Squire of Ealing

Name: Chris Edwards
Comment: Squires was a musical instrument shop, sold pianos, etc, situated in the parade of shops in Ealing Broadway, about halfway between the Town Hall and Christchurch. The record department was in the basement. Dusty Springfield worked in the record department, as a teenager, before her singing fame.
(22 October 2014)

Name: Jon Savage
Comment: I remember Squires very well. I started going there by myself in 1963, it was just off my daily journey to school. The record section was down a spiral staircase. The ground floor was quite staid, full of radiograms - this was the period when record players had to look like expensive bits of furniture - but downstairs was space age with the latest records on display. The first record I bought there was Del Shannon's Hey Little Girl and then it was Beatles, Beatles all the way.
(25 February 2015)

Name: Terry Norris.
Comment: I used to work at Squire of Ealing. It was my first job from leaving school, think the year was 1976. I worked in the piano workshop at the rear of the buildings, old cobbled paths. I wanted to work my way up to the television repair workshop that was above the piano workshop. I used to go and watch, ask questions to the radio repair guy whose repair bench was on the landing between the piano and television workshops.

I left the company after being turned down a position to move up to the television workshop which was my passion to get into at the time. I got the break i needed with British Relay TV in Hanwell and several years later went back to Squires into the TV section where I became a field engineer for TV repairs and AV installer.

Things were very much different when Roy Squire owned the business, very much a high class of service given to customers, but it all changed when the business was sold to Currys group service. That's when the beautiful shopfront turned into the pic as it was here after the sell out. Still sad to see that "Closed" notice just painted onto the front. I enjoyed quite a few years working there with Mr Reed, Frank Firth, Oliver, Tony the service manager (TV), Mick Giltrow, Fred our aerial installer, George Knoller(french polisher), Harry (tuning), Roger(strings), Bernard Carrier(aka Pigeon), he was the boss, always reminded me of the toy maker in Pinocchio. Barry (piano actions), Mick O'Shea RIP - Mick died suddenly, couldnt believe the news that day, he was only 23 I think. Yes, Squires has a lot of fond memories for me.
(29 October 2015)

Name: Brian Eakins
Comment: I was a Manager at 12 New Broadway and Squires unloaded pianos behind my branch  - they used to block our spaces! We kept the car repos there, nice guy Sid was a worker.
(13 December 2015)

Name: Douglas Reynolds
Comment: Nice to hear about Squires, I started work there in 1961 and worked with Fred installing aerials and later repairing radios, record players, then into repair of TVs as an apprentice. I remember Tony and Mick Giltrow, in our dinner breaks we were either playing darts, cards or snooker, I also remember the piano side where the French polishing was done by hand, it was beautiful until they went to a spray. I also saw Sid James a number of times outside the shop, never did see him in the shop, had good times there but went to work for Radio Rentals as I was getting married and moving to Bedford.
(20 March 2016)

Name: Ken Cromey
Comment: I worked at Squires of Ealing from 1948 until 1952 when I left there to do my National Service. The record counter stretched from inside the door on the left to the stairway. Customers could ask for a record at the counter, and go into one of the booths, and play it, before deciding whether to purchase it. The rest of the shop floor was mainly taken up with pianos, for which Squires were well known. The TV department was downstairs, and they had a smaller shop opposite Christ Church. I was an indentured apprentice TV and Radio Engineer earning 25 shillings a week, which was a joke as during my time there I learned nothing except how to climb ladders, and install TV Arials, working with Freddie Lane, and then Freddie Ford, both of whom I enjoyed working with. The TV repair workshop was at the end of the alley opposite Christ Church. I remember Frank,
Cyril, Tony, who were some of the repairmen, and Chris Nolder who was a boy like me. And of course Sid who was in charge of the collection, and delivery of pianos. He lived above the main shop. My cousin Brian Cromey also worked for Squires. Mr Seath was in charge of the French polishing, and general rebuilding of pianos that they bought, and sold. Brian was one of several boys who were employed to strip down and clean these old pianos, and eventually became a French polisher. All a long time ago now, but it is good to know that others share memories of Squires
(18 August 2016)

Name: Tony Wright
Comment: I remember Squire's well - on my route back to Ealing Broadway station each day from Ealing County Grammar (first former in 1963) - I seem to remember listening to records in those individual sound booths (or maybe that was somewhere else!) The smell of those radiograms/stereograms was something unique - I sang in the school choir at the nearby Town Hall on one occasion and spent numerous lunchtimes swimming at the public baths around the corner - How we managed to get dry and back to school for the first afternoon lesson, was some achievement (but I digress).
(19 November 2016)

