Souvenirs: Flyer and Receipt from Bea’s Vintage Tea Rooms, Bath, 28/04/15.

09 Tuesday Jun 2015

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Assembly Rooms, Assembly Rooms Bath, bath, Bea's Vintage Tea Rooms, cream tea, dippy eggs, flyer, Food and Drink, Saville Row Bath, soft boiled eggs, Souvenirs, tea., Vintage

My sister and I sat at the very table featured on this leaflet for Bea’s Vintage Rea Rooms; my sister was the cream tea and I was the boiled egg on the receipt [we had a difference of opinion regarding the time of day, as we arrived between breakfast and elevenses]. I sat where the lady on the left of the photograph is sitting and from there I could see the end of Saville Row, a glimpse of Bennett Street and the corner of the famous Georgian Assembly Rooms; you can see all the fashionable comings and goings.

I can’t say I’ve seen soft boiled eggs on the menu anywhere else I have called in at for tea and I really enjoyed it, so if you have walked up Saville Row and you feel like you are in desperate need of a dippy egg and tea in a vintage china cup call in at Bea’s.

Souvenirs: Penny Black Pin Badge, Bath Postal Museum, Bath, 28/04/15.

07 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by Mr. B Flaneur in Souvenirs.

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badges, bath, Bath Postal Museum, Green Street Bath, John Palmer, letters, mail, Museums, Northgate Street Bath, Penny Black, Penny Black pin badge, postage stamps, poster, Ralph Allen, Souvenirs, Stamps, Thomas Moore Musgrave

You will find the Bath Postal Museum, if you find it at all, below stairs at the Post Office on the corner of Northgate Street and Green Street. I have mentioned this fact first because, when my sister and I arrived, I made a casual remark about having to make an effort to find the museum to one of the volunteers on duty and her reply gave me the impression that I wasn’t the first person to say that.

Three historic Bath residents revolutionised the British postal service through some significant firsts:

Ralph Allen (born. 1693), a Cornish man who moved to Bath to take up the position of Postmaster at the age of 19, came up with the radical idea that sending all letters via London, which was what happened when the postal service was in its infancy, was a waste of time and effort. The museum guide describes the services Allen invented as the cross and bye posts, which allowed letters to travel between addresses on more direct routes.
John Palmer, who was a native “Bathonian“, to quote from the museum guide, made the postal service even quicker by arranging the first ever mail coach run in 1784.
Thomas More Musgrove, who became Postmaster of Bath in 1833, is thought to have been the first person to affix a stamp to a letter, The Penny Black, on the 2nd May 1840, making him the first ever person to use a postage stamp (4 days before they were officially issued).

Did you know?

The museum’s hands on displays included a stamp perforating machine [yes, believe it or not, there was a time when you had to perforate your own postage stamps] and the “Potholes and Pitfalls” mail coach board game, both of which my sister and I thoroughly enjoyed. Other interesting exhibits included a wall of post boxes and stamp machines, an educational film about the history of written communications (narrated by the late Richard Briers) and an interesting audio display about different post horns.

If you’re in the area, do call in at the Bath Postal Museum at 27 Northgate Street or have a look at the museum’s website: http://www.bathpostalmuseum.co.uk/.