114 The Queen's Arms - Oldham

First  visited  : 1989

This  is  a  sad  one  for  me.

The  Queen's  used  to  be  on  the  corner  of   Rochdale  Road  and  Chadderton  Way. This  junction  is  controlled  by  traffic  lights  so  my  bus  home  from  work  ( 1987-93 )  would  usually  be  halted  there.  Some  time  in  1989  I  noticed  a  poster  in  the  window  for  "Uncle  Peter's  Pop  Quiz",  a  weekly  event  though  I  can't  now  remember   which  night  of  the  week  it  was. It  would  either  have  been  Wednesday  or  Thursday.

Eventually  I  interested  someone  else  - again  I  can't  remember  who  was  first  - into  going    along  with  me  to  check  it  out. This  was  during  my  first  year  of  driving  and  I  always  preferred  company  even  if  they  weren't  drivers  themselves.

Uncle  Peter's  Pop  Quiz   was  very  simple  in  format. He  played  ten  songs  on  a  theme, you  wrote  down  title  and  artist  and  then  swapped  papers  with  someone  else  in  the  pub. If  you  won  you  got  one  of  those  minature  whiskey  bottles ; if  there  was  a  tie  one  of  you  went  up  to  his  deck   and  he  asked  a  tie-breaker  question. And  then  it  would  all  start  again.

More  often  than  not  my  team  would  win  whoever  my  companions  were; the  competition  was  mainly  a  bloke  called  Colin  who  stood  at  the  bar  and  must  have  been  peeved  whenever  I  showed  up  but  he  never  let  on. It  was  actually  a  very  friendly  pub  and  I  remember  one  time  we  went , we  ended  up  playing  for  two  girls  on  the  adjacent  table  to  win  some  prizes. I  often  wish  I'd  made  a  bit  more  of  that  opportunity. I  can't  tell  you  how  often  I  went  now , perhaps  half  a  dozen  times  over  a  three  year  period  ?

Then  the  poster  disappeared  from  the  window. I  rang  the  pub  up  to  check  whether  it  was  still  on. They  told  me  Peter  didn't  do  it  there  anymore  but  generously  told  me  where  I  could  now  find  him. I  didn't  recognise  the  name  of  the  pub  and  never  followed  it  up.

There  has  been  a  lasting  significance  to  my  visits  there. One  of  my  companions  was  a  guy  called  Graham  Mather  who  started  work  in  our  office  at  the  tail  end  of  1989. He  noted  my  prowess  and  a  couple  of  years  later  invited  me  to  join  him  and  a  couple  of  other  guys  at  a  regional  pop  quiz  run  by  two  guys  calling  themselves  Northern  Pop  Quizzes. I'm  still  in  touch  with  them   - one  was  DJ  at  my  wedding  reception - and  met  my  current  quiz  partner  at  one  of  their  Christmas  quizzes. So  thanks  for  that  Uncle  Peter.  

I  don't  know  when  it  closed. It's  now  a  Shisha  bar.