Cash tube systems
Posted: Sat 01 Nov, 2014 12:05 am
We've talked about these before - I believe I described the tube system in the old Yorkshire Post building on Albion Street but I can't use search at the moment to update it.
I came across a few memories of the systems at various Leeds shops here:
http://www.ids.u-net.com/cash/locations ... kshire.htm
<LEEDS. A corset shop, County Arcade. "I used to love the way Auntie Dolly's money was put into a round cylinder and sucked up a pipe to the cash office and then returned with the change." Brendan Sheerin. My life: a coach trip adventure. London: O'Mara, 2011, p.31
LEEDS. Hitchins. Tube system."At Hitchins department store in Leeds more than fifty years ago I was fascinated by these. They worked on a suction/vacuul principle." Mary Fisher in posting to DIYbanter.com 3/11/04
• "I can vividly remember, as a small child, the overhead lines running throughout Hitchen's shop, to enable your money to be sent, via a suction tube, to the cashiers' office." Cynthia on Leodis website
LEEDS. Lewis's, Headrow. Pneumatic tube system "including a tube room fifty feet below street level. It was connected by twenty-five miles of pneumatic tubing with the 250 change points in the store, the change returning to the points, it was boasted, at thirty miles an hour."Briggs "In 1932, at the age of 14, Mrs McNess got a job at Lewis's in the 'Tube Room' counting change and sending it back up to the shop floor." Methleys website
"Lewis's, Matthias Robinson and Schofields had an ingenious system of pneumatic pipes that took your money down to the cashiers in the bowels of the store. A hand-written slip was put into a canister with the cash, stuck in the pipe and away it went, only to return moments later with any change and the receipt. It never ceased to thrill as it shot back up the pipe with a satisfying thwuck!" This England, Winter 209, p.35
LEEDS. Matthias Robinson, Briggate. "With those roaring pneumatic tubes whose grey-capped cylinders fetched back your change from some distant basement". Alan Bennett in the Guardian, 1 Apr. 1994, p.7. "A Grace Brothers-type store with a lift and a lift-man." This England, Winter 209, p.35
LEEDS. Pygmalion. Cash Ball system. Information from Mrs Proctor.
LEEDS. Schofields. Pneumatic tube system throughout the store, including quick sale departments. (Hammond). Good photographs of cash office in 1987, when the shop relocated, at Secret Leeds website. Schofield's "did have a nice gentility to it". This England, Winter 2009, p.35>
So - what or where was 'Pygmalion', which Mrs Proctor recalled?
I came across a few memories of the systems at various Leeds shops here:
http://www.ids.u-net.com/cash/locations ... kshire.htm
<LEEDS. A corset shop, County Arcade. "I used to love the way Auntie Dolly's money was put into a round cylinder and sucked up a pipe to the cash office and then returned with the change." Brendan Sheerin. My life: a coach trip adventure. London: O'Mara, 2011, p.31
LEEDS. Hitchins. Tube system."At Hitchins department store in Leeds more than fifty years ago I was fascinated by these. They worked on a suction/vacuul principle." Mary Fisher in posting to DIYbanter.com 3/11/04
• "I can vividly remember, as a small child, the overhead lines running throughout Hitchen's shop, to enable your money to be sent, via a suction tube, to the cashiers' office." Cynthia on Leodis website
LEEDS. Lewis's, Headrow. Pneumatic tube system "including a tube room fifty feet below street level. It was connected by twenty-five miles of pneumatic tubing with the 250 change points in the store, the change returning to the points, it was boasted, at thirty miles an hour."Briggs "In 1932, at the age of 14, Mrs McNess got a job at Lewis's in the 'Tube Room' counting change and sending it back up to the shop floor." Methleys website
"Lewis's, Matthias Robinson and Schofields had an ingenious system of pneumatic pipes that took your money down to the cashiers in the bowels of the store. A hand-written slip was put into a canister with the cash, stuck in the pipe and away it went, only to return moments later with any change and the receipt. It never ceased to thrill as it shot back up the pipe with a satisfying thwuck!" This England, Winter 209, p.35
LEEDS. Matthias Robinson, Briggate. "With those roaring pneumatic tubes whose grey-capped cylinders fetched back your change from some distant basement". Alan Bennett in the Guardian, 1 Apr. 1994, p.7. "A Grace Brothers-type store with a lift and a lift-man." This England, Winter 209, p.35
LEEDS. Pygmalion. Cash Ball system. Information from Mrs Proctor.
LEEDS. Schofields. Pneumatic tube system throughout the store, including quick sale departments. (Hammond). Good photographs of cash office in 1987, when the shop relocated, at Secret Leeds website. Schofield's "did have a nice gentility to it". This England, Winter 2009, p.35>
So - what or where was 'Pygmalion', which Mrs Proctor recalled?