AT least until lockdown struck (again) and changed everything, most people’s main experience of Nunnery Lane was probably of being stuck in a long traffic jam waiting for the lights at Blossom Street to change.

Which is a shame. Because Nunnery Lane is a street with an interesting history all its own.

It’s a history that should be better known. Enter the award-winning Clements Hall Local History Group to do something about it...

The group has already produced hugely popular books about the old shops in Bishy Road and South Bank. And now they’ve turned their attention to Nunnery Lane...

The shops on Nunnery Lane, then known as New York Street, emerged as early as the 1840s, says group member Susan Major, who will be highlighting new research about Nunnery Lane in a Zoom talk on January 29. Those early Victorian shops concentrated on selling basic commodities to York’s working class. They included grocers, greengrocers and butchers.

The shops reached their peak in the first 30 years of the Twentieth Century, Susan says - at one point, there were as many as 50 shops in or near Nunnery Lane. “Eventually though, by the 1960s, it all started to change. Redevelopment destroyed the corner shops in the side streets and gradually closed the shops and pubs on Nunnery Lane. These have either been turned into houses, or into service businesses, such as hairdressers, dentists and takeaways.”

The Zoom talk on January 29 will feature a number of fascinating details, Susan says.

“An old press report in 1847 describes an affray at the Trafalgar Bay, after the ‘Nunnery Lane feast’, when a number of prostitutes had been found dancing upstairs, much to the disapproval of local magistrates.

“At the north east end of Nunnery Lane, long since redeveloped for housing, in the mid 19th century there was a ‘select boarding school for young gentlemen’ in a large house outside the City Walls, Clementhorpe Hall. It advertised that ‘pupils are watched over with parental solicitude...and each is provided with a separate bed.’

“Most local people won’t know about a renowned sculptor who lived on Nunnery Lane. Mark Hessey had a reputation which extended beyond the City of York. Several examples of his work still exist locally, among them the bust of Shakespeare in the apex of the gable of the Theatre Royal, the arms of the Merchant Adventurer’s company over the entrance archway in Fossgate and a statue of the Virgin Mary at the Bar Convent.”

Before lockdown, the History Group was using the Trafalgar Bay pub on Nunnery Lane as a local history hub, thanks to landlords Sarah and Phil there.

The history group has already collected many pictures of the old shops. Among them is a picture of Reed’s general store, which was at 21 Nunnery Lane in the 1950s and 60s, and which is now The Orthotic Works.

The photograph of Reed’s from the 1960s shows an advert for frozen foods. Lynne Townend, whose family owned the shop, told the group all about it.

“(There were) definitely frozen peas, fish fingers, fishcakes, beef burgers (and) ice cream, not tubs,” she said. “Ice cream used to come in cardboard cartons.

“I remember the cellar where we had a big set of scales and I used to weigh potatoes for sale and put them in brown paper bags... A speciality of ours was penny ice lollies. My Mum got some ice lolly moulds, and using fruit squashes she made them. They were a great seller.

“The girls from the Bar Convent School and the children from Scarcroft School loved them. The first frozen chips we got were those crinkly ones.

“At the end of every week, pay day we would work out what some of our customers owed and they would pay.”

Anne Allinson sent the group some pictures of her confectionery and newsagents shop, at 55 Nunnery Lane, in the 1960s and 1970s. It is now a house - Anne says supermarkets destroyed the trade.

The group also received a lot of material from the family of butcher Harold Wilson, who had a shop at 59 Nunnery Lane. There were three generations of butchers there until they sold up to Tony Neary in the 1980s.

“We were given a lovely poem written by a customer about this shop,” Susan Major said. “The butchers were William, Harold and Colin, and there used to be a slaughterhouse behind the house and shop.”

There were several Cooperative shops locally - including a large grocery store at the east end of Nunnery Lane, pictured in about 1900. And at the west end of Nunnery Lane there were once three pubs all in a row.

The Wheatsheaf was originally the Golden Ball beer-house. It dated from about 1837 and was in what is now a small park area next to another pub, the Trafalgar Bay. The Golden Ball later became the Barley Sheaf, then The Crown and eventually the Wheatsheaf, before being closed in 1938 and later demolished.

The Britannia dates from around 1837 too, but was rebuilt around 1902 by the Tadcaster Tower Brewery. It closed in 1969 and then in 1974 the building was bought by Neil Guppy to become his Enterprise Club. It has been a meeting place and centre for art, education and leisure activities ever since. Neil was made an Honorary Freeman of York in 2010.

The Clements Hall Local History Group’s Zoom talks are open to non-members for £3 per talk. Alternatively you can join the club for £5. Find out more at www.clementshallhistorygroup.org.uk.