As a kid, whenever in the vacinity of Waingate or the Wicker i can always remember the awful smells that came from Lady's Bridge brewery.

Dont know if it was the hops or whatever but it was real strong.

I would accept the smells back though, for the sake of the brewery, what a scandle all those breweries that disappeared over what seemed like a short space of time.:rant:

I remember that smell very strong must have been the hops,

happy memorys.

Yeah,they made a really strong brew there.Once a brewery worker fell into one of the vats and drowned.
The police had the sad job of informing his missus. She was heart--broken.
"Oh ,I hope he didn't suffer ",she sobbed on the policeman's shoulder.
"I don't think so,love,"he replied, "he jumped out twice for a slash ".

My uncle Walt worked at that brewery. He told me the workers could drink a maximum of 12 pints a day. Said it took him a few years to handle that amount.

I remember that smell also. I was only a child at the time and I hated the smell. Was it a Whitbread brewery?

As a child i was always travel sick on the buses going to town and i always remember that horrible smell as we got in to town
which made me ten times worse.

I'm afraid I have to admit that I loved that smell. To me it was a pleasant aroma and probably explains why years later beer became a good buddy of mine.

Wards at the bottom of Ecclesall Road is the one I remember most, alongside Whitbreads near Lady's Bridge. I think it is the smell of the hops in the mashing tuns that creates the smell.

Like sticking your nose into a freshly opened jar of Horlicks - lovely!

I used to travel up Solly St to St Vincents School when I was young and the smell was almost unbearable, but I never knew it was from the brewery. I thught it was from the old lodging house at the bottom of Solly St. I think they just took in down and outs and they were always hanging around the building. Plaster crumbled from the walls and the smell hung about the place. I suppose the men were casualties of the war, I'm talking late 1940's. But to me asa child the were just dirty old men who had this smell around them.
Hazel

Originally posted by stevo
I remember that smell also. I was only a child at the time and I hated the smell. Was it a Whitbread brewery?
yep, Whitbread. They used to produce Trophy bitter....best sampled at The Albert...a lovely smooth pint.
When they went over to keg beers, they stopped making Trophy in Sheffield but it remained the centre for brewing Gold Label Barley Wine (shudder!)
The smell was definately the hops but I think it was possible to detect a different sweeter smell sometimes as well, which I took to come from mashing the malt.

Trophy's still a nice pint now where u can get it. Usually the older pubs. Does anyone know anywhere in town where u can get a pint?

I work in the Old Brewery and unfortunatly it smells of a typical office now.
All the old brewing kit has gone and the cellar is like a maze.
Its creepy at night though, feel your not alone.

would accept the smells back though, for the sake of the brewery, what a scandle all those breweries that disappeared over what seemed like a short space of time.



In 1927 there was 11 Brewerys in Sheffield. Truswells Norfolk lane and Eyre St. Henry Tomlinson Anchor Brewery. William Stones Cannon Brewery Rutland road. Tennant brothers Bridge st. Sheffield free brewery Co Queens rd John Richdale Britannia Brewery Bramall lane. Thomas Rawson Pond st.
Old Albion Brewery Ecclesall Road. Duncan Gilmour Ladys Bridge .
Carter Milner and Bird Hope Brewery Mowbray st. Warwicks and Richardson Crookes Place Hillsbro.Plus Smiths. Whitbreads. Ind Coope. Bass all had depots. nuff sed.

Originally posted by hutch
would accept the smells back though, for the sake of the brewery, what a scandle all those breweries that disappeared over what seemed like a short space of time.
And the biggest scandal of all: The closure of Wards, Sheffields last major brewery. A profitable business employing 200 people closed for the sake of property development and asset stripping.

I ventured upto edinburgh for the first timein the summer nad spent 2 days walking round wondering what that horrible smell was- it wasnt until the last hour we were there i got told that it was the hops from the mcewans brewery- i couldn't live there- i would be sick :(

There was a bass brewery on claywheels lane. And when the wind was in the right direction you could smell a bit of a pong across the river on Dudley road where I was.
I can remember walking down Haymarket and Waingate when I was a nipper and smelling a strong smell from the exchange brewery, but at the time I thought it was tar.

