(A) Handsworth Council House and Library
Handsworth Library (Grade II listed) was built in 1878 as both the local council house and public library for Handsworth Borough Council. It was incorporated into Birmingham in 1911.
(B) Shri Guru Ravidass Bhawan
The Shri Guru Ravidass Cultural Association (Birmingham) is a registered charity based at the Shri Guru Ravidass Bhawan (Temple) in Handsworth. The temple was founded in the 1960s by immigrants from Punjab in North India from the Ravidassia community.
Ravidassia means someone who follows the teaching of Shri Guru Ravidass Ji – a saint and philosopher from the 15th Century in North India. Shri Guru Ravidass Ji’s teachings primarily champion devotion to God, spiritual contentment, and denouncement of casteism and prejudice. Shri Guru Ravidass Ji himself was a proponent of the Bhakti movement in India which includes other saints such as Guru Nanak Dev Ji, Tulsidas and Kabir. The teachings of saints and philosophers in India mainly focused on helping alleviate the pain and struggles of the ordinary people; and giving them freedom from the rituals and formality of the so called higher castes. Over time however, with the arrival of the British and the Independence of India, many people who were oppressed by the caste system had the chance to improve their lives and break free from the cycle of oppression and humiliation. It is from those early pioneers that the Ravidassia community found it’s way into the West and to countries as far apart as UK, USA, Canada, Western Europe, The Middle East, and Australia.
The Bhawan is the focal point of the Ravidassia community in Birmingham and it provides a place for religious and communal functions including ceremonies, registrations and celebrations. The Bhawan is a place for the community to meet with each other, to discuss important issues, and to get support if required. The aim of the Shri Guru Ravidass Cultural Association (Birmingham) is to promote the Ravidassia community, it’s people and also develop inter-faith relations with other community groups in Birmingham. Another important function is in it’s charity work to help the disadvantaged amongst us.
Source: http://gururavidassbhawan.org/about/
(C) Cannon Street Memorial Baptist Church
The church's website says: We are based in the heart of a unique and diverse community. We are a warm, caring and friendly church, working with people of all ages, the community and other local churches. We would love you to join us in a blend of traditional and modern worship giving praise to God, so we can share the message and blessings with you.
Source: http://csmbc.co.uk
The church has been undertaking an oral history project. For more details go to : http://www.search.digitalhandsworth.org.uk/ then type 'cannon' into the search box.
(D) The Excelda Works
The Excelda works was built by W H Collins, a typical Birmingham firm manufacturing "toys", not toys in the way we know them today, but the old meaning such as thimbles, propelling pencils, fancy spoons and the like. I do not know when Collins vacated the building, but it has since been turned to asian textile manufacture, and currently lies empty awaiting demolition. A care home will replace it. I do not know if the fine late 20's frontage is to be retained, lets hope so! (Late on in its life the works was used by Malhi Laminating Limited and Anywear International Limited).
Lisa Andrews says: March 27th, 2011. I have a reprinted extract from ‘Goldsmiths Journal’, March 1927, a feature was written on the history of W H Collins & Co, Excelda Works, Rookery Road, Handsworth. It says the business was started about 60 years previously by Walter Collins. The feature shows a picture of my great grandfather, Edward Marston,aged 75, at work, apparently the boss would send his driver to collect him to help with seasonal demands. My grandfather is stated as a ‘jeweller’ or gold cutter’ on all census’ from 1871 to 1911. I have the engagement and wedding rings of my grandmother, made by my great grandfather.
Sources:http://www.28dayslater.co.uk and
http://handsonhandsworth.info/2010/11/17/excelda-works-do-you-know-its-story/#comment-2080
(E) Gurdwara Yaad Baba Deep Singh Ji Shaheed
A newly built Gurdwara which has replaced an old Victorian building on Holyhead Road. No details available.
(F) Tu Dam Buddhist Temple
The temple was purchased by the Midlands Buddhist Association in 2002 following an intensive fundraising effort across the community. The building was formerly a working men’s club and a team of dedicated volunteers have spent the last few years converting it into a beautiful chanting hall and a community resource centre. The grand opening on Sunday 8th October 2006 celebrated the completion of the major conversion. The day began with a traditional street procession into the chanting hall including drums and lion dancing lead by monks and nuns. According to Wikipedia the temple hosted the worlds's largest jade Buddha in 2011.
