Pictures from the past: Dudley High Street and Market Place throughout the years
Picture from the past is an Express & Star feature giving you the chance to look back on bygone days. Here we take a look at the ever-changing Dudley High Street and Market Place.
Dudley remains at the bustling heart of the Black Country.
The town's open-air market dates back to the 12th century and, from the outset, was located in the centre of the town.
Dudley Market is in the town's high street with its ever-changing line up of shops and businesses.
Here we take a look back at 21 images of the high street and market through the decades.
Dudley High Street and Market Place
1. Dudley High Street, pictured in the mid 1980s when Cooks department store was a major focus of the town.
2. Plans to demolish the Spiers home furnishing store in Dudley High Street were met with opposition in April 1970, with campaigners voicing fears the town would become subject to rectangular uniformity and called for the building to be preserved.
3. Winter sale in Dudley High street during a cold January in 1958.
4. Dudley High Street looking towards Lower High Street and Bottom Church in September 1983.
5. The Woolworths store in Dudley High Street in 2004.
6. The Co-operative store at the top of Dudley High Street in 1969
7. The interior of William Granage cake shop and cafe in Dudley High Street, taken in 1912.
8. Dudley High Street, viewed from the recently-pedestrianised market place, as it looked in May 1985.
9. Ted North ran his Black Country Bakes traditional baked potato business in Dudley High Street for decades.This is his potato baker stall in 1982.
10. Four Debenhams staff with 100-years service between them were bidding a fond farewell as the store in Dudley High Street closed for the last time in January 1981. Manager Douglas Spalding, who was with the company for 26 years, was photographed with Nancy Robinson, Kathleen Jackson and Marion Sutton.
11. The days were numbered for these historic buildings when this picture of Dudley High Street was taken in November 1970. A public inquiry was being held to decide whether five listed buildings in the street could be demolished to make way for the new Trident Centre shopping complex. Permission was granted, and it was discovered during demolition that parts of these buildings dated back to the Middle Ages.
12. Hanson's Brewery at the top of Dudley High Street, pictured here in November 1991, shortly before it closed. An Asda supermarket now stands on the site.
13. Owner Alan Caswell outside the Arcade Toy Shop in the Fountain Arcade in July 2011.
14. Dudley Market Place where archaeologists found the foundations of old market buildings while preparing for the redevelopment of the area in April 2014.
15. Dudley Market Place, pictured here in the early 1980s, with the Trueform shoe shop being rebuilt.
16. Locals would pop into The Hen and Chickens Hotel for a quick pint and a chat in December 1982. The popular watering hole dominated the corner of New Street and Castle Street in Dudley Market Place.
17. Dudley Market Place pictured in May 1982. Trade has been conducted here for around 1,000 years.
18. Dudley Market Place looking west in 1955.
19. Dudley Market Place formed the main focus of this aerial picture, taken in the early 1970s. The impressive turreted building at the top of the photograph is the old Crown Court, which became used as council offices, while the Trident Centre shopping mall was springing up in the top left corner.
20. Prince Charles shares a joke with some of the people he met at Dudley Market in February 1996.
21. The new market in Dudley market place in 1983 had a little more aisle space between the stalls, making shopping easier for customers. The market had just reopened after three months spent in Stone Street while it was refurbished. Traditionalists had bitterly attacked the replacing of wooden stalls with metal and the removal of the old-fashioned cobbles. This was taken on May 15, 1983.
