Tom Harry Loosemore was born in Newport and his wife, Alice, in Ryde, so both were Islanders. He entered the grocery business in Ventnor at Parker’s corner by taking over the store run there by Mr. Amis. By the late 1880s, though, he had relocated to the opposite side of the junction of Madeira and… read more »
Thomas Brading came to Ventnor from Newport about 1881, initially as an apprentice to the firm of Messrs Silsbury and Kingswell, based on Grove Road. By the 1901 Census, Thomas is given as aged 35, with a wife Emily, aged 38, along with seven children, ranging in ages from twelve to one. He is described… read more »
Albert Bull died at the age of 67, a prominent local figure with a lively interest in local affairs, becoming Chairman of the Ventnor District Council. He had been born in 1845, the son of William and Peggy Bull who lived at Rock Cottage on Belgrave Road. He started his working career assisting in his father’s business… read more »
Margaret Dick lived at Madeira Hall where she was attended upon, probably up to her death in March 1879, by Dr. James Mann Williamson who was a doctor who had come to the Royal National Hospital in 1868 and later set up practice in Ventnor in 1876. He prescribed various medication for her, whilst also… read more »
At one time, Prospect House (near the bottom of the south side of Grove Road), provided regular rooms for the YWCA, the Young Women’s Christian Association. It appears, ostensibly, to have been a boarding house, but its specific use may also have included being a hostel and club for working women. In the Ventnor Red… read more »
It Used To Be Like This is a classic memoir of life in Niton Undercliff in the early 1900s, written by George Roland Haynes (1906-1984). In his words: Already the lifestyle of my childhood is beyond the grasp of the young people of today . . . so I have written all that I thought should be… read more »
Charles Hibberd’s mineral water business was started at the rear of the butcher’s shop of his uncle, Moses Hibberd, 86 High Street, in the early 1860s. On the double doors to the side archway, the signage read ‘C. Hibberd’s Soda Water, Ginger Beer and Lemonade Manufactory’. The mineral water business thrived and manufacture was soon… read more »
Ventnor and District Local History Society 2022 Annual General Meeting The 2022 Annual General Meeting of the Society will be held on Monday 4 April 2022 from 7:30 to 9:00 pm in the Masonic Hall on Grove Road, Ventnor. The meeting will be followed by a short slide show about the history of the Cascade… read more »
Over the last 170 years there have been various different businesses located at 86 High Street in Ventnor. By the early 1900s the premises had become Joe Newnham’s Dairy. Joe first worked in Ventnor as a wine merchant’s cellarman, but later went into business as a dairyman. He seems to have set up at 86… read more »
Over the last 170 years there have been various different businesses located at 86 High Street in Ventnor. Around the 1890s, Robert Tolman, a native of Seaton in South Devon who had originally come to Ventnor in 1866 from Bristol, established a confectionery, bakery and dining business there. Later he had a shop at 105… read more »