create a Manchester & Suburban Co-Op Society. Well that didn't happen.

1958 M&SE and Blackley plan to merge. Members vote against.

1959 M&SE, Beswick, Blackley, Droylsden, Failsworth, Pendleton, Prestwich in talks for another attempt at creating one Society for Manchester.

Now we're talking about one city in England, but it does reflect an urban mentality of tribalism. You are local, stay local and will visit other towns far away on holiday. Yet you rarely go to a district a few miles away unless it is for work or family. There is no bigger picture when it comes to local independence.

Cost of Living

Cutting the cost of living a phrase that echoes through the years. If you live on a slim budget it matters. The photograph has all the elements to get that message across. The zig-zaggy graph showing prices rising or falling. The lovely wicker basket of provisions. No plastic bags back in 1948. The young child who must be nurtured with the smartly dressed young mother who has made the right choice by shopping at the Co-Op. Well you can spot the "Join Your M&S Branch" on the mat. A window display of a pyramid of cans. When did you last see that?

But Britain has an obsession with cheap food even when people spend less of their total income on these essentials.

“There is hardly anything in the world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little cheaper, and the people who consider price only are this man's lawful prey." quoting John Ruskin. Ruskin besides being a fascinating intellectual chap was a supporter of co-operatives. Well he did send best wishes to the first of the modern Co-Operative Congresses in 1869...

Guesting Guild Post

Done a spot of guest blogging over at Chorltonhistory. It's a story about the Chorlton & Manley Park Womens' Guild with a three tier cake celebrating their 25 year birthday.

It's an attempt to bring local co-operative stories to  a wider and different audience. Also still on the hunt for a picture of the Co-Op stores on Beech Road (1915-1967) where the above event took place. There is the link if you wish to read and see the 1947 photo...here