Photo above: Pictured on its opening in 1960.
The Netherhall Estate, like Thurnby Lodge, was built 1950-55 to rehouse inner city clearance. Although in the city boundary, it was only a couple of miles from the village of Scraptoft.
The Golden Age was built by the James Holes Brewery of Newark, one of a dozen they had in the city.
According to the brewery history site, the pub was originally to be called the Graziers Arms, but was changed to the Golden Age at the last minute.
Early doors it was a cracking community local run by Len Lyner, an experienced licensee that ran a ‘tight ship.’ This pub was so busy the beer was ‘tanked’ in: beer would be brought in by tankers instead of barrels to be piped into tanks in the cellar.
David Grey posted this photo of the Golden Age (Made in Leicester)
In the early 1960s, I worked in Scaptoft, in the building trade. The Golden Age was one of the brickies’ nearby haunts to which I would find myself having the ‘craic’.
Holes Brewery had an office/depo in the Humberstone Road weigh bridge around this period. Holes brewery was acquired by Courage in 1967.
Once again another of the estate pubs built in the 1950s-70s fell into disrepair and disrepute – a sad reflection of what was once a lively thriving pub where a welcome awaited. The reasons again are many, most stemming from the 1990 Beer Orders Act, which threw the pub industry into chaos. The Golden Age was finally demolished in 2008. The site is now occupied by a nursing home.
The Pub History Project – Leicester has a Podcast. Please click below, subscribe and have a listen!