No.1 Co-op

Back in June 2021 (gosh, I thought I'd written that post only a couple of months ago, but it turns out to be nearly 18 months since it was done!) I wrote about the former No.1 Co-op store down on Derby Road, close to the new supermarket, the chip shop, and Belton Road. Before the Co-op was built, the land was close to the Charnwood Forest Railway, and adjacent to the Wood Brook. 

Pictured in 2020

Detail from 2020

I think it was sometime the year before, so, in 2020, that the former Co-op, which was then an Oriental restaurant, had been sold, and was being converted to flats: the June 2021 post was a record of progress with that conversion, but also a brief history of the Co-op stores, the movement having definitely been active in Loughborough from around 1866. The Derby Road Co-op, despite being called 'No.1' was not the first Co-op in Loughborough, that honour going to the store on Wood Gate, coincidentally, now an Oriental restaurant.

Detail of the Wood Gate store

At the time, it was a puzzle as to why the Derby Road Co-op was called the No.1 Co-op, having been built in 1926. 

Several theories had emerged:

*Was it the first Co-op in Knightthorpe? It could not have been the first Co-op store in Loughborough, as the store on Wood Gate opened in the 1860s

*Had the Loughborough Co-operative Society merged with another local society, and this was the first building to be built and occupied by the merged Society?

*Was it a road number? Perhaps intended to be the start of Alan Moss Road?

*Was it the first of Loughborough's buildings to be clad in Hathernware faience tiles?

*Was it the first to be built along the Charnwood Forest railway line, with others planned along the route?

*Was it the first self-service Co-op in the area?

A recent chance conversation on Facebook, about the No.1 Co-op in Farnborough, has led me to what I believe might be the answer. I might not quite have got the dates right, but I think it does all have to do with parish boundaries.

At one time Loughborough was surrounded by a number of different parishes, including Woodthorpe to the south, Knightthorpe, and Thorpe Acre cum, or with,  Dishley, the latter two being northwest of Loughborough. 

In 1871, Knight Thorpe is described in Wilson's 'Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales', as "a township in Loughborough parish, Leicester; near Loughborough. Real property, £1,533. Population, 58. Houses, 12."

The same source describes Dishley-Cum-Thorpe Acre, as "a parish in the Loughborough district, Leicester; adjacent to the river Soar and the Midland railway, 1.5 miles NW of Loughborough. Post town, Loughborough. Acres, 890. Real property, £1,742. Population, 194. Houses, 54. Bakewell, the distinguished agricultural improver, lived and laboured here; and has bequeathed to the place marked benefits of his skill. The living is in the diocese of Peterborough. Value, £150. Patron, the Bishop of Peterborough. The church was built in 1845 [designed by William Railton]. A school has £11 from endowment, and other charities £11."

By 1925 this had all changed, as shown by the following extract from Kelly's 1925 directory. This explains that by an Order of the County Council, confirmed by Local Government Board Order, which came into operation on 25th March 1892, parts of the parishes of Knight Thorpe, and Dishley with Thorpe Acre were constituted the new parish of Knight Thorpe, and parts of the parishes of Garendon and Dishley with Thorpe Acre constituted the present parish of Dishley with Thorpe Acre, and parts of the parishes of Garendon, Knight Thorpe and Dishley with Thorpe Acre formed into the new parish of Garendon.

So, looking at a map of the municpal boundary, i.e. post-1888 when the borough became incorporated, it appears that the Knightthorpe boundary runs alongside the Wood Brook, down to part of what is now the university campus, and up past the site of the No.1 Co-op (X marks the spot), along what is now Belton Road.

As the No.1 Co-op built in 1926 on Derby Road, is on the Derby side of the Wood Brook, it might therefore follow that the store, being outside the boundary of Loughborough, was the first one to be built in Knightthorpe parish. But I could be wrong!

Anyway, over the years there have been, and indeed still are, various Co-op stores across town including, on Loughborough High Street and Swan Street, on Lansdowne Drive, on the site of the Maltings pub off Epinal Way, on Nottingham Road, on Derwent Drive and on Ashby Road.

And so the renovation continues ...

Photographed November 2022

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posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

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Dyer, Lynne (2022). No.1 Co-op. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2022/12/no1-co-op.html [Accessed 4 December 2022]

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