Boot and Shoe Trail

Leicester Road has always been a direct way into Anstey from Leicester, even though it was not metalled until 1923.
The houses facing you and the ones on your right, on Leicester Road, were built at the end of the 19th century to house the expanding village population and are traditional Victorian brick-built terraced houses with slate roofs.

The building where you are standing, Anstey Funeral Directors, has been the premises of a number of factories important in the development of the village boot and shoe industry.
The first company to use the building was Springthorpe, Black and Hunt.
This was one of the oldest shoe businesses in Anstey, being established in 1882. The original business carried on until 1889 when it was dissolved and became Springthorpe, Hunt and Company.
The company was wound up in 1926 during the General Strike.

Opposite, the building that now houses Potters Carpets, has been an integral part of the life of Anstey for over 100 years.

Originally this was known as the Bridge Works. In 1906 Thomas Pickett moved the shoe company that he founded in the 1880s, in Latimer Street, to this site and by 1917 it was producing 3,000 to 4,000 pairs of shoes a week.
The company closed in 1934.

In August 1951 Artisan Press moved into the premises. It became one of the village’s top businesses and employed many Anstey people.

On the opposite corner stands The Coach and Horses public house, built in its present form around 1895 when the business was taken over by Marstons Brewery and the much earlier building, predating the 1841 census was demolished.

Part of the car park was originally the stables for horses.

Although relatively small, Latimer Street has been important part of Anstey’s history. The Victorian terraced houses were built as the shoe trade expanded.

Many of Anstey shoe factories traded from this street at some time in their history, as did other associated businesses such as box factories.

On the left- hand side, behind the building that now houses Anstey Vets was Smith Boot Manufacturer. This was established in 1913 by J.A. Crooks, T. Smith, G. Griffin and A Moore and produced hard wearing boys’ and girls’ boots, both for wholesale and retail. By 1917 a new wing and storage area for leather had been added to the original premises.

Opposite, where the new (2025) flats have been built, was one of the village’s box factories, Kenilworth Box, which traded until it closed in 2006.

The first company to occupy the premises was Willett Bros. Heel Factory,
Established in 1899 by three brothers, Charlie, Frank and Will Willett. It carried on business here until 1912 when the family moved the business to Park Road.

The next business to use the premises, Gelsthorpe’s, was established by S.A. Gelsthorpe with Alec Bramley as manager. Both men originally worked for Graves, Jackson, Richards and Co. in Gladstone Street.

This was followed by Pollard and Wain, first established in the early 1900s. As a result of growing demand, the company needed to find larger premises and so moved to a purpose-built factory which stretched from High Street (now Andrew Road) to Rosebery Road.

They specialised in manufacture of good class boys’ and girls’ boots and shoes in various leathers and became very successful. The company became known as the national firm Airborne Shoes.

Half way up the right-hand side of the road is The Jetty.
Stop and look up The Jetty. The developments you see today were originally factories, built on both sides.

On the left-hand side was Pollard Boxes which traded until the 1990s.
The company originally known as J Wright and Co was founded in the early 1900s by Job Wright.

The factory, on the other side of The Jetty housed the first shoe factory in the village, believed to be as early as 1849 owned by William Moore. This company was replaced by J. and J. Springthorpe’s Boot and Shoe works which was established in May 1910 and occupied the space between Bradgate Road and Latimer Street.
The business was established by James Springthorpe, who had had 30 years’ experience in the trade and his son John, who had previously worked for the ill-fated shoe co-operative in Church Lane.
They specialised in the manufacture of children’s boots and shoes using both cheap and medium grades of leather.

The next building on the right- hand side is Lilliput Montessori Nursery
The Lilliput Montessori Nursery is housed in two buildings.

One, formally the Liberal Club, dates from around 1923 and the other was previously the Anstey Toc H building.

The present building, built on the site of the previous Toc H Hut was purchased and erected in the early 1930s.