Name: Jeremy Fairbanks
Comment: I went for an interview there in 1984 for a job in the new Bracknell store. I remember Eric Reed quite well (always had to say Mr Reed, never Eric!). I worked at Ealing in 1986 after some foreign company bought it from Currys and it seemed to be being used illictly with many foreign directors, yet we always struggled for stock because they never paid the suppliers.
(19 February 2017)

Name: June De'Ath/Bradley (maiden names)
Comment: I worked at Squire of Ealing in the 1940s and 1950s until I married and left the area. Worked on the sheet music counter, theatre bookings and the cash desk. Where are you Betty Sempler, Maureen Scott (now Stapleton) Jeanne Butler, Jennifer Marsh? I remember Mr Seath, Mr. Downs and wife Terry, Mr Ruggles and Mr P? (blind piano tuners), Mr. Adams, Hales, Etherington, Muriel Young and many many more. Would love to hear from anyone still around.
(2 March 2017)

Name: Richard Piper
Comment: I worked as a junior radio and TV salesman when I was just 17 in 1969. I then left to join the RAF. Five years later after being medicaly discharged l went to see how my old friends were doing and Mr Hackett my old boss asked if I could help out over the Christmas period. I ended up staying for two years. I joined Frank Firth at the Ruislip branch as Assistant Manager then as Manager after Frank went back to work at Ealing.
(27 July 2017)

Name: Terri Hills
Comment: I too worked in Squires of Ealing, in the 1970s - on the classical section which was upstairs - but my friend worked downstairs in the hip, modern music section. I even got to play piano sometimes, as they were right next to me in the next department! I loved my time there and recall the listening booths, where customers would sit and listen to albums before purchasing...
(12 July 2017)

Name: Alan Hoghton
Comment: My first job was at Squires in the radio and television department in 1962 { if my memory serves me right) I started about a month after Dusty Springfield left.

My manager was Mr Hackett. I learnt all about the radio and television trade there, Squires was one of the most popular radio and television shops in West London... Many fond memories.
(2018)

Name: Mike Skillman
Comment: I worked for Squires when I left school in 1958. I worked on collection and delivery with Sid - also packing items to return. Then I was put on aerial erecting with Freddy Ford. The other team was Freddy Lane and Peter. Health and safety a bit dodgy. After efforts from Tony Green, Chief Engineer, I got the apprenticeship that I was initially promised and worked with Reg Hebbes on radios, record players and tape recorders. Later Derek Kerridge took my place and I went upstairs to repair TVs, Very hot up there in the summer. There was Len Downes and Diane Strange in the office. Arthur was a radio outside engineer. TV engineers were Spike Marlin (went to Brendons in Beaconsfield) Brian Smith, Bill Smith, Martin ..., Ray Totterdell, Arthur .... and Benny ..... I eventually became an outside engineer and the workshop was moved over the road to the Town Hall side, behind the shops. I couldn't get a rise out of Mr Roy Squire so had to leave in the end, as I wanted to buy a house and get married. The apprenticeship served me well. Found jobs easily.
(2019)

Name: Graham Rankine
Comment: I worked there when I left school as an apprentice TV and radio engineer working as a van boy delivering and collection of TV and radio repairs with a man called Sid Oliver. I did two evenings a week in Technical College, I remember Mr Roy Squire and a Mr Hackett and Freddie Lane the aeriel man, also I helped on the piano van delivering a white grand piano to the actor Donald Plesance in Datchet, Bucks.
(2019)

Name: Ivor Griffiths
Comment: The record shop, I spent pounds upon pounds in there. I still make a pilgrimage to the building whenever I am in London, I have a carrier framed on my wall it is that important a shop in my and so many others' history.
(2019)

Name: Alan Harley
Comment: I worked in the music department 1965-1967 or thereabouts. The manager was Mr Buck. We used to serve the batty old music teachers. Mr Heyward ran the piano department. My dad worked in that department too for a while. I also remember there being a central box that was a theatre booking office. I also remember a young lady called Brenda Mendelson who played piano. I seem to remember that she played with another young lady on Radio 3. (Two pianos). With the introduction of colour TV, we used to see the first broadcasts of Wimbledon tennis. I worked with another young man. Surname Bennet, but can't remember his first name. Was it Paul's restaurant next door? I may remember more in time!
(2019)

Name: Colin Wilsher
Comment: I worked at the Ruislip branch aged 17 from 1965 under branch manager John MacNally and then transfered to the Ealing Broadway shop in 1967. I sold TVs, radios and stereograms. I also worked with Mr Squires personal assistant, Mr Gordon, from time to time. In 1968 a pal of mine with long hair who looked a bit like a hippy came to the shop and cadged some cigarettes off me. I was accused of giving him drugs. I was totally innocent but it upset me that they could think that of me and so I gave in my notice. I went on to become the sales director of the UK subsiduary of a US corporation so they kind of did me a favour.
(2019)