Also I remember wards bitter itself being a bit of a smelly pint. It's no wonder the brewery smelled.

Originally posted by Ned Ludd
And the biggest scandal of all: The closure of Wards, Sheffields last major brewery. A profitable business employing 200 people closed for the sake of property development and asset stripping.

Errr, that's not how I remember it...

Wards was bought by Vaux who then decided that they would concentrate on their Swallow Hotels business rather than brewing. The property was sold rather than the business for various reasons including the Governments Beer Orders and the tangled web that is international brewing conglomerates and competition.

The £4.2m that Finnegans paid for the property was (from very hazy memory) LESS than the amount on offer from the management buy out proposal.

So putting it all together, the closure was not about asset stripping or property development.

Anyone with a clearer memory care to elaborate / correct?

Anyone remember the old Stones beer from the 50's & 60's it tasted great..but it was cloudy with bits of yeast and such floating around in your pint.. A "gent" who worked at the Stones brewery (and was also the Treasurer of the La plata club) told me this story ...That one day at the Brewery they announced the arrival of a new wizz kid boss who had Studied brewing at university...He came down to the Brewery floor and asked about the pipe lines that supplied the the beer from the brewing vats to the bottling department.
He wanted to know when they were last cleaned ???....To his amazement he was told that they had never been cleaned "ever".
"So" he stopped production that weekend and ordered the pipes to be cleaned...When the pipes were dissasembled and examined
they were found to be almost blocked with yeast, the 2 inch pipes only had about a half inch of bore to alow the beer to flow through...So using soda and other methods of pipe cleaning they managed to clean out the pipes over the weekend..,The result was a "beautifull clear pint"... "BUT" it didn't taste the same and Stones beer sales dropped off for while. And the Flavour was lost forever.

Originally posted by sheffexpat
Yeah,they made a really strong brew there.Once a brewery worker fell into one of the vats and drowned.
The police had the sad job of informing his missus. She was heart--broken.
"Oh ,I hope he didn't suffer ",she sobbed on the policeman's shoulder.
"I don't think so,love,"he replied, "he jumped out twice for a slash ".

Even though that is just a joke, two men did die cleaning out the vats. The first man was overcome by the heavy fumes and his mate went in to save him only for both of them to lose their lives. This could easily checked, however I lived up on Harborough Avenue on the Manor and when the wind was in the right direction you could smell the brew.
In the early seventies I actually worked there seeing to the boilers and each and every day we had three breaks and you could drink as much free beer as you wanted during these breaks only the drivers were not allowed any beer for obvious reasons.
Believe it or believe it not the biggest thieves there were the SECURICOR operatives they stole everything, on a Saturday afternoon they would come down Millsands and fill a van with bottled beer and Goldlabel barley wines. They never did get caught.All the excess yeast that was produced was sold on to make yeast-vite tablets (remember them) and the hops that were left after the brew was sold as garden fertilizer and such.
The brewery was Whitbreads

How long before that gets edited/pulled?

I used to work in Whitbreads social club and one of the guys once told me they found a dead pigeon in one of the vats - Apparently it had been in there for a few weeks....................:gag:

I worked with somebody who was married to a person who worked at Wards at the time it closed, and although I can't remember all the details of the closure, it was an absolute scandal.

A group of top brass from Wards thought they had secured it to continue brewing the beer but they had the rug pulled from under their feet when another group persuaded shareholders - who were not interested in beer or local jobs - that more dosh was to be made if the site went for residential use.

Low and behold what do we have now? Trendy flats on Ecclesall Road, a restaurant waiting to be filled and Sheffield minus a great ale.

Something along those lines anyway. I'm not sure of all the ins and outs but, I think, that is how it was summed up to me. I stand to be corrected.

The only compromise, as far as I can remember, was that planners insisted that the Wards tower be kept as part of the town scape


Wards was a classic brew, a premier cru, a delight to drink but having been weaned on it I'm baised. Sheffield has lost a gem.

