Music Halls and my Grandad Harry HEATLEY born 1886

[positiverateofclimb]

Hi

I am writing to you from New Zealand. My Mum had transferred a spool tape to a cassette some time ago and I had this transferred again to a cd which I played for the first time yesterday. I heard my Grandmothers voice for the first time, the initial recording was made in 1964 a few months before I was born and not long before my Grandmother passed away. Aside from listening to her, there was a part where my Grandfather was interviewed for radio. He described the music halls of Liverpool including Haymarket and the one in Rosscommon Road. Listening to the recording I learnt that my Grandad would have performed in the Music Halls of Liverpool. Certainly when he emigrated to New Zealand I have found he was mentioned quite a few times in newspapers and also wining various competitions here.

My question : is there an online database somewhere so I can find some record of him performing. The period he mentions is from 1895 to 1908

Thank you in advance and a Happy Christmas
Matthew

[Hilary]

If you google music hall archives there are 2 or 3 organisations that come up. I have no idea if their archives are online but you could contact them and ask.

[positiverateofclimb]

Thank you for the suggestion, I have emailed one of the contacts so heres hoping something may come of it.
Just while we are on the topic of suggestions, any clues to where I should start looking to see which school my grandfather went to. I know he left at the age of 13 and lived in both Rokeby Street and Greenland Streets in Liverpool.

Have a great Christmas and a Happy New Year too

Matthew

[Tina]

Hi Matthew thank you for Christmas Greetings and the same to you and your family.
Perhaps you give us more details and we can search for you?
Cheers

[MaryA]

which school my grandfather went to. I know he left at the age of 13 and lived in both Rokeby Street and Greenland Streets in Liverpool.

Hi and welcome to the forum. Rokeby Street ran, and still does, between Everton Brow and William Henry Street. http://www.liverpoolhistoryprojects.co. ... laz/M8.htm and a wider area http://www.liverpoolhistoryprojects.co. ... z/km79.htm

The school he went to will depend on his religion.

[Hilary]

The 1901 census shows Harry's occupation as a commercial office boy. In 1891 his father is a licencensed victualler with pub written by the enumerator and on the 1901 census his mother Margaret is a public house manager. Perhaps he started by entertaining people in the pub.

[positiverateofclimb]

Thank you all for your help, his details are

Harry HEATLEY (Just Harry)
born 1886
Parents John (Salop) and Margaret (Welsh)
Lived Greenland Street and Rokeby Street
Left school at the age of 13
Initially employed as an Office Boy, but became a steward on ships and worked on trans Atlantic crossings, later he worked again as a steward for the railways in Canada. I have no clues to which line he sailed for except I did find the vessel he worked on his journey to New Zealand at the end of 1908.

You are right he did entertain the patrons in his Mothers pub, however it reading the news of the Boer War to the men who could not read, I am not sure whether he sang. In saying that the recording I now have indicates he was quite heavily involved in the Music Halls from 1895 to 1908

He left the UK to work on his Uncles farm in NZ. His uncle a Thomas HEATLEY born in about 1844 in Shropshire emigrated to NZ in about 1866 and joined a gold rush. He must have found some gold as I have found records of him owning a farm in 1872. I have not been able to ascertain when Thomas left the UK to make his fortune.