Leicester

[Undertoad]

"The Loaded Dog" Please tell me that's a pub.

[DanaC]

My local pub is called "The Shouder of Mutton".

[Trilby]

Why don't we have cool pub names like this? My local bar is called Harrigan's (always some bloody Irish name and you know damn well the owners are Italian or Norwegian or similar) and nearest tavern is called Norton's. Sigh.

I'd love to live in a town that had street names like Gallowtree Gate...but NOOOOOOOoooooooooo. Such is the disadvantage of living in a new country. We've no history to draw upon. No castles, no fairy hills, no 14th Century haunted graveyards. No catacombs lined with the bones of heretics. It's enough to depress a person.

[DanaC]

No castles, no fairy hills, no 14th Century haunted graveyards. No catacombs lined with the bones of heretics. It's enough to depress a person

That really made me chuckle :P especially the catacombs lined with the bones of heretics hehe.

Talking of cool street names:

In Halifax there is a street called Gibbet Street, it's where the Gibbet used to be. Cutting across Gibbet Street.... is Hope Lane.

The Halifax Gibbet is the reason for this medieval proverb: "From Hell, Hull and Halifax, God preserve us."

[Trilby]

Darling Dana--what the hell is a Gibbet?

[DanaC]

*grins*
Halifax Gibbet
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Halifax Gibbet in the town of Halifax, West Yorkshire, was an early guillotine. The town had held the right to execute criminals since 1280. Although there is early reference to a gibbet, there is no evidence about the method of execution until the sixteenth century, when the town acquired a fixed machine which cut the head off the condemned criminal. Local law required that “If a felon be taken within the liberty of Halifax...either hand-habend (caught with the stolen goods in his hand or in the act of stealing), back-berand (caught carrying stolen goods on his back), or confess and (having confessed to the crime), to the value of thirteen pence half-penny, he shall after three markets...be taken to the Gibbet and there have his head cut off from his body”.

It was believed that the law against theft was much more strictly enforced to protect the cloth industry, which had grown very important.

The reputation of Halifax for strict law enforcement was noted by Daniel Defoe, who gave a detailed description in his Travels, the antiquary William Camden and by the "Water Poet" John Taylor, who penned the Beggar's Litany From Hell, Hull and Halifax, Good Lord deliver us. The reputation seems to have been greater than the facts, as between 1541 and 1650, the official records show that only 53 men and women were executed by the Halifax Gibbet. The Gibbet was taken down in 1650, perhaps in response to the execution of Charles I, but a replica was erected in 1974.

[Trilby]

Awesome!

You know, I guess Gettysburg (In Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia) is a pretty haunted place. Lots of civil war soldiers lost their lives there. Supposed to b suffused with the restless energy of them.

[DanaC]

If anywhere is going to be haunted (and I have severe misgivings about that as a possibility:P) one would assume Gettysburg to be regular Central Station of restless spirits.

[DanaC]

Sorry for the detour SG, I'll get out the way of the bus after this :P

Bri, check out this link. If you really want beautiful and haunted historical locations, Kirkstall Abbey is hard to resist.

http://www.kirkstall.org.uk/abbey/

[Sundae]

I have replaced the old video with a newer (shorter) one from today, where I got pole position. Well, the front seat on the top deck anyway.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBozp_oFjp0

The driver sits downstairs on all buses - so it would just have been a passenger in the other video. I understand that some London Double Deckers have been replaced by articulated buses (much to car drivers' disgust) but the double decker is alive & well in Leicester. What has been phased out totally are the old Routemaster buses, which you accessed via a platform at the back of the bus and bought your ticket from a conducter. Having spent a large part of my childhood in London I mourned their passing - I remember more than one occasion where it felt as if I'd taken off as a parent or Grandparent dragged me by the hand onto a moving bus. Knowing my family it probably wasn't moving very far or very fast, but you don't know that as a 6 year old. It did mean you could get off where & when you fancied though - often a boon in heavy traffic.

The Loaded Dog is indeed a pub. Not a traditional one sadly, a made up name for a student pub. But that's the one I've mentioned before, that does a curry, chips and a pint of beer for £2.95 (less than a McDonalds meal) so I forgive it.

My favourite traditionally named pub was in Oxford - the Eagle & Child. No idea how the name came about. Very few pubs are known by their full names anyway - the George for the George & Dragon, the Crat for the Aristocrat and the Plant for the Last Plantagenet are some of my locals.

[DanaC]

There's a pub in Bolton called "The House without a Name", other wise known as the no name pub. My ex's dad lived near it. Was established around 1820 I think.
Best one in Bolton though is: The Man and Scythe. 1st built 12th Century, rebuilt again in 17th Century and again in the Victorian era. Bits of it are I believe from the original construction. The 7th Earl of Derby was held there and taken out for execution frm there in 1651. There's a skull behind the bar which is traditionally assumed to be Derby's.....But the pub is known to Boltoners usually as "T' Cider 'Ouse".

[Trilby]

Originally Posted by Sundae Girl

the George for the George & Dragon, the Crat for the Aristocrat and the Plant for the Last Plantagenet are some of my locals.

A pub named the Last Plantagenet? Be still my heart!

See--that is another thing that is wrong with Americans. They do not take the time to think up good bar/tavern names.

[Sundae]

You should open one

The pub is named for wicked old Richard III, the last of the Platagenets. He's supposed to have consulted a soothsayer in Leicester before the battle of Bosworth Field (didn't do him much good, she predicted his death... and was correct!)

[DanaC]

What a brilliant name for a pub.

[Sundae]

AND it's a Wetherspoons, so the old men turn up for beer and breakfast about 10.00, and are still there at 17.00 when we pile in for cheap shots and steak & ale pie

If you don't mind sticky tables and the couple next to you fighting aover the head of their two year old it's not a bad place to drink.