Name: Steve Timson
Comment: This is a nice bit of nostalgia. I worked at the Beaconsfield branch from 1980-81 but had regular jaunts to Ealing. I loved the old shop Bedoe Curry’s took over. Both stores were virtually untouched since the sixties (Ealing before that I reckon) and were beautiful. I remember a scene from an episode of Minder was shot in the store. They used the tea room and the back stairs out to the car park. The was footage taken inside the store as well but it never made the cut. I don’t remember any specific names from the Ealing store but shall always remember my visits fondly. Beaconsfield was my first proper job at 16 and looking back I really enjoyed it. The early eighties were the end of an era I think. Squires was built on service and a great attitude from a bygone era the like of which is hard to find now.
(2019)

Name: Raymond Adams
Comment: My grandfather worked there after he was invalided in WW1 until his death in the early 1950s.

Name: Bob Archer
Comment: I worked for Squires in the summer of 1964, putting up television aerials. It was a summer job, and the money was very good. Enjoyed working there. Can't remember any of the other people who worked there.
(2020)

Name: Barbara Canning
Comment: At 16 in 1951 I started worke in Squires, my first job every morning was to dust every piano in the showroom at the rear of the shop. I remember Roy Squire striding through one morning saying good morning as he passed. I replied good morning, I was rebuked and told I should say good morning sir. Next morning when the doors swung open I stood to attention and loudly said "Good Morning Sir!". Sir was not amused.

I later worked on the sheet music counter, in the theatre booking office, and in those days the record booths.
(2020)

Comment: A real longshot but have to start somewhere.My family bought a John Braodwood upright piano from Squires. It must have been c.1960/61. It was second-hand and I would love to know who Squires bought it off. I have the manufacture history from John Braodwood archives and can trace the ownership from new... sent to Lincolnshire in 1912 and back to Hackney in 1945.
I own this lovely piano now and it plays like a dream but would love to fill in the missing gaps in its history. I would like to add this to the archive back at John Braodwood so the next owner (after I have gone) can add to the wonderful story of the journey of this piano.
(2020)

Name: Robert Goodchild
Comment: I Worked at Squires in Ealing from 1977 to 1980 in the sheet music and music instrument depertment. The department manager was John Buck and I worked with Ray. Loved the job and only left because of the low pay. Most of my wage was passed to the record department. Got the job when mum purchased a piano and I was leaving school and enquired about a post. I remember old Mr Squire who at the time had late stages of Parkinson's. There were further shops in Ruislip and Brendans in Gerrards Cross and Beaconsfield. Brendan being the maiden name of Mrs Squire. There were some real characters working there. The piano salesman was a very flamboyant person with arm flying everywhere while giving customers a demo. The whole place was a throwback to an earlier age. The music department was kept going by local schools sending students in to buy music, records and guitars.
(2021)

Name: Michael Sagar-Fenton
Comment: I worked in Squires in 1969-70 in the downstairs record department called the Browserie (ugh...)

I did my best to bring it up to date and get some young people back in and pretty much succeeded. They even let me put a non-classical record (Bridge Over Troubled Water) in the window after a lot of asking. I had to get the record company reps to sneak past the lady in the classical department who did the ordering.
(2021)

Name: Barrie Downes
Comment: My Dad was Len Downes, my mum was Terry. My Saturday memory, I’d go and help out because I was off school, Reg Hebbes helped me build my first radio from scratch, chassis upwards, I was taught how to disassemble old pianos and radiograms, and saving the timber that my dad made into bookcases we still have. The most exciting part was dropping cathode ray tubes out of the first floor window in sacks to break them up for recycling! The sound they made was very satisfying. Also I was babysat by Dusty, she was lovely. Reading through all these memories has given me shivers and many happy memories of being with Freddy Lane up and down ladders.
(2021)

Name: Roger Francis
Comment: I worked in the record department 1961-2, under the watchful eye of Miss Evans. Overall manager of the 'music' side was the eccentric and gay Alec Skinner. Sheet music was run by John Buck, who made everyone (including Mrs. Ann Buck) uncertain as to whether he was taking the p*ss. Usually he was. 'Tech' side manager was Freddie Hackett who I gather might have had a senior post at EMI had he not been a Labour stalwart. Others included radio salesmen Cyril Rowntree and Harry Fowler (most unlike his actor namesake); Jim Hayward in pianos who had a second (fake) wage packet to show his wife; a lovely Latvian guy who looked and, to my ears, sounded like a young Franz Liszt; "Dotty" Hawke and Shirley Batchelor in pop records while I specialised in jazz and classical. Squire Pianos across the road was run by John McNally, Beaconsfield, and later Ruislip by Bill Uren. I revisited 28/30 some 15 years later, incognito. J. Buck was still there, minus most of his hair. Also present was Pauline Watts - I don't know if she had retained her habit of changing her hosiery in the cash-desk.
(2022)