The Town and Country Club, Bradford - October 2010

Explored with nij

History from the Telegraph & Argus.

The old Mecca Locarno cost £550,000 when it opened in Manningham Lane in the early 1960s on the site of a former roller skating arena which was burned to the ground in 1955.

It later became known as Dollars and Dimes and the Palace before the venue was bought by Mr Majid in 1990 and became known as Maestros. It was then turned into Penningtons by Bradford businessman John Pennington who sold it in 2003 when it became the Town and Country.

Property developer Mr Majid remained tight-lipped about his plans for the site, but offered assurances that it would be a development the area would be "proud of".


Thanks for looking

The last one was clever!I do like old leisure venues and its good you included some old stuff too.The freezer looked suitably rank,did it hum at all?

Cheers. Yeah that freezer absolutely reeked. There was two others, one empty one and a chest one with a load of brown goo in the bottom, I couldn't even hold that open long enough to photo!

i was one of the djs here 90-93,the revolving stage was the best part,also had a monster lighting rig.the owner also had the mall and McMillans. hit man and her if you remember that?

woody65 said:

i was one of the djs here 90-93,the revolving stage was the best part,also had a monster lighting rig.the owner also had the mall and McMillans. hit man and her if you remember that?

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Sadly I do remember it..Pete Waterman and Michaela Strachan was it?

Ah, that's why the middle part of the floor was missing! The lighting rig is still there. There also appears to be some sort of lighting workshop in the basement, along with all the manuals and a partially completed neon sign.

Don't recall Hit man and her, although I was only 11/12 in 1993 and not living in this area heh

....The horror... the horror...

Good report Kook. Like the 3rd picture. Thats Buddy Holly on the left innit.

Thanks very much. It could well be, although I can't find any record of him performing there, he did perform at the Gaumont (ODEON).

I did find out this little nugget though:
Second from left is Barry Goodwin who moved from the Locarno Wakefield. Regional Mecca Director at Bradford was later Wilf Preen, who I replaced at Wakefield.

I was wondering

Not a Corrie Fan then? Each bar was named after a soap, so there was Brookside, Corrie, Eastenders etc. In the cellar each beer line was named as such, like Brookie Fosters.

KooK. said:

Not a Corrie Fan then? Each bar was named after a soap, so there was Brookside, Corrie, Eastenders etc. In the cellar each beer line was named as such, like Brookie Fosters.

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Not really. More of a young doctors and albion market fan.

TranKmasT said:

Not really. More of a young doctors and albion market fan.

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Albion market was sad but like the inclusion of Joseph Conrad