IN all the jumping up and down excitement generated last week by the news the former Argos outlet at 1-2 The Shambles, Worcester, might resurrect as a carousel-themed bar – “WOW” in the current vernacular - just spare a thought for what was there before.

Because the plot on the corner with very narrow Church Street used to be occupied by one of the most handsome black and white timbered buildings in the city.

For more than 50 years, certainly since 1905 when it appeared in a business census, it was the home of J and F Hall, ironmongers to the gentry and just about everybody else. However, the fact that it dated from the 1600s and was a high spot in one of Worcester’s most colourful trading thoroughfares counted for nothing in the wrecking ball

atmosphere of the 1960s, when it was flattened and replaced by a brick and glass box.

Too expensive to renovate, I expect. But in truth renovation came fairly low down the list in the Swinging Sixties. It was easier and certainly cheaper to knock down and start again.

Which is a real pity as far as the Halls building was concerned. It is also ironic the proposed use for the corner site is now “a Victorian-themed carousel bar”. Probably a nod to the annual Victorian Christmas Fayre, but in the original you had all the Victorian atmosphere you could want.

It’s a futile exercise to blame previous  administrations for planning gaffs because you never know what constraints or pressures they were under, but with the benefit of hindsight Worcester had lost some gems that would be made much of today.

Only 200 yards away from Halls, at the other end of Mealcheapen Street,  the Public Hall formed one side of Cornmarket square. Here Charles Dickens appeared to read A Christmas Carol in 1867, Dvorak conducted, as did Edward Elgar, and national politicians spoke at election times. It was a major venue.

But again history counted for little when the Hall was demolished in 1966, ostensibly to make way for City Walls Road, although this subsequently by-passed the site, which is now a car park.

In fact for all their fawning, the city elders didn’t do the Elgar legend that many favours. First of all they allowed the one-time family music shop at the top of High Street to disappear during the Lychgate redevelopment of the mid-Sixties and then the demolition of Elgar’s last home, Marl Bank at the top of Rainbow Hill, in 1969.

Its replacement was a modern apartment block. Very Land of Hope and Glory.

But among all the big names, there was one lost settlement few remember today. At the rear of Greyfriars, now a much visited National Trust property in  Friar Street, once stood a small court of houses called George’s Yard, so typical of many in Worcester in Victorian times.

However, in the early 1960s they were pulled down, the residents re-housed and the land used to create a garden for Greyfriars. Laudable, I’m sure. But what if they had been saved and renovated. What a time capsule they would present today. As it is, George’s Yard remains one more “what if” in the mists of Worcester’s past.