The Midlands Vietnamese Community Association (MVCA) is the principal Vietnamese community organisation in Birmingham. Throughout its 18-year existence it has sought to promote and advance the interests of the Vietnamese community as a whole, and to provide personal advice and assistance in areas such as language interpretation and translation, housing and settlement, welfare benefits, employment, education and training. Outside London, Birmingham has the largest settlement of Vietnamese in the UK, estimated currently at around 3,500 persons. Compared with some ethnic communities, the Birmingham Vietnamese are quite geographically concentrated, with over half living in just five of the City's 39 Wards - Handsworth, Soho, Aston, Sandwell, and Ladywood.
Sources: http://www.bbc.co.uk/birmingham/content/articles/2006/10/12/vietnamese_buddhist_temple_opening_feature.shtml
http://www.search.digitalhandsworth.org.uk/engine/resource/exhibition/standard/default.asp?theme=&originator=%2Fengine%2Ftheme%2Fdefault.asp&page=4&records=3829&direction=2&pointer=6058&text=1&resource=3640
(G) Guru Nanak Nishkam Sewak Jatha
Guru Nanak Nishkam Sewak Jatha is a faith-led 'not for profit' organisation dedicated to practising and promoting Nishkam (selfless) service in the name of Guru Nanak Dev Ji (1469 - 1539) the founder of the Sikh Dharam (religion). The building was established in 1977 with the transformation of a small Polish club into a Sikh place of worship. Today it is one of the largest establishments of its kind outside India, serving over 30,000 visitors every week. Next to the Gurdwara is the Nishkam Civiv Association which engages with the wider community in a wide range of activities.
Source: www.sikhiwiki.org/index.php/Guru_Nanak_Nishkam_Sewak_Jatha
(H) Villa Road Methodist Church
Methodism (from Greek: μ?θοδος - methodos, "pursuit of knowledge" is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother Charles was instrumental in writing much of the hymnody of the Methodist Church. George Whitefield, another significant leader in the movement, was known for his unorthodox ministry of itinerant open-air preaching. The Methodist Church is known for its missionary work, and its establishment of hospitals, universities, orphanages, soup kitchens, and schools to follow Jesus' command to spread the Good News and serve all people. The church website says: We are a friendly medium-sized church. Our services contain a variety of worship styles. Children, babies to teenagers are very welcome. We enjoy fellowship with the local Anglican and Baptist Churches. Many of our members originate from the Caribbean, African countries and other overseas countries.
Source: http://www.birminghamchurches.org.uk/churches/villa-road-methodist/
(I) St Michael's Parish Church
St Michael's Church (Grade II listed) dates back to 1850. It would have been built to cater for the expansion of Handsworth in the early Victorian era. It was designed by William Bourne of Dudley, and is built of sandstone. The spire was added in 1868 and can be seen for miles around, particularly when coming up the hill from Winson Green, and from Handsworth Park. A new sensory garden has been created on the site of theold church hall. The plants originate from all over the world to celebrate the diversity of the area.
Source: http://handsonhandsworth.info/files/2011/03/A_brief_history_of_St_Michael_s_Handsworth.pdf
(J) The Rhodes Almshouses
Almshouses are charitable housing provided to enable people (typically elderly people who can no longer work to earn enough to pay rent) to live in a particular community. They are often targeted at the poor of a locality, at those from certain forms of previous employment, or their widows, and are generally maintained by a charity or the trustees of a bequest. Many almshouses were European Christian institutions though some are secular.
Alms are, in the Christian tradition, money or services donated to support the poor and indigent. Almshouses were established from the 10th century in Britain, to provide a place of residence for poor, old and distressed folk. The first recorded almshouse was founded in York by King Athelstan; the oldest still in existence is the Hospital of St. Cross in Winchester, dating to about 1132. In the Middle Ages, the majority of European hospitals functioned as almshouses.
These almshouses (Grade II listed) were erected in 1871 at the request of Matilda Juliana Rhodes in memory of her husband John Rhodes on a piece of land worth 43 pounds 6 shillings (a shilling is 5p in new money). They contained separate sets of rooms to accommodate 16 ladies in 'reduced circumstances'. Over 200 years later the houses were sold at auction for over £500,000 to be used as residential accommodation.
Source: http://handsonhandsworth.info/handsworth-heritage-trail/ and Wikipedia.