The Latimer School occupies much of the other side of the road.
This ‘new’ 5 room school was opened in January 1896 as an addition to the Bradgate Road School to help with overcrowding. It was transferred from the school board to Leicestershire Council in 1903.
In 1912 the Anstey Council Junior School, on the opposite side of the jitty, was built as the 1896 building was still too small and classes were being held in the Methodist School Rooms on Cropston Road. The 2 schools amalgamated in 1928 to form an elementary school

The infant school remained on Bradgate Road.; the older children transferring to Latimer School where they took the 11+ exam. Those who passed went on to the appropriate grammar school; those who failed remained at Latimer Street in the 1912 building which was named the Senior School. The infant and junior schools were combined in 1967, by which time the Martin School had opened, in 1956, as a high school.
Note the separate entrances for girls and boys and the bell tower on Latimer School.

The Tannery Terrace development is built on the site previously occupied by Harry Roberts Tannery. The company, established in 1923 in Leicester, moved to Anstey in 1937 because of the number of local boot and shoe factories in the village and cheaper rates.
It was the last business of its kind in the area when it closed and the building was demolished in 2006.

The house in front of it, now no 16 Bradgate Road, was the home of William Moore, who ran Anstey’s earliest shoe factory.
He was also one of the first shoe manufacturers to be declared bankrupt, something that was to repeat itself many times.

After his death his widow, Sarah, continued the business for some years.

Church Lane, another of the ancient roads in Anstey, is situated next to the church and was part of the medieval centre of the village.

Most of the surviving houses in Church Lane were built in the late 19th or early 20th century for the growing population of workers in the village boot and shoe industries. There were a number of alleys and yards leading off, with names such as Kidney Bean Alley, Wells Yard and Clarkes Yard as well as Papermill Row. A large number of these houses have now been replaced with modern builds. However, enough remain to give an idea of what the area would have been like. The numbering of the houses indicates how many of the original have disappeared since 1923.

The house next to the church was where the curate, who assisted the rector, lived. This meant he was close to the church. Originally a door would have led straight onto the churchyard. Although this is now blocked up, the outline can still be seen.

On the opposite side of the road are St Mary’s Church Rooms.
Built as the schoolrooms of St. Mary’s Church in 1833, the building was the first purpose-built establishment for the education of children in the village. Following the Elementary Education Act of 1870, the Bradgate Road Board School, known as the ‘Godless School’, was built in 1872 and, despite bitter opposition St Mary’s National School closed in 1880.

The building next door was the village Adult School.
This building has had a long and varied life. It was built in the mid-19th century and was used as a papermill around 1875 –1887, hence ‘Papermill Row’ behind where the library is now.

In the mid-1880s George Harry Palmer opened a boot and shoe factory in the premises. He remained for only three years before moving to larger premises on Main Street (Bradgate Road). The business was later to become one of the renowned shoe companies in Great Britain.

In 1900 the building was bought and rebuilt by the Adult School & Institute. After WWII it was an extension for the growing Artisan Press which was based on Leicester Road.

The garage, next to the Victorian terrace, was built around 1906 by Maurice Reeson to house his horse drawn coach and later his motor bus ‘John Bull’. This was one of the first motorised buses in Leicestershire. This business was taken over in 1911 by Johnny Hutton who garaged his coaches and delivery vans on this site for many years. At the Bradgate end of the road, near the site of The Plough Inn (now housing) was another shoe factory. This was built by Henry Clarke, behind his Georgian house. He was responsible for building many of the houses in this area.

The company became Anstey Boot Company, which was an early example of a co-operative, with 300 shareholders and was known locally as ‘The New Firm’.
The factory burnt down in 1909.
The manager was James Springthorpe, who then established J and J Springthorpe in The Jetty, Bradgate Road.

At the entrance of Park Road, with no 2 on your left-hand side, you will see
the remains of the outside water closets on the left.

