QUALITY STREET

Our illustrated story earlier this week about the Country Lines premises being put up for sale may have rekindled memories of Bridge Street for older Brigg residents.
Some 30-40 years ago, Bridge Street was quite different to what we now see.
Family firms like Barnard's, Sherwood's and Dunham's were there back then, but this street has seen more changes than most in our town.
First and foremost, of course, the A18 used to take thousands of heavy lorries over the County Bridge and right down the full length of Bridge Street, shaking the buildings, prior to the inner-relief road being built.
What's now the Country Lines shop, on the corner of Kiln Lane, was home to Peter East's motorcycle shop, where so many of us took our Triumph, Norton and BSA machines for their annual MoTs.
Ike Tutty's hairdressers (pictured top left) was next to Sherwood's cycle/toy shop and offered competition to Harry Wescott's, in Wrawby Street. Ike always finished a boy's hair by offering to apply scented spray or a dab of Brylcreem. It was not the done thing to refuse!
Men would often pop their heads round the door to request 'Something for the weekend', as barber's like Ike did their bit to keep the Brigg population in check - a little after the post-war Baby Boom - by supplying packs of Durex condoms.
You could pop in to see Topliss, the jeweller, who had a clock hanging outside his premises.
There was Miss White's tiny sweet shop and Harold Green's model shop, whose owners were both quite elderly during the Swinging Sixties; plus the unusual Gwen's Bargain Shop.
Further down the road - opposite the Brocklesby Ox - was Button's general store, which got a lot of trade from the caravan site behind the pub (frequented by gypies/travellers), and also handled parcels for Lincolnshire Road Car, whose green buses stopped right outside the front door.
Syd Whelpton then had a car showroom (pictured top right) on the corner of Forester Street and Bridge Street, while those in need of a quick snack, or a cuppa, could pop in to the street's own cafe, which we mentioned recently while talking about town character Tansy.
A prominent Brigg councillor does not like to hear him described as a tramp, by the way, so we'll stick with Tansy. If you are over 50, and a long-serving Brigg resident, you will know who we mean, just from the name!
The White Hart pub was rescued from a derelict state by Ray Neall - still living in Brigg today - who transformed it in the late 1970s/early 1980s into a popular hostelry.
Similarly, a few years ago, Bridge's Street's quaint Yarborough Hunt ale house, which closed in 1967, was put back pretty much as it was, and now has the Tom Wood sign handing outside.
There was a brewery in this area of Brigg until the late '60s, brewing Sargents locally famous ale, so Bridge Street and refreshment go hand in hand.
At the far end of the street, adjoining the County Bridge, was the Nelthorpe Arms, run by the legendary Myles Scanlon, who never sought to change its charming interior, or imposing Georgian exterior, very much after he took charge in the '60s.
Manley Gardens, leading off Bridge Street, housed Stennett's Thursday produce market for many years, after which it was moved on to the old stockmarket (Cary Lane/Barnard Avenue) and then Station Road.
One of our jobs for editorial staff on the old Lincolnshire Times weekly newspaper, about 2pm each Thursday, was to leave our Wrawby Street base, walk through the Market Place and down Bridge Street and Manley Gardens to visit a rather smelly and poorly-lit wooden shed at Stennett's.
People would be visiting the windows to settle up for what they'd bought, but eventually the head clerk would reach for a stencilled sheet, lick his stub of a pencil, and write in that day's prices paid for things like boiling fowls, pigeons, dressed roasters and eggs.
This news was then telephoned over to a copy-taker at the Hull Daily Mail, where the Times was printed on Thursday afternoon, and usually became the very last story to go into the paper before the presses rolled.
There was much interest one particular Thursday when a trainee came back to the office with the price paid for a single ferret which had been added to the usual list of staple foodstuffs and livestock.
From then on, the Stennett's copy run became known, within the Lincs Times, as collecting The Ferret Prices!