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Louth Museum

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Brown Cow

by Ruth Gatenby

Mrs Alice Wright outside the Brown Cow

Mrs Alice Wright outside the Brown Cow

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This photo, kindly donated to Louth Museum by the late Mrs Rowena Smith, shows Louth’s Brown Cow pub many years ago. Today the Brown Cow at the junction of Newmarket and Church Street is a thriving popular pub. The first mention of the Brown Cow I have seen was in 1834 – in the early days it was described as a “Beer House”, which meant that it had a lower social standing than the larger, more up-market inns. In the 1970s its name changed to the Newmarket Inn, but reverted to the Brown Cow in 2007.

In the photo the name visible above the door of the pub is Arthur Wright, and this greatly helps in dating the photo. Arthur Wright was the landlