The Rocket

Here is another photo of the shops at the Rocket, Liverpool, that I have mentioned in a few previous posts. It was taken in the late 1960s.

The Rocket

 

This was the Rocket, Liverpool, in the 1960s / early 1970s before the arrival of the M62 motorway and all its flyovers. In the 1950s the four shops in the first picture were Howcrofts (newsagents / tobacconists); a greengrocers; a ? ; and a chemist which had big old blue bottles on high shelves. Around the corner from the newsagents was a tiny dress material shop. In the photo they are a newsagents (still); launderette; butchers; and dress shop.


Opposite the newsagent – to the left – there were no shops in the 1950s but by the 1960s there were two. One of them kept changing use and owners; the other, unfortunately, didn’t – it was owned by a grocer called Mrs Gibbons who sold overpriced goods and glared at you in the process. Those two shops can be seen in the background of this picture of the old Rocket Pub after it had been ‘done up’. Between us and those shops is a roundabout, one of many traffic control measures tried throughout my lifetime in an attempt to get vehicles going on the outer ring road, Queens Drive, across the traffic going into Liverpool city centre from the Huyton / Warrington / Manchester direction. The two bus stops served the 61/68 (going to Aigburth) and the 81 (going to Speke).


Just to the right of this picture there was another block of shops but I don’t have a photo. It contained, inter alia, the bakery (“Up the steps”); newsagents; and a hardware store (Bithells?).


These shops – opposite the last mentioned block – contained, in the 1950s Murphy’s – a hardware store; the Post Office; a chip shop (later replaced by Reece’s the bakers); Green’s the newsagents; and Irwins the grocers (later replaced by Waterworths, the greengrocers, who moved from the other block); the bank; and a little butchers. Tescos arrived in the 1960s and left shortly afterwards, being replaced by a golf shop.


Sorting through my post cards I came across this unnamed one which I only just recognised as the Rocket. There is a narrow bridge in the foreground under which the railway line would have run. By my youth this had been widened to carry a two lane Queens Drive. Nowadays there is four lane flyover and two two lane slip roads on the site! In the distance on the postcard is a big Victorian house which by the 1950s had been knocked down – as had half the big blocky building next to it – to create the Rocket Motors garage.