Gloucester Then and Now: Eastgate Street Market in 1968

THESE fantastic photographs show the old Eastgate Street Market on its very last day of operation on Saturday October 26 1968.

They were taken by Elvin Young, of Hempsted, who sent them in following The Citizen's appeal for interesting old photographs of the city.

A market has stood on the site in some form or other for more than 200 years.

The market hall in these images was built in the 1850s as part of reorganisation of the city's markets.

Business Cards From Only £10.95 Delivered www.myprint-247.co.uk

myprint-247

View details

Print voucher

Our heavyweight cards have FREE UV silk coating, FREE next day delivery & VAT included. Choose from 1000's of pre-designed templates or upload your own artwork. Orders dispatched within 24hrs.

Terms: Visit our site for more products: Business Cards, Compliment Slips, Letterheads, Leaflets, Postcards, Posters & much more. All items are free next day delivery. www.myprint-247.co.uk

Contact: 01858 468192

Valid until: Sunday, June 30 2013

It was a covered hall with a large decorative portico to house a daily market.

This particular building survived until the present market and shopping arcade was built.

To preserve some continuity with the past, the old portico was retained and moved further along Eastgate Street where it still stands today as the entrance to the Eastgate Shopping Centre.

The building of a new market and shopping arcade caused a lot of excitement in the local papers.

When the first stage opened in 1971, the Gloucester Journal reporter wrote that it was "bright without being brash" and "had been given a touch of luxury with a carpeted second floor".

Gloucester has a long tradition of markets that dates back into the 12th Century and probably much earlier. Originally each of the gate streets had markets often concentrating on a particular sort of product.

Street names can give us a clue about the history of the street. Bull Lane is at the top of Westgate Street, just where the records suggest that there were lots of butcher's shops in medieval times.

The Oxebode or Oxbody Lane, leading to King's Square had a history of livestock sales well into the 20th Century.

Sometimes an individual product had such a commercial importance that it was sold from a specific building.

In other cases an existing building was adapted so The Kings Board, which probably started life as an open air chapel, was used as a cheese and butter market by the late 16th Century. This building has survived and now stands in Hillfield Gardens. By the late 1780s the markets were concentrated into two sites in Southgate Street and Eastgate Street.