THIS here picture is from the Post from this week 40 years ago,

and shows two women looking at the painting by Arthur Wilde Parsons, which shows the departure of John Guy from Broad Quay in 1610. (He was bound for Newfoundland where he set up the first English colony there.)

The big deal about two women looking at a picture on March 31 1983 is that they were in the Commercial Rooms on Corn Street and this was the first time that women (who were not catering, cleaning or waiting staff, or, in Victorian times, what we nowadays call “sex-workers”) had been allowed in.

The Commercial Rooms had been founded in the early 19th century as a meeting place for local businessmen (its first president was John Loudon McAdam of road building fame) and had remained an all-male hangout ever since.

But when the club members asked Bristol City Council if they could borrow a painting from the city’s collection, the pesky liberals and feminists down the Council House noted that the Rooms were barred to women, so yeah, sure, they could have a painting, but only if they let women in.

Some horse-trading later, it was agreed, but women were still not allowed to become members.

Fast forward to March 31 – the same day – eleven years later and the Commercial Rooms closed for good. Members blamed the economic downturn and the death of the traditional businessman’s large lunch for the closure. The Post was told that “young businessmen” (yes, men) were too busy to have a proper lunch and had to eat a sandwich at their desks these days.

It being 1994, some other members also felt that the Commercial Rooms were not keeping up with the times. It did not have computer or even phone facilities for members. And if your memory or knowledge of recent history is any good, you’ll also know of one other vital bit of 1980s/90s technology the place lacked – a fax machine.

By the early 90s the Commercial Rooms had gone from 500 members to just 250. They had by then allowed female members but only 12 had signed up.

The Commercial Rooms are now a Wetherspoons pub.

Nice painting, mind.*