"Beauty Lies in the Eye of the Beholder"

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Valerie though that I may have been a wee bit harsh in calling Birmingham an unattractive city. Of course this is not a fact, it is a personal opinion.

Birmingham does not attract me to it.

It may attract many people like shoppers, but I could never imagine it becoming a tourist attraction.

This is not to say that I have always felt this way. Birmingham has certainly served this country well. Many famous and important people have been born, lived and worked there. In Victorian days it was known as the ‘Workshop of the World’, with very many famous manufactures being based there.

To me as a child, going to ‘town’ was an exciting adventure.

With Dad away fighting the war, my mother and I lived at my grandparents in Linden Road. From here we would walk up to Cotteridge to catch the tram into town. Much to my grandmothers despair, I always wanted to go upstairs on the tram and sit at the front. As going out was a treat, I usually got my way. Cotteridge was the terminus for the trams, right on the outskirts of Birmingham, right alongside the Warwickshire countryside. The ride into ’town’ probably took a good half hour.

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The one place in Birmingham I remember most was the old Market Hall and Bull Ring. Here is an old picture of the Bull Ring and on the left is the Market Hall complete with its roof. The hall is the one on the left with the large columns.

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The roof was later to be blown off thanks to one of the Luftwaffe's bombs. Now one of these bombs, unexploded of course, had been placed at the top of the Market Hall steps, just outside the entrance. A slit had been cut in the top and the bomb was used to collect money for, I assume, the War effort.

Well it was a big bomb, must have been 18” in diameter, and as a little boy I remember being lifted up to sit astride it and drop a penny into the slot.

Even though it had no roof, the old hall continued to house market stalls and in those days they were of an amazing variety. Apart from the usual traders there was a pet shop selling cats, dogs, rabbits and white mice. There was a music stall where my Mother would have bought her music (she was a violinist - but that is another tale for later).

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At the east end was another set of steps down with brass banisters running down to the Bull Ring. Again I was picked up and slid down the rail with Mom holding on!

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The 'Bull Ring' as I remember it.

The open Bull Ring market was mainly fruit and veg but I do remember a stall selling live baby chicks. After the war, with all the food shortages, many people kept chickens or rabbits in the back gardens. The chicks were put into little cardboard boxes with tiny holes in the sides ready for the homeward ride to Cotteridge on the tram.

Around 1962 the old hall was demolished and a new ‘Bull Ring Centre’ was built. For some reason it was known as ’The Big Top’.

I managed to get a few photos on my old box camera before is disappeared for ever.

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Not really attractive any more.

But just think of the memories it held of my younger days.

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The ’New’ Bull Ring centre was again demolished to make way for the present Centre, which I have to admit I have yet to see. Cherry Pie tells me it is 'attractive' now.