(K) Soho Road
The Wednesbury Turnpike was set up in 1727 along the present Soho Road/ Holyhead Road. Largely a new road via existing village tracks, it left Birmingham from Bull Street and Snow Hill via Constitution Hill, Great Hampton Street and Hockley Hill, before ascending Soho Hill to what is now the Holyhead Road. At the bottom of Constitution Hill and at Villa Road were tollgates and keeper's cottages which operated until the road was disturnpiked in 1870. This was a vital busy route bringing coal from the Black Country to the iron furnaces of Birmingham. However, it traffic must have decreased dramatically with the opening of the Birmingham Canal to Wednesbury in 1769. In 1781 William Hutton noted of the road: “To Wolverhampton, thirteen miles, much improved since the coal-teams left it.” The road takes its present name from the London-Holyhead Mail Road set up after the 1801 Act of Union when further improvements were made to enable Irish MPs easier access to the port of Holyhead. Thomas Telford raised the road level across the valley of Hockley Brook and reduced the height of Soho Hill. A milestone has survived inscribed: “111 miles from London. 3 miles from Birmingham. 10 miles from Wolverhampton”. and is now in the grounds of St James's School nearby. The road was disturnpiked in 1870.
Source: http://www.ramsdale.org/birmingham.htm
Benjamin Zephaniah was born in Handsworth, and has written a poem about Soho Road, which is included in 'A Picture of Britain' and begins:
Handsworth wakes
But Handsworth never sleeps
And Soho road is where the heart beats,
Industrious it has always been
And the people have always been keen
To say ‘Good Day’ and welcome you
And do what must be done they do.......
For the rest please see http://www.bbc.co.uk/birmingham/content/articles/2005/05/11/poem_handsworth_wakes_feature.shtml
For a discussion of the religious faiths mentioned, please see Wikipedia.
HANDSWORTH
In 1831, the Ordnance Survey Map of Birmingham showed Handsworth to be a village of 6 houses close to St Mary's Church, situated in heathland with a few houses and farms dotted about. To the south was the Soho Road (the Holyhead Turnpike) with the villages of Soho and Soho Hill adjacent. South of the Soho Road was Boulton's estate centred on the Hockley Brook which stretched all the way from Soho House to Nineveh Road opposite what is now the college, and contained the large pool used to power the Soho Manufactory until 1863. Then south of that again was the empty expanse of Birmingham Heath, bisected by the old and new Birmingham Canals.
In only 80 years the entire countryside would be filled with houses, churches and schools, with factories, hospitals and the asylum relegated to the area around the canal (now Winson Green). In 1911 Handsworth (which was then in Staffordshire) was absorbed into Birmingham. The situation of high employment in heavy metal working industry was maintained up until the end of the Second World war, when labour shortages led to the arrival of workers, mainly from the West Indies, but also from the Indian sub-continent, the Sikhs being prominent amongst them. Unfortunately decline of a lot of heavy manufacturing industry followed, leading to unemployment. The early settlers were joined by people from many other lands, leading to Handsworth being a relatively poor but uniquely multiracial place, not without its tensions.
Handsworth represents many of the features of contemporary Birmingham:
• A change in the local economy from manufacturing to service industries. As local manufacturing has declined in recent decades, Handsworth’s economy shifted towards retail, leisure and the arts. New businesses emerged, created by and serving the needs of Handsworth’s and Britain’s diverse communities such as East End Foods, Thandi Coaches and a kaleidoscope of restaurants and shops.
• An area where different communities have settled. In the 19th century, Handsworth became home to people of Scottish, Irish and Jewish origin. After 1945 Polish refugees and migrants from the West Indies and South Asia settled in the district. In the 1980s Handsworth became the most important local place of settlement for displaced Vietnamese boat people and more recently, it has become a home for asylum seekers and refugees from Afghanistan, Africa, Eastern Europe, Iran and Iraq.
• Religious activity representing many world faiths and diverse sects. Handsworth has been the location of Anglican, Methodist, Presbyterian and Christadelphian congregations. The Rastafarians, Jehovah’s Witnesses, the New Testament Church of Christ and Asian Christians have places of worship there. There are also Hindu mandirs, Muslim mosques and Sikh gurdwaras in the area
• The importance of the arts within the local cultural scene. Musicians such as Ruby Turner, Joan Armatrading, Apache Indian and Steel Pulse hail from Handsworth and the area is a home to British bhangra. Photographers such as Vanley Burke, Pogus Caesar and Sukhvinder Singh Ubhi also reside in Handsworth. The poet Benjamin Zephaniah was born in Handsworth.