JUNCTION OF CHAPEL STREET & BRIDGE STREET

I can still remember the sign that used be there. "each for all and all for each"

I can remember going in with my mum and her divy book and buying the blue and white striped crockery. Is that the remains of the original building and if so what happened to the second storey and tower? or was it all demolished and rebuilt in a similiar style?

I can still remember my Nan's Divi number 60468, and my Mum's 98705.

I remember when it was Co-op shoe shop, my mum took me in there for my pair of 'super dukes wayfinders' the shoes had a compass inside the heel and animal paw prints for the tread, size 10. I slept with them on in bed that night and mum only gave me a 'medium' whack !

It was great to find the photo of the Co-op Department Store (third photo down) looking more or less exactly as it was when my Father, Arthur Longly, took over as manager back in about 1950. It was a most impressive building at the time although I'm not sure whether the small clock tower still remained in situ. In the winter the building was bitterly cold and there were various ramshackle arrangements made to try to keep it even vaguely tolerable for working in. The picture certainly brought back a flood or memories for me of the period when I was about 12 to 13 years old, travelling across to Newhaven to see my Father. He used to deal with the men's outfitting section in particular and always complained I was the 'wrong shape' whenever he had to measure me for new suit or school uniform. Considering how old fashioned the building was it is rather amazing that it still survives even though greatly changed and modernised.

As an apprentice at Bannisters Builders and working in the joinery shop on the top floor the Co-op clock was about the only way we had of telling the time, I seem to remember I spent a lot of time looking at it. I had to put the kettle on the gas ring at twenty to ten and twenty to one. At twenty past five I had to chop a bundle of kindling for the shop foreman Ernie Lipscombe, they had to be 9 inches long and the bundle had to be the right size to fit into his grub bag.

The Co-op was a place of wonder to a young child with it's different departments and it's ceiling mounted railway like cash and change system. I remember getting Tuf shoes from there in the late 60's. Our divi number was 80139. Strange how these things stick in your mind.

I remember going to the back where the shoe department was, for new school shoes. There was an X-ray machine in there where you put your foot in the slot and the assistant pressed a switch and she could see the bones in your foot against the outline of your shoe to see if they were a good fit. I later found out that these machines were suddenly withdrawn when they found that the assistants were getting a massive cumulative dose of X-rays.