This building on Yarm Lane must have been demolished then re-built as it’s a three storey building now and has the same name, ‘Green Bushes’.
Photograph and details courtesy of Derek Buttle.
Picture Stockton Archive
A Pictorial History of Stockton-on-Tees
Picture Stockton Archive 
My father Herbert (Bert) Ridley was the tenant landlord of the green Bushes from 1960 until he retired in 1985. He was a traditional landlord who took great care of the Bass draught beer, and over the years the pub undertook several transformations. When he took over it had three rooms on the ground floor, a men only bar (halcyon days!), a “posh” lounge with carpets for when the men took their wives out for a drink, and a music room at the back for youngsters. There was also a small snug and take away, entered from a side entrance off Brunswick Street, serviced by a sliding hatch behind the bar. It was used by 3 or 4 elderly ladies who drank Mackeson Milk Stout or sherry (Ena Sharples style – for those who can remember the early days of Coronation Street). I remember when we moved into the pub that in the bar there were wooden barrels chocked up on the bar top but I can’t remember what was in them, there was also sawdust on the floor and brass spittoons. Many of the old gas light fittings were still visible. Bert installed a piano in the bar and Friday and Saturday nights the bar was packed wall to wall with regulars enjoying a sing song by one of the resident pianists.
In the 1970’s the hand pumps were replaced by electric pumps, much to the dismay of his regulars, who also believed the wooden barrels had been replaced by metal tanks. After many complaints by his older regulars Bert grabbed the main protagonist by his ear, marched him down to the cellar, allowed him to take a good look and returned him to the bar to inform everyone that the cellar was indeed full of wooden barrels. Around the same period, draught Carling Black Label lager was introduced – more dismay!
Upstairs there was a large function room, with it’s own toilets, bar and fittings for the draught beer pumps. There was also a hand operated lazy waiter lift that could be used to bring things up from the pub below. The function room wasn’t used very often, I can remember an old age pensioners Christmas Dinner taking place in the 1960’s and it not being used after that, though there might have been functions that I cannot remember. At some time in the 1980’s a pool table was installed for the pool team to use, they seemed to be quite successful and had now somewhere to practice.
Incidentally, someone commented about whether it had been a hotel? There is a second floor to the pub and although not many rooms would be available, there was a system of bell presses in most rooms and in one of the 1st floor rooms was a wall mounted designator box to identify in which room the bell had been pressed, this would seem to indicate that it had at some time been used as a hotel or b&b.
The 1980’s saw the biggest changes to the pub when it was updated and made open plan, one of the first in Stockton to do so, this made it one of the more popular venues for a night out and it became so busy that Bert had to employ door staff to control numbers in and out, the first pub in Stockton to do so and the Evening Gazette sent a reporter to find out what was going on.
When Bert retired in 1985 the brewery installed managers to run the pub but this did not appear to have been successful, and unfortunately, as mentioned in a previous comment, like many of our pubs, it’s use was changed On the opposite corner to the Green Bushes was another popular pub, originally called the Brunswick Hotel, then The Birds Nest and in the final years of it’s demise, the Falchion, it’s now a chemist.
LikeLike
Hi Peter,
I quite often accompanied my dad who was a regular in the 60/70s, along with other members of Hunters the Bakers salesmen from Bowesfield Lane. I have lived down south nr. Portsmouth since the late 70s and completely out of the blue bumped into your dad in the lounge on Southsea pier. It is a small world!. Other pubs my dad, George, frequented in Stockton were, the Bowesfield and the Royal Oak and back in the day, the Spotted Cow.
LikeLike
I understand that the above building (originally a house at the end of the terrace) was demolished and the current building erected in the 1930’s. The Bass architecture department did a good job in designing their new pub as a tall ‘pastiche’ Georgian town house, similar to the original 18th century houses on the High Street, whilst still retaining the garden forecourt. There is a wonderful shell-canopied portico to the side street entrance. Once a very popular pub, it ceased to trade some years ago and has now been developed by the owners of the adjacent Borgés Restaurant as a ‘function’ suite. The upper floors of the rest of the terrace still remain as shown, the shops having being built over the garden areas of the former houses. The shop shown next door at No.52 selling ‘Pianos and Organs’ was Burdon’s musical instrument shop until the 1970’s when it became Tillotson’s Motorcycles. The name of the premises licensee, by tradition, is usually on a tiny panel over the main entrance of any pub. However, in this case Mr J.Bartle seems to have been so proud of his incumbency, that he has unusually had his name ‘writ large’ under the prominent eaves-level sign. Am I correct in believing the story that movie-star Clark Gable, whilst serving in the USAAF and based at a local airfield during WWII, actually spent some time having a drink in The Green Bushes one evening?
LikeLike
Thanks for information a lot of things I did not know. I remember the brass plaque on the side entrance which said “No Hawkers Allowed”.
LikeLike