It’s the smallest museum in town
IT’S a former pawnbroker’s shop that has hardly changed since it was opened in the 1860s. While the familiar three brass balls have long gone – present whereabouts unknown – the shop itself remains.
Greenwood’s still sells what it has always sold – working clothes, boiler suits, overalls, caps of all descriptions and jewellery.
Bolenium Bill, a curious advertising figure for an industrial clothing company, was a mainstay of the shop window for decades.
The old mahogany counters, which had been there since the shop was built 150 years ago, are still there.
The man running it for many years, Colin Parkin, had started working at Greenwood’s at the age of 15 after leaving Wheelwright Grammar School in 1953. He remained there right up to his death.
It was a job he loved and one to which he dedicated his life, and his hard work and loyalty was rewarded when the owner, Jack Gledhill, died and bequeathed the business to him.
When the solicitor called into the shop to tell Colin the news, it was so totally unexpected, he broke down in tears.
Greenwood’s was always a familyrun business, and when Colin died, his wife Catherine and daughter Caroline took over, helped by a second daughter Lisa, in her school holidays, and Colin’s nephew Michael Collins.
The Parkin family always made sure the shop adapted to changing trends but never made changes for the sake of change.
They sold the business four years ago to Sue Baker, a retired dentist whose dental practice was just across the road from the shop.
When Sue heard the business was closing, she decided to buy it so that this well- loved shop with its amazing social history would remain exactly as it was.
She also wanted to ensure that its highly skilled jewellery manufacturing and repair service, run by their on-site craftsman, Kevin Parkin, would remain in the town.
The early history of Greenwood’s is not very clear, and until recently nobody in the town even knew who its namesake – John Greenwood – was.
The mystery was solved recently when one of his descendants, while researching his family tree, discovered his great, great, great grandfather, John Greenwood, had once owned the shop.
Dr Inness Simon Chadwick, who lives in Cheshire, came to Dewsbury a few weeks ago to visit the shop which his mysterious ancestor had once owned.
John Greenwood, we now know, was a publican from Pudsey, who bought two shops for his daughters, Ellen and Sarah Jane, the one in Church Street and another round the back in Robinson Street.
After John Greenwood died, in 1900, both shops were run by his daughter Ellen’s husband, Henry Chadwick. Eventually, the shop was sold to Tom Burns, and it was his daughter, Doris, who later ran the shop for many years.
Jack Gledhill, pictured above, took it over from her, and many will still remember him as a dapper man, always smartly dressed.
The different tradesmen, of which there were many in Dewsbury in those days, bought their overalls from Greenwoods – plumbers wore blue, joiners brown, and painters and decorators white.
During hard times, people were often forced to pawn their most treasured possessions, items like watches, clothes and jewellery.
Sometimes, some poor people brought in items which were not worth anything, but Colin, feeling sorry for them, took them anyway.
People pawned some of the most unusual items. One man once pawned a pig which had to be kept round the back. Colin had to feed it, and after that he said – no more pigs!
Greenwood’s had two shops, the one in Church Street, which is still open and doing a brisk trade, and another in Robinson Street, now demolished. Fortunately Greenwood’s has been saved, and the new owner, Sue, has made one addition.
She has made space for a small “museum” in which she has placed many fascinating items discovered in the shop. It’s open for public viewing but you must book an appointment by ringing the shop on 01924 461198.
IT’S A THROWBACK TO A BYGONE ERA AND IT STILL HAS MANY OF ITS ORIGINAL FIXTURES AND FITTINGS. IN FACT IT’S SO ORIGINAL THIS DEWSBURY SHOP NOW BOASTS ONE OF THE SMALLEST MUSEUMS AROUND. LOCAL HISTORIAN MARGARET WATSON TELLS THE STORY OF JOHN GREENWOOD’S