Pillar & Co newsagents and toy shop, Lower Street, Dartmouth, Devon, England, UK
When eighteen year old Dartmouth Grenadier Guardsman, William George Pillar, lost a leg in the fierce fighting during the Third Battle of Ypres (today commonly referred to simply as Passchendaele), it meant that he was unable to return to his previous civilian trade. On returning home, ably assisted by his sister Nora and together with the help of his mother Ellen, he opened a small newsagent and sweet shop at 2 Lower Street on 11th August 1919. Sometime later the business expanded into 1 Lower Street the more spacious corner location next door. When George’s brother Wilfred retired from the Royal Navy in 1936 he also joined the growing business. Being a newsagent they quite obviously sold newspapers and magazines but it has always stocked a plethora of sweets, tobacco and cigarettes, stationery, postcards, greetings cards, buckets and spades, crab lines, toys and games. At one point in its history it also ran a lending library! After World War II Wilfred’s sons Edgar and Eric were at the helm and when Edgar died his widow Wendy continued in the business. Then, when Eric and his wife Jessie decided it was time to retire after 40 years, the business was officially handed over in 1986 to Edgar’s son Jonathan and his wife Julie and Jonathan’s brother in law Gordon Barnes and wife Bridget (Edgar’s daughter). Jonathan had previously been working in the Model Railway Department in Mansell’s Models in Paignton and Gordon had been working in a fruit packing factory in Kent. Now with the business celebrating its 90th anniversary this year it is certainly one of the oldest surviving family concerns in Dartmouth.
Size: 4680px × 7020px
Location: Lower Street, Dartmouth, Devon, England, United Kingdom
Photo credit: © Jeff Gilbert / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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