Can you imagine somthing like that happening in France? If they'd made a distinctive and popular wine in a region since 1840 and big business shareholders shut it down in the name of profit?

It wouldn't happen.

The new Wards is nothing like the old stuff. It could be any beer.

On the Exchange Brewery front, I always though the smell was a delight and I miss it.

By the way, does any one remember the old brewery tours that they used to do at the Exchange brewery and the Stones one on Rutland Road?

They were excellent. They'd show you round and then there was a free bar!

I was always told not to ask the tour guide any questions as a shorter tour meant more time to sup free beer!

Originally posted by Ousetunes
I'm afraid I have to admit that I loved that smell. To me it was a pleasant aroma and probably explains why years later beer became a good buddy of mine.

Wards at the bottom of Ecclesall Road is the one I remember most, alongside Whitbreads near Lady's Bridge. I think it is the smell of the hops in the mashing tuns that creates the smell.

Like sticking your nose into a freshly opened jar of Horlicks - lovely!
I must admit Iliked the smell too. My Gran lived on Clarence street (now disappeared under the ring road) and you could smell the Wards brewery. It didn't remind me of horlicks though, I thought it smelled like Weetabix.:)

Originally posted by algy
I must admit Iliked the smell too. My Gran lived on Clarence street (now disappeared under the ring road) and you could smell the Wards brewery. It didn't remind me of horlicks though, I thought it smelled like Weetabix.:)

I hated the smell of the Wards brewery when I was a kid. Now I would give almost anything to smell those hops today.

Originally posted by Tony
Errr, that's not how I remember it...

Wards was bought by Vaux who then decided that they would concentrate on their Swallow Hotels business rather than brewing. The property was sold rather than the business for various reasons including the Governments Beer Orders and the tangled web that is international brewing conglomerates and competition.

But Vaux then went under, and the Swallow hotel chain was broken up. Some bought by the Marriot chain, and others independents.

There was some thing decidely dodgy (allegedly) about how Vaux senior management and their principle shareholders handled the whole affair.

I liked the smell. Used to get a whiff every morning
on the tram on the way to school (fare 1/2d). Talking
about smells, does anyone recall that of roasting coffee
beans in the morning from Davy's cafe on Fargate? I got off
the tram there on my way round to Leopold Street to catch the bus on the second leg of my journey. Also the alarm on H L
Brown's `The Jewellers' on the corner would be going off.
I could go on and on.

Hi Dow
I went to school on the tram everyday. We all used to sit in the bay.
I hated the smell of the brewery.
I remember the wooden seats and how at the terminus the driiver used to click them all the opposite way.
Yes the coffee beans roasting/ grinding in Davys window And after the tram I also caught my bus on Leopold St.

Hazel

Just being pedantic but the smell isn't the hops, which only have an effect on the smell and taste of the beer, not the surrounding area.

I think you'll find that the smell is sugar depleted malt left sitting in a mash tun after the water for brewing has stewed/passed though it.

It stinks, doesn't it? I remember when I used to have to shovel the stuff into big farmhouse bags. It makes excellent compost material but put me off horlicks for life.

Wilf

How right you are Brainthrust.....it was the MALT that you could smell and not the hops.

I know this is only a , "loose " connection but does anyone remember the malt that was like a dark treacle ?
It was a lovely taste and mothers often gave it to kids after they'd had to take some awful -tasting medicine.Well . mine did at any rate !
The malt concoction was , I think , in squat -shaped brown -coloured jars. What made it all the more attractive , is at that time , after the war , sweets were on ration and malt was , to us , a sweet !
Only one teaspoonfull allowed !

