The Chronical and Advertiser 24 December 1952
Next door to Poplar Farm is an interesting building, which bears the inscription “The Castle” on its gable ends. Nowadays “The Castle” is a shop, but until a few years before World War 1 it flourished as a public house.
Extensive cellars ran under the premises, and at the rear, in the entry by Poplar Farm, there stands an ancient yew with a hook set in one of its arms. The tree was used as a derrick for the lowering of beer casks into the cellar.
Over the way, in New Street, is the black and white barn or yore that served as a village hall. In the time of Mr. Thomas Cooper, licensee at “The Castle,” the barn was used as a granary and skittles alley.
That was when patrons could be assured of six pints of good beer for a shilling.
At the turn of the century the licensing laws were different to what they are now and, on a Sunday, only a bona-fide traveller could get a drink. Three miles was the qualifying distance, and when The Castle public house in Chester Road opened at 6pm, there was invariably a thirsty queue from Birmingham waiting outside.
Business was business, so the city influx could not be denied. The Villager, however, did not take kindly to the Sunday invasion, and an incident at The Castle soured whatever welcome the visitors may have had later.
It was during one Christmas that Mrs. Cooper, a widow, and licensee, was preparing for Christmas dinner but had to leave off to serve in the bar. After tending to the travellers’ needs, she dashed back to look at her Christmas pudding which she had left boiling on the tap room fire. It had vanished.
Can it be that a certain local antipathy towards strangers from Birmingham had its origins in the mysterious disappearance of a Christmas pudding?
