The Richard Spooner Column: A journalist 's haven, bar none�

After a flood* of emails, I 'm delighted to tell you that the boss has given me the opportunity for a more frequent column in this space.

Sadly, I have to resume with an old hack 's lament brought about by a different flood** of emails.

This regards the demise of several drinking establishments in Birmingham and one in particular situated near the parish which used to house the old Birmingham Post and Mail offices in the Colmore Circus district of the city centre.

The Crown, sadly, has called last orders after 134 years in business.

Situated at the corner of Newton Street close to Birmingham Crown Court and Queen Elizabeth Law Courts, the pub was built in 1888 and survived two World Wars.

Stonegate, Britain's biggest pub group with more than 4,500 sites in 2020, told BirminghamLive that it was pulling out of the building at the end of October.

A company statement simply said: "The pub will be closing at the end of October as the lease has terminated." Beyond that, it's possible future was not clarified.

The Crown was one, but not the favourite, watering hole for many journalists working at the Post and Mail offices virtually on a round-the-clock basis, publishing a multi-edition evening newspaper, two editions of a morning paper and the Sunday Mercury.

Clearly, there were a great number of potential customers form the newspaper world (and police from the nearby West Midlands headquarter for that matter) for all eating a drinking establishments in that area. There was a thirsty and hungry captured audience within the newspapers ' portals.

And that was despite the fact that the Post and Mail building had its own pub (The Printers ' Devil) and three restaurants of various standards.

But don 't run away with the idea that it was only the journalists who were partial to a mid-shift libation. The inkies (printers to the general public) were just as thirsty and hungry.

The favourite for many journalists and inkies alike was the historic Queen 's Head, which was opposite the Post and Mail building on Steelhouse Lane. It had a recent sojourn as the Jekyll and Hyde but reassuringly re-opened as the Queen 's Head in a more much upmarket format than its former namesake.

In those distant days the pub was renowned for its lunchtime buffet upstairs, set out on a large table as if you were visiting a friend for a family party.

And there was generally a party atmosphere in the bar, which was famous for its perpetually sticky carpet, earning it the nickname of the Glue Pot because it was so easy to stick in there.

The favourite pub for the inkies was the Old Contemptibles hostelry in Edmund Street. Thankfully, the pub survives as does the nearby Old Royal, once headquarters of Birmingham Press Club.

The pub most favoured by Birmingham Post journalists when it was published six days a week was the Gunmakers in Bath Street on the other side of the Aston Expressway.

Once the first edition of the Post was printing at about 10pm, the hacks would leap from their desks and breathlessly enter the Gunmakers via a pedestrian subway under the busy main road into Birmingham.

Thankfully, many pubs in the area are surviving but in a very different dressing from when it was the epicentre of newspaper production in the city.

*OK, a trickle

**OK, a dribble

JL