I rememeber it I loved it. I think it was codliver oil and malt. Perhaps supplying vit A & D

It was provided by the health clinic. My sister and I used to be sent to get it and you had to exchange it for stamps. First we had to go to the Post Office at Intake, then Manor Clinic then back to Arbourthorne Rd wherre we lived at that time.
There were bottles of thick orange juice to. I suppose together with the malt we had our vits A D & C

Not sure now whether the stamps were for the baby food called National Dried in huge tins as we fetched that too

We once accidently dropped a jar of ithe malt in the middle of the road and ran.

hazel

Originally posted by Fareast
I know this is only a , "loose " connection but does anyone remember the malt that was like a dark treacle ?
It was a lovely taste and mothers often gave it to kids after they'd had to take some awful -tasting medicine.Well . mine did at any rate !
The malt concoction was , I think , in squat -shaped brown -coloured jars. What made it all the more attractive , is at that time , after the war , sweets were on ration and malt was , to us , a sweet !
Only one teaspoonfull allowed ! i had to go to leopold clinic as a child and was force fed this malt,horrible stuff,even in my later years if i passed the brewery the smell brought it back to me,it made me physycally sick

Originally posted by depoix
i had to go to leopold clinic as a child and was force fed this malt,horrible stuff,even in my later years if i passed the brewery the smell brought it back to me,it made me physycally sick didnt put you off the beer though did it alan:gag: :gag:

Originally posted by roughy101
didnt put you off the beer though did it alan:gag: :gag: cheekie young thing,ill have you know i havent supped a pint in two years,spill most of it before i get back to my seat:banana:

I remember the smell of the brewery on exchange st. Thought it was strange but not unpleasant as a kid

Also remember the smell of a pint of Wards bitter. Shall I say it was, errr... eggy? The head that floated on top of that malty brew we used to refer to as "Sheep's Brains". Both these things were the sign of a good pint

Wards was the best beer I ever drank. The new stuff is not a patch on it

Several times a day at work, my picking lists appears, in 2 slots on the wall, both marked "Wards". I sigh every time .....

There is no such thing as a nasty smell coming from a Brewery.

Originally posted by depoix
cheekie young thing,ill have you know i havent supped a pint in two years,spill most of it before i get back to my seat:banana: you little liar,out everynight boozing,thinking and everything else ending with ing, watch out for big lips shes going to get you:clap: :clap: still cant do a bannana though

The smell of Whitbreads will stick with me for life. My grandad (Doug Senior) used to work there and we often used to pop in and see him. I was only about 5 then think i used to stand there cringing. What a smell!!!!

Everyone refers to Exchange Brewery as Whitbreads,well for you folk old enough to remember it was Tennant Bros up until about 1961/2 then it was taken over under the "WHITBREAD UMBRELLA". I worked there and loved the smell which was the "mash", Hops are used to flavour and enhance the shelf life.
Stories get exagerated over the years and you couldn,t drink all day you were allowed a couple of pints (officially) obviously some had more on the quiet.one of the very true stories is that the old Coopers who made the wooden casks used to pour a gallon of scalding water in the old whisky casks and leave overnight then drank it the next day which was like pure spirits,i cringe at what it must have done to their liver.

I remember that smell also. I was only a child at the time and I hated the smell. Was it a Whitbread brewery?

Hi,

The reason for the strong smell was the presence of two breweries on Bridge street. On the river side was Tennant Brothers, Exchange Brewery. Many of you will only know this as Whitbreads Brewery but they only showed up in Sheffield late in the game.

Across Bridge Street from Tennant's was Duncan Gilmour's Brewery. Gilmour's were taken over by Tetleys in the mid 50's. Tetley's did brew there for a while after the take-over and then it was just used for storage.

Regards

my father was apprenticed as a cooper when he first left school, but the trade was dying on its feet, even then, as they were bringing the aluminium barrels in. He left and went into the steelworks, before going on the buses and then long-distance lorry driving.

The smell from the brewery(ies) is a very fond memory from my childhood, I loved standing near the top of Haymarket/ FitzAlan Square and drinking in that delicious malty aroma that would drift up the hill... bliss.

I really miss being able to smell that aroma now that the breweries have closed down... :( :(

I remember that smell also. I was only a child at the time and I hated the smell. Was it a Whitbread brewery?

Whitbread, yes it was, two slices!

The mention of Richdales on Bramall Lane reminded me of when i was a kid at Denby St nursery. You were put to be outside on the veranda and I used to watch the sacks being hoisted up the outside of the brewery before going to sleep.1940 ish

My Grandfather used to have piles of smelly used hops in the garden , he reckoned it was a good fertiliser.