Local History: Coincidence & Serendipity

I had wander around the 'Toon' earlier this week. Yes, another one. I like to do so once in a while. Maybe I'm in the city centre for some specific reason and am just looking to fill a couple of hours (hospital appointments usually), or perhaps it's a deliberate ploy - a quest, if you like - for some historical information / photos. 

This time I wanted to check out a few corners of Newcastle which I'd never been to before, but which had popped up on Twitter as possibilities for an interesting 'nose about'. These expeditions always surprise and delight in equal measure. Something unexpected usually turns up, and/or I get pleasantly sidetracked or distracted. 

Anyway, I set off from the Central Station area with my little list of 'to dos', and headed first for the Castle Keep, followed by the Quayside, Ouseburn, City Stadium, Jesmond Dene, then across to the Great North Road and back into town for my bus home. About eight miles, I reckon, in a leisurely four hours.

There were many points of interest, but one stood out - or rather one 'strand' of coincidence/serendipity - which I wasn't aware of until a couple of days later when I followed things up with a bit of research. It began when I was poking around the environs of the Hotel du Vin on the corner of City Road and Ouse Street. Here it is, both in full and the main entrance:

As you can see, the property used to be the HQ of the Tyne-Tees Steam Shipping Co.Ltd. Now I didn't know this, and, to be honest knew nothing about the company in question. Turns out that they were formed in 1903-04 following the amalgamation of four smaller companies (The Tyne Steam Shipping Co.Ltd, The Tees Union Steamship Co.Ltd, The Free Trade Wharf Co.Ltd and Furness Withy & Co.Ltd), and provided shipping services between the UK and continental Europe until 1943, when they were bought out. The brick building which is now a hotel was built specifically to house the new, enlarged, and ever-expanding company in 1908. I didn't know all of this until long after I'd got back home.

Anyway, my circuitous route eventually brought me out at the Blue House Roundabout about two hours later, where I spotted, quite accidentally, this little item, sitting pretty much on the busy junction in question:

Now I'd never noticed this before, so looked for the 'dedication stone', thus:

I thought to myself that there may be a tie in here to the Laing Art Gallery or something. But if there is then it isn't obvious. Turns out that William Laing, quite coincidentally, was a major player in ... The Tyne Steam Shipping Company Co.Ltd (the forerunner of the Tyne-Tees company). In fact, he was, as far as I can tell, the man who jointly founded it (along with William Davies Stephens) in 1864. I really was quite taken aback when I discovered this little trail of coincidences when I was back home sat at my computer.

Nice touch, this, too, for the benefit of the so-called 'dumb animals'. A little ground-level bowl for the canines:

It didn't quite end there, though. As I walked down the Great North Road I came across this little beauty:

(click on image to read text)

Yes, a memorial to W.D.Stephens, pal of the aforementioned William Laing. Again, though, I was totally ignorant of the links until a good two days later.

BTW, the location of both monuments is thought to reflect the men's close involvement with the Temperance Association, and the founding of the Temperance Festival (the 'Hoppings) on the nearby Town Moor in 1882.

So there you have it. Well, I thought it was all rather very neat, anyway.