The most prominent building is the original village school. This was opened in March 1874 to replace the National School in Church Lane.
The first headmaster and schoolteacher were Mr Albion Chard and his sister Emma Chard. Albion Street was later named after Mr Chard.
It was built from local materials with the help of local people after a suitable site was found.

When Latimer Street School was built Park Road School became the village infants’ school and finally closed in 1982 when the remaining children were transferred to the Latimer School. By this time Woolden Hill School had opened to accommodate the children on the other side of the village.
The site on Park Road has now been converted to homes.

Further along on the right-hand side is Mafeking House, built by George Lowe, a hosiery manufacturer, in 1874. This property had a large brick building behind it known as The Shop. This housed up to 8 knitting frames, of which two were still used up to WW1. The stockings were sold in Leicester.

This part of Park Road is the only unadopted section of road remaining in the village. It is an excellent example of how Anstey looked at the end of the 19th century with a cobbled pavement and mixture of houses. The road would have been central to village life as it had manufacturing and services as well as domestic dwellings.
The road would have originally continued to Anstey Mill and was called Mill Lane.

It was here that a factory was built which became home to successive shoe companies.

G.H. Palmer began his career as a shoe manufacturer working at this factory, trading as C Pollard and Co with four other partners, before leaving the company when they got into financial problems and moving to Church Lane.

Job and William Wright carried on trading as C. Pollard & Co until they went bankrupt in 1895.

Next were Smart, Cufflin and Co. who were formed in 1895 and only survived until 1899.

Abraham Willett and his son John Walter took over, and the business survived until 1908.
The final company, Willett Bros. Heel Factory, was established in 1899 by three brothers – Charlie, Frank and Will Willett in Latimer Street, moving here in 1912.

Although the factory produced heels of various shapes and sizes for the boot and shoe factories in the village, it specialised in ladies’ and girls’ heels.
These were cut out either by power driven presses or by using mallets and blocks of ash wood.

The factory was later used by Mr Geary’s box making business. When this was destroyed by fire in 1931 the company’s 30cwt Chevrolet van was acquired by Jack Hancock and converted into a lorry. It became the first vehicle of Anstey Haulage operating from the Bottom Green on Leicester Road.

Behind the factory was the bakery run by ‘Doughy Harris’, who had a shop at the bottom end of Bradgate Road.
The site is now a private house named The Bakehouse.

Originally named Main Street, Bradgate Road was the main street through the village, joining Cropston Road in The Nook and Newtown Lane towards Newtown Linford.

Until the latter part of the 19th century this area would have been fields and farms, interspersed with cottages.

It was from this main road that most of the village roads radiated when Anstey was a nucleated village. As a clustered settlement St Mary’s Church was the centre of the medieval village.

It was the area where most of the population originally lived; the village only expanding with the coming of the boot and shoe industry in the 19th century.
The United Reformed Church, originally known as Anstey Congregational Church, was formed in 1851 and for the first three years met in in a small cottage on the Top Green, next to The Stew footpath (now marked as a public footpath next to The Crown Inn). Later, the congregation moved to a barn on the corner of Groby Road.

In 1861 they purchased a factory owned by Mr S Lovett on Bradgate Road for £130 and converted it to a chapel. The present church was opened officially in 1879.
It closed in 2021 due to a dwindling congregation and it held its last service on Sunday 31st October 2021.

The Stadon Club, on the left, was another building that was used as a shoe factory for many companies.

Thomas Gilbert had a factory here from the late 1870s until 1886 when he started to build up large debts.
A fire in 1888 devastated the factory and he finally filed for bankruptcy in November 1889 when his newly rebuilt factory and adjoining houses were sold.

The first Boot and Shoe Trade Union was formed in this factory.

G.H. Palmer appears to move into the premises almost immediately, where he stayed until the early 1890s.

