The Gardeners Call Public House Luton
The Gardener's Call June 2011
The Gardener’s Call Public House: 151 High Town Road, Luton
The countywide licensing register of 1876 reveals that James Nicholls’ beerhouse, which had no sign or name at that point, was first licensed in 1869 and was owned by Simpson & Company of Baldock [Hertfordshire]. The title deed to the property, which is at Hertfordshire Archives service at Hertford, dates to 1872 which indicates that that is the date at which Simpson & Company bought it.
Bedfordshire and Luton Archives and Records Service has very little in the way of records for the Gardener’s Call because of its ownership by an out-county brewery. The beerhouse became a fully licensed public house on 28th March 1956. Simpson & Company was floated on the Stock Market in 1935 as Simpson’s Brewery Limited. It was acquired by Suffolk brewers Greene King in 1954 and in 1963 changed its name to Greene King (Baldock) Limited. At the time of writing [2011] the Gardener’s Call remains open as a public house.
- PSL6/1: Register of Alehouse Licences - Luton Petty Sessional Division: 1872-1876;
- CRT110/102: title deeds in Hertfordshire Record Office: 1872;
- Z1169/8/46/7-13: plans of proposed alterations for Simpson & Co.: 1904. Block plan, ground plan showing room designations, cellar plan, section and elevations. 1" to 8ft, block plan 1" to 41.66ft. 1904.
Licencees: note that this is not a complete list and that dates in italics are not necessarily beginning or end dates, merely the first/last date which can be confirmed from sources such as directories and deeds:
1872-1877: James Nicholls;
1885-1894: Henry Sharp;
1920-1940: Charles Taylor;
1957-1958: Leslie Cecil Guage;
1958-1959: Frank Smithson Stringer;
1959-1966: Frank Edward Sewell;
1966-1967: Derek Ernest Harold Buckland;
1967-1973: Alfred William Bolton Clark;
1973-1980: William Jackson;
1980-1984: Andrew Gibson;
1984-1993: Peter Parks;
1993: Connell Sammon and Elizabeth Jane Adams.