LIVERPOOL COWKEEPERS

[MaryA]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/mar/26/george-scharf-london-john-soane

I've been told that this scene would be typical, with cows in the back and a counter to sell the milk at the front.

[rattler]

I lived off Lower Breck Road in 40s and 50s and I remember a small dairy called Metcalfs at the bottom of Grange Street.  They had a cow in the yard at the back.  I am glad I spotted this post, as no one else in the family remember it and reckon I was making it up.  Anne

[hiraeth]

Hello

Thanks for the interesting replies. I am beginning to picture Liverpool as a very messy and smelly place with all those cows in the streets. I would love to see some photographs if anyone has any. I haven't been able to find any on the old photo sites.

Michael

Hi Michael

I have a Francis Roberts who is listed as a cowkeeper on 4-8 Garmoyle Road, Toxteth in 1891.   I recently looked on Google Street view to see if I could find a picture of the house.  It looks like the "barn" is still there.  amazing!
Its right at the North West end of Garmoyle Road if you want to check it out.

Heather

[MaryA]

Immigrant Welsh builders constructed the terraced houses around County Road and Walton Lane during the last years of the 19th century. The Welsh brothers who financed and built them named the streets by using the initial letter of each spelling out their own names.

Owen and William Owen Elias are revealed, also I believe one of their sons was also added - Alfred

Oxton, Winslow, Eton, Neston, Andrew, Nimrod, Dane, Wilburn, Ismay, Lind, Lowel, Index, Arnot, Makin, Olney, Weldon, Euston, Nixon, Liston, Imrie, Aston Streets and Stuart Road. (I may have missed a few out there)

When these were built apparently provision was made for a Cowkeeper in each of these streets.

[jan44]

 

Interesting thread.

I took this photo in Keble Road Bootle about 5 years ago, the building (painted Green) with the big gates is on the 1891, 1901 census and later directories, the name on the 1901 census who occupied the building was Thomas Hindle - Cowkeeper, you can see the old cow shed in the background just peeping over the gates, it was in a bad way back then, but has since been fixed, the house is now 3 flats, but this is just an example of what other premises that cowkeepers had.



Jan

[MaryA]

Hi Jan, I thought mention of the Welsh builders would attract you    This was mentioned in the talk given at the Liverpool FHS this week, about T J Hughes, but the story started further back with his mother Ann, who began trading in Old Hall Street.  When the houses were built in Walton, together with the shops, she was first to grab one of the most prominent, now where Ethel Austin's is on County Road.

Good pic of Keble Road.

Mary

[jan44]

 

Hi Mary,

Thanks for the comment on the pic, the house painted red next door is my old place, the old cow shed was part of my back yard wall!  All the houses on that side of Keble besides the old cowkeepers place and another house the other end, are all boarded up and waiting for demolition now, such a shame, a lot of history being lost and destroyed.

Jan

[tillyminto]

My Grandfather Thomas Mawer was a cowkeeper at 3 Dalton Street, near to where the Royal Liverpool Hospital is now. 

His family originally came from Lancashire/Yorkshire border area, apparently there were quite a lot of them in Liverpool, West Derby area.

[skyblueFF]

A big thank you to all who have responded to my post, It's all helping to build up a picture.

Michael