In the 1930s International Stores laid claim to being ‘The Greatest Grocer in the World’ and its signage was a familiar sight on British high streets. It had a presence in Ventnor for almost one hundred years, opening first at 58 High Street in 1889 (next to the Commercial Hotel) and closing in 1986, by… read more »
In 1911 a new ‘moving picture house’ The Electric Palace was opened in Ventnor High Street. Later renamed The Bijou it continued showing silent movies until 1930, despite a brand new cinema equipped with a sound system opening in 1924 in Grove Road, built by Tom Brading and named The Cinema. In 1930 Brading sold… read more »
Richard Leitch moved to Ventnor for his health in 1889, arriving with a wife and young family at a property on the corner of Albert Street and Market Street, where he set up as a boot and shoe repairer, remaining in business for the rest of his working life. He was one of several tradesmen,… read more »
Edmund Newberry ran a grocer business for 34 years at premises located at the junction of Newport and Gills Cliff Roads in Upper Ventnor, having taken over the shop from Henry Burnett in 1923. Everyone had come to know the location it as ‘Newberry’s Corner’ and even when the shop was finally closed by the… read more »
Brenda Creese is well-known to older Ventnor residents as someone who gave extraordinarily wide vocational service to her community, a contribution that was honoured in 1993 when Ventnor Rotary Club presented her with a citation certificate and cheque. Over the years, she helped countless local causes, including St. Alban’s Church, the Mission for Deep Sea… read more »
One of several impressive graves in Ventnor cemetery is the one dedicated to Laura Richards, wife of John Morgan Richards, the owner of Steephill Castle from 1903 to 1918. John Morgan Richards was an American businessman who made his fortune from the promotion of patent medicines (the most well-known being ‘Carters Little Liver Pills’). He was… read more »
Many people will be familiar with Villa Amanti on Ventnor Esplanade, dating from 1843, and now wonderfully restored. But what many will not know is that, in the late 1970s, it became the location of the first commercial sauna complex in Ventnor. Finnish sauna baths and solariums had been installed there, the idea of Brenda… read more »
By the early 1960s, Ventnor Station was rather ‘down at heel’. The ‘Southern Railway’ signage, a relic of railway ownership before ‘British Railways’ took over in 1948, had not been replaced, perhaps an ominous portent. The solution offered to the problems of the ailing rail network was drastic pruning under the ‘Beeching Plan’, including all… read more »
Wollescote occupied a very large land plot on the north side of Spring Hill and was built sometime in the 1860s for a Mr. Thomas Pargeter who came to Ventnor for his health. He figures in the 1871 Census, along with his unmarried 34-year-old sister, Caroline, the house then described as Wollescote Villa. They employed… read more »
At the end of the Second World War, Lowtherville (or Upper Ventnor as it is known today) was less than half the size it is now with just a few roads. There wasn’t a lot for children to do, with very little in the way of entertainment. In 1946 an organisation called ‘The Upper Ventnor Childrens Fund’… read more »