Pettifor Court, on the right, is the site of the Ansty (Anstey) Brewery, established in the 1840s by Samuel Burchnall and later taken over by John Doleman.
By the 1880s Daniel Pettifor was the owner and it was he who built the
two rows of back-to-back houses with a shared row of earth closets, next to The Crown Inn, for his brewery workers. They were known as ‘Pett’s Front and Backs’.
The Steam Brewery remained in the Pettifor family until 1900 when the business was taken over by Marston’s Brewery.

The Crown Inn is one of Anstey’s four public houses, run by Anstey’s Steam Brewery, before they were taken over by other breweries.It is one of Anstey’s oldest public houses, possibly pre-dating1851.

This area is another of Anstey’s two greens. Known as The Green or The Top Green, it was one of the main parts of the village.

The area was mentioned on the Enclosure Map of 1761 when it was common land.

Originally very rural, The Green was surrounded by farms and cottages, some thatched and some slated and some dating to the 15th Century. The large Georgian house in front of you being an exception.

Green Farm (to the right of the Georgian house) is said to be the oldest domestic building in the village and parts of it are proven to date to the 15th century. The more modern house adjoining it was built about 1800.

The white building at the far side of the Green, Manor Farm, belonged to Ulverscroft Abbey until the land was possibly allotted to the 7th Earl of Stamford (of The Grey family of Bradgate) as a result of the Enclosure Award in 1762.

In the centre of the green is the village well. It is believed that the wall surrounding it is medieval.

Hollow Road was originally a cul-de-sac named Hollow Lane, which led from The Green to a point just past the Stadon Road junction. The top end of the road was a fenced off field with a pond and a large elm tree until the council houses were built in the 1950s.

The top end of the road is mostly terraced houses built for shoe workers. The remainder of the road consists of villas and larger houses built by wealthy factory owners for their families.

Bosworth and Wright Box Factory, on the right-hand side, was founded in the 1920s by Arch Bosworth and Ernest Wright. This was originally located in ‘The Tin Hut’, a building at the bottom end of Hollow Road on the Green.

The present building was built around 1934, and the company was operating until 2025.

The Shoemakers housing development, further up on the left, was built as a shoe factory in 1895 by Cornelius Smith in partnership with John T. Brammage.

Smith lived next door at no 40 which he had built at the same time as the factory.

Their company had begun in 1889, in a rented factory in The Jetty (Latimer Street to Bradgate Road).
In 1893 they had a devastating fire and subsequently built the factory in Hollow Road.

Brummage left the business in 1897 and Smith carried on with his son James Arthur.
James left in 1908 and Smith continued until 1913 when he was declared bankrupt.

By 1915 the company was run by William Mason and was renamed Diana Shoes. This became a well-known British shoe brand until it ceased trading in the 1970s.

Known as Stadon Lane in the 1761 Enclosure Award, the name had disappeared by 1895 when it became Throne Lane. It ran from The Nook to a point approximately opposite the Working Men’s Club (now Sapori, an Italian restaurant), then turning right and past the end of George Street, eventually meeting Causeway Lane in Cropston.

Originally a cul-de-sac, Stadon Lane stopped just by the Recreation Ground. Colonel R.F. Martin, who owned the land, built a link road through to Hollow Road/ Ellis Street junction, but because of a dispute with the Parish Council over its upkeep, it was fenced off at either end for a considerable time.

The large field on the right-hand side of Stadon Road is known by all Anstey folks as The Reccy.

Villagers fought for many years to have a recreation ground in the village. Even though the subject was mentioned in Parish Council documents as far back as 1928, it was not until 1952 that land was purchased for this purpose. It cost the parish £1,400 which included piping the ditch that had run across the field for many years and levelling out the ridge and furrows.

The new Jubilee Hall was built in 2003 to replace the original Memorial Hall, which had stood on the same site.
The gates were erected in 1977 to celebrate the Silver Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II.

