A view of the flat roofed maisonettes of Brus House seen above the shops of Thornaby Town Centre c1960.
Picture Stockton Archive
A Pictorial History of Stockton-on-Tees
A view of the flat roofed maisonettes of Brus House seen above the shops of Thornaby Town Centre c1960.
Love Thornaby born there in 1957.
Teesside had suffered physical damage during World War Two, and there was a national need to reconstruct cities which had been damaged due to the war. For the first twenty years after WW2, government resources were directed towards home and new towns building, as there was not time to develop a detailed housing plan in each area it was decided that copying the Soviet Urban Housing Program would be the quickest and cheapest course of housing action. The first Soviet style buildings built in Teesside was Thornaby Town Centre (shown above) which apparently did not involve local urban planning officials to any significant extent because there appears to be no visible link between these buildings, their neighbourhood and the people they serve.
It was estimated that 100 worker families could be housed in the apartment buildings shown with the downstairs shopping centre containing a workers cooperative, a maternity unit with a guaranteed 2 hour stay for mothers giving birth, a children’s detention centre and a bible reading room. The three workers bandstands shown with turreted roofs – contained space for a workers chorus. As part of this housing plan, the somewhat dilapidated terrace housing situated in the George Street and Mandale Road area of Thornaby was quickly demolished, and the workers asked to voluntarily leave the district, many thousands did so.
Love the site guys… Brought up in Thornaby, Stockton (Norton) now living in Canada – brings back so many childhood memories.
Thornaby New Town Centre opened in 1967, shortly before I moved from Middlesbrough.
I remember walking around the new Town Centre the day before its official opening. Woolco seemed futuristic at the time! Does anyone remember the murals which decorated the outside of Woolco? I think there were paintings or mosaics of fruit and vegetables, but can anyone remember for sure?
I worked in Brus House in 1971 at Max Downes dentist. Travelled all the way from Lazenby each day. Loved it though. My first job.
I used to go to Mr Downes dentist surgery when I lived in Thornaby many years ago. Sandra Dover
My first job was also working for Max Downes. This was in 1965 when he had the surgery in the front part of his house in Cumbernauld Road. I did a bit of part-time work at the Brus house surgery in the mid 80’s when Max used to love to tell people that I was his first nurse, much to my embarrassment. Lovely man to work for and quite a character.
Were you there when Mary Dack died in Cumbernauld Road?
Did you also used to babysit Sally?
The garage opened in 1968 my wife worked there.
They first started building on the airfield in the mid-60s.
Wrong date not 1960 I was still at school in 1960 and the airfield though closed was still there we used to play on it, so more like the 70s…
I would say more closer 1970 than 1960, I agree about the Neesham buildings too.
I can remember going to the Chinese takeaway on the ground floor – and the bank on the corner. Fascinating picture – especially the Nesham’s building pre years of dereliction..
The almost ‘brutalist’ late 50’s/60’s flat-roofed architecture of the shopping centre / maisonettes is contrasted with the vastly more entertaining ‘turreted’ roofs of the unusual Nesham’s car-showroom in the background. I was always amazed, how freely the architectural-profession went on specifying flat-roofed buildings, even when the technology of that era was being, time and again, proven to be significantly lacking in terms of durability. As for the Nesham’s building, I honestly believe, it should have been awarded a Grade II listing, and preserved.
Fond memories of the old shopping center. Definitely late 60’s early 70’s. I went to the CofE school on the opposite side of the dual carriageway. Used to nip across the road at lunch time for chips and scraps. Cousin used to work at Nesham Garage unfortunately not as clever as he thought, went to live with “her maj” for a bit.