Upon reading about the demise of yet another Potteries pub, I went off in search of someone who could tell me a little more about it.

You may be surprised to know that the Holly Bush, in Keelings Lane, Northwood, was briefly kept by local historian and author Alan Myatt.

Alan, below, whose volume on Trentham was recently published by Amberley Books, is now aged 73 and married to Glynis.

They ran the boozer as tenants between February 1985 and February 1986, and as newcomers to the licensing trade, found it a very steep learning curve.

Alan recalls some of the artists who performed at the pub, including Gerry Orbison Grant, who many people remember as being the next best thing to the incomparable Roy Orbison.

Alan Myatt

However, another act that appeared at the pub had a greater novelty value.

“We were approached by a little chap in a wheelchair named Lindsay who asked if we would feature his group,” says Alan.

“They were all disabled in some way through dwarfism, and they called themselves the Poison Dwarfs.

“They were brilliant and everyone loved them.

“We also advertised exotic dancers on Sunday lunchtimes and they packed us out.

“They weren’t exactly strippers, but they were scantily dressed and they performed on a table.

“The customers had their jukebox favourites, particularly Secret Love by Doris Day.”

The Holly Bush also played host to a pigeon club that met on one Sunday in a month and offered bingo for pensioners on Thursday nights, with Alan calling the numbers.

The rigours of the trade soon took their toll on Alan.

“We had to pay into a decorating fund each month for pub decoration,” he smiles grimly. “But another thing that began to get to me was the smoking.

“As a non-smoker, I found it hard to take and so Glynis and I bought a newsagents in Pembrokeshire.

“Ansells kept the decorating money when we left, saying the whole place needed decorating.

“Funny that, as we had only been there for a year and the pub looked just the same when we left as when we started.”

Then again, perhaps some re-decoration was indeed required in the toilets, as a piece of graffiti in marker pen – “THE THING 85” – kept appearing in the gents’ despite Alan’s best efforts to erase it.

“It was our first foray into self employment,” declares Alan, “and we quickly learned that most people would try to rip you off, customers and management alike.

“We had to learn very quickly to trust no one, and if you could make a quick buck, then do so.

“As new landlords we attracted all the conmen who had been barred by the previous tenant.

“One respectable looking Indian gent offering his gold cufflinks in exchange for booze, and a smartly dressed little man who was a regular, asked for a couple of pints on tick. We never saw him again.

“The optic containing port
seemed to be going down rather quickly, despite no one serving it frequently.

“We discovered that one customer could stretch over the bar and help himself.”

The Holly Bush

Alan tells me that one patron imbibed Burton Cask Ale and was regularly critical of its quality, always holding his pint up to the light to see if it was cloudy.

“One evening,” Alan continues, “he did his usual check, grumbling about the quality.

“I took his pint from him and poured him another, which he carefully inspected, judging it to be a beautiful pint.

“I placed the previous pint I’d served him beneath the bar until he came back for a second pint.

“I then put a top of froth on the previously rejected pint and served it to him. He painstakingly inspected it and declared it to be another beautiful pint.”

With his interest in the trade fast fading, Alan announced to his customers that he was holding a Grumpy Night.

They were puzzled, asking him what he meant.

He explains: “I informed them that tonight I could be as grumpy as I liked and they had to smile and be nice to me – a reversal of our usual roles.”

Alan concludes that he and Glynis enjoyed much about this brief flirtation with the pub trade, but with the hours being so long, there was precious little time for anything else in his life.

He adds that he still misses the jukebox – and the exotic dancers!