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40-42 Devonshire Rowd

42 Devonshire Road, Newton Villa

History of 42 Devonshire Road

The occupant of this house reported in 2020 that she thought that Mr Parmenter had had the house built for him originally. She wrote that the house was a coal merchants for many years and used to have a side access path that ran through to the light engineering works behind in what is now St Barnabas Court (was Mantles). In the back garden there were lots of foundations of walls from what may well have been mini coal/storage sheds. There were lots of bits of coal embedded in the soil of the  garden. There was an internal window between the front and middle rooms which looked like it could have been a cash/office hatch. There were still offices throughout the 1960s-90s. There was a dentist’s here at some stage. In the 1990s there were still  various offices downstairs and a flat upstairs. At that stage the whole house was pretty much open plan and there were office strip lights everywhere so it could be  assumed that the whole house had been offices for a number of years. It was converted into a single house after the current owner moved in in the 1990s. Knowing that Douglas Adams lived in the area they have often joked that the house name (Newton Villa) and number (42) provided him with 42 being the answer to everything!

1901:

Edward Parmenter, railway engine driver

1911: –

1913:

Edward Parmenter, engine driver

1962:

B Stacey and Sons, coke and coal merchants

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