There are many ways to walk around Childwall, one may walk around the Parish boundary, or maybe just around the heart of the Village and take in the tour of the Church and Graveyard.

I plan to take you on a long and varied tour starting in the heart of the village having just left the Church and now crossing over the road towards the Childwall Abbey Pub which has been featured in the previous page. Up Childwall Abbey Road past the Gatehouse, around the Triangle for a look at shops in days gone by, down towards the fiveways for information on the 'Farm', turning left on Queens Drive to head up to Woolton Road, turning left and going past the old Dudlow Lane Pumping Station, carry on down Woolton road past Childwall C of E School, heading out towards the roundabout of Childwall Park Avenue/Woolton Road, heading through the gate at the edge of Childwall Woods, through Childwall Woods in to Childwall Fields, out of Childwall Fields to Childwall Cross, then up Childwall Lane past the church and along to Score Lane. At each stage on the tour you can read up on current and past information.

Records on a Vicarage go back all the way to 1307 when a dwelling place for the newly-created Vicar was provided for in the endowment by the rector of the vicarage, dated 17th December 1307, on a piece of ground next to the church called Greenland.

In the churchwardens books, the Vicarage is first mentioned in 1572, 1574 and in 1657, the parish to pay for repairs of the "vicaridge" house.

The Vicarage house, out-housing and an acre of land, worth in all 2, 10s. a year, appears in Mr. Marklands revenue statement of 1714. The terrier of 1728 describes it as containing a house, brew house, granary, barn, stable, and cow-house, with a kitchen garden and an acre of lane, apart from some glebe in Little Woolton and Childwall.
The terrier of 1778 gives fuller details, and we see it was then a stone and slated building, 36 feet by 33 feet, with hall, parlour, kitchen, pantry, milkhouse and cellar, and four rooms above. The above picture (centre and right) of the Vicarage is on the grounds what is now the Church Hall and was demolished in the 1930s. Before demolition took place, a new Vicarage was built further up Childwall Abbey Road and the entrance was next to the road entrance to what was Childwall Hall, and is now Lime Pictures. This is now a privately owned house but before the sale took place, part of the land was sold off behind the Church Hall and a new Vicarage now stands.

Today, the shops around the Triangle produce a very good place to shop, with many different outlets. However while the shops themselves have undergone many changes, it is the area that has gone considerable change even in the last 100 years.

Standing in the same place over 100 years ago, you wouldn't be shopping, but rather you would be standing in a sandstone quarry! Not only was this a large quarry, there were also changes to the road layout and was also home to a couple of large exclusive houses.

Walking down Taggart Avenue (which was once called Park Road) up to Stand Park road, this was once called Rabbit Lane. However Rabbit Lane, while taking the same route at it does today, stopped around the location of what is now Highville Road and turned left rather than carrying on to Childwall Park Avenue (as Childwall Park Avenue wasn't there 100 years ago!). The lane then followed part of Highville road as it is today but then came out opposite the top of Childwall Abbey Road. The location today would be part of the Alleyway that runs behind the shops on the left hand side. At the junction of Dunbabin Road, there were two large houses.
On the left hand side one was called Stand House and what was Rabbit Lane is now called Stand Park Road taking the Stand from the house name and the Park Road from the name what is now Taggart Avenue.
On the right hand side of Dunbabin Road was a house called "Hill Top". Now long gone, the only remains is the name which is given to Hilltop Road which can be found off Dunbabin Road.

The colour photo above left was taken in 1960 by Mr Dale and shows his fathers tobacconist/confectioners shop, which was owned, from 1938 to 1965. In 1965 it was taken over and remained a tobacconist/confectioners shop but changed hands again a few years later when it was bought by a Larry Hodgson. It was subsequently sold to Ricafeg who only used it for a short time as they had bought the shop on the other block, which then became RS McColl. Ricafeg sold 94 Childwall Priory Road to Sylvia Rose who bought what was Dorothy Rennies shop knocking them through in to one.

The black and white photo above shows (what is now Martins on the corner) Kirkland Jennings Bakers and this had a tea-room above it. The entrance was on Taggart Avenue and the black and white picture shows a walled area and you can still see where it was today. There was a small gate to the entrance and you went in and up the stairs to the tea-room. Also note the way the car is parked, as prior to 1961, this was a two-way road.
The Welfare Food Distribution Centre in Dunbabin Road used to give out free orange juice to passing youngsters after the war. Also the Post Office corner where the ATM machine is now in the wall used to be a stairway to the flat above the post office. This was part of Childwall Radio/ Childwall Wireless and contained booths where you could listen to gramophones before buying them.

Childwall Priory Farm
(Pictures from a private collection)

Childwall Priory was a farmhouse and is said to have stood on the location for over 500 years before being demolished in the early 1930s. The Church-like side was added in the 1820s and perhaps this is where it gets the name Priory from.

The drive way appears to be more or less the same position as the small alleyway leading off Childwall Valley Road next to the Dentist shop to get around the rear of the shops. It follows the same line as the alleyway towards Orton Road and the farm appears to have been placed between what is now Orton Road and Paignton Road.