In 1919, the Parish Council discussed three alternatives for a memorial to those who had lost their life in WW1; public baths, a village hall or a memorial in The Nook. In the end, The Anstey War Memorial was erected on land given by the Martin family.
It was built using Mountsorrel granite and Swithland slate and was dedicated on 7th May 1921. The village sexton, Mr, T. Moore was appointed caretaker at 5s per week.
At the end of WWII, 25 names were added to the 114 already on the memorial.

The Hollies on the right-hand side, was built by George Harry Palmer, as he wanted to live close to his new factory so he could keep an eye on what was going on, at all times.

His factory was sited where The Mill Court Development is now.

This is where G.H. Palmer made his final move; this time to brand-new, purpose-built premises on the corner of Stadon Road and Highfield Street. Gradually, over the years, it was extended until by 1917, it was regarded as one of the best equipped shoe factories in Leicestershire, producing ladies’, girls’ and boys’ shoes, for both the home market and export.

In later years it traded as “Eagle Shoes” under George White.
The building was finally demolished in 2007.
However, some of the original factory was used in the development and can be seen from George Street.

This area, known as New Anstey, was built as housing for the expanding shoe and boot workers. Most of these workers were employed by George Harry Palmer in his factory at the bottom of Highfield Street.

Note how much wider the roads are where the newest factories were built.

Near to the junction with Edward Street stands the building that was Page’s Bakery. The bakery had been established in 1880 by Walter Jones Page on Main Street. His sons, Tom and Walter, followed him into the business; Walter ran the bakery in Main Street (now Bradgate Road) and Tom the bakery in Albion Street.

Opposite, the row of terraced houses was built when the road was extended, for the drivers of Horace Elliot’s haulage business.

Continue down Albion Street until you reach Rosebery Road on your left.
Turn into Rosebery Road and continue along noting the redeveloped row of terraced houses on your right, built on the site of one of Anstey’s successful shoe manufacturers, Pollard and Wain Shoe Company.

First established in Latimer Street by Fred Wain and Fred Pollard in 1915, growing demand resulted in a move to a purpose built and well fitted factory which covered an area from Andrew Road to Rosebery Road.

The company specialised in the manufacture of high-class boys’ and girls’ boots and shoes and was probably the most successful of all Anstey shoe companies, becoming known as the national firm Airborne Shoes.

Follow Gladstone Street to the bottom of the road.
The housing development on the right-hand side (Pack Horse Mews), is built on the site of the shoe factory of Graves, Jackson, Richards and Co.
This factory was established in 1885 by Thomas Henry Graves, George Jackson and William Richards. It was sold in 1913 to Daniel Richards (William’s brother) and Farmer Staniforth (Daniel’s father-in-law).
The factory specialised in ladies, boys’ and girls’ shoes.

As well as trading within Britain, the company exported overseas, especially to South Africa.

In the 1930s the factory became Marston Oil Works which subsequently closed around 1980 and then it was taken over by Waltons Powders.

Cropston Road was another main route into Anstey from Cropston.

It was originally known as Cropstone Lane, later Cropstone Road, the spelling being changed in the early 20th century.

The Chinese takeaway is on the site of the original Anstey Methodist Church, which served the Primitive Methodist movement. The church was built in 1870 to replace an earlier 1840 building and was extended in 1872. Services continued until 1970 when worship was stopped due to the poor condition of the building and it was demolished in 1973.Next door to the Chinese takeaway is the entrance that led to what was the Norwood Press Printers which was located in the building behind until 2007.

This building was built around 1885 for the Leicester manufacturer, George Green and Sons, who expanded his boot and shoe company to Anstey to make use of the lower rates in the village.

By 1920 it was occupied by another shoe manufacturer, C.H. Preston.

The last shoe manufacturer to occupy the building was Burton and Stone, who moved in after WWII. The company had been founded in 1925 by
Fred Burton and traded until 1977 when it became the final Anstey shoe factory to close ending approximately 125 years of boot and shoe manufacturing in the village.