As a young lad I roamed my side of the city fairly widely. I had no street map but found my way by the use of my invaluable street guide, a copy of which I always carried. Wakelin’s Street Guide of the City of Birmingham cost me 6d, or a week’s pocket money but I considered it worth the expense.
Francis Henry Wakelin set up in business as a printer at 354, Wheeler Street, Birmingham in 1886. In 1904/5 he began printing what was to become a long running series of Street Guides ‘ showing at a glance the location of each street and road …’. These were not maps but pocket sized street directories about 10.5cm x 7cm that listed streets and defined where they started and ended.
Unlike maps they were cheap enough to buy a new edition every time one was produced, eventually one per year. In 1930 they cost – 2d, by 1940 – 3d, 1945 – 4d, 1955 – 6d, 1966 – 9d.
They were so cheap that every delivery driver and every ambulance driver carried one with him until they fell to pieces to be replaced by the latest edition.
Originally they covered only three cities, each in separate volumes: Birmingham, Coventry and Bristol. By 1930 there was also an additional volume covering West Bromwich, Wednesbury, Oldbury & Langley. By 1945 there were seven volumes: Birmingham, Bristol, Coventry, Stoke & Newcastle, Walsall, Smethwick & West Bromwich, and Wolverhampton.
The Library of Birmingham holds 5 editions dating from 1906 to 1928 [LoB:L83.3/191963]. The first: Wakelin’s Clear type Street Guide of Birmingham and District Showing at a glance the Location of each Street & Road in Birmingham and Suburbs, Also times for lighting lamps, and calendar for the current Year 1906. From 1912 they became Wakelin’s Street Guide of Greater Birmingham covering … each street and road within Birmingham and District and by 1945 Wakelin’s Street Guide of the City of Birmingham covering … every street and road within the City Boundary.
Street entries originally gave only the names of the streets at either end. By 1945, they included the district and following their introduction, from 1959, the district postcode. By 1950, they not only listed the street at either end but often the house number on those end streets at which the street emerged.
From 1945 the guides included a double page map of Birmingham’s city centre streets in the centre pages, showing the new Inner Ring Road for some years before 1971 when it first carried any traffic.
In 1945, when the street directory cost 4d, a street atlas cost 4s [48d] i.e. twelve times as much. On 17 March 1975, the Birmingham Post noted,
Pocket sized street atlases cost by then only just over three times as much as street guides but with the maps in addition and covering nearby towns Wakelin’s guides were no longer so attractive a proposition and this was the last edition advertised.
Old copies of the guides regularly appear for sale but not at their original prices. Even so, it is possible to acquire second-hand copies in reasonable condition for as little as £5.
John Townley
[The Wakelin’s Street Guides in the photographs are the Author’s own copies.]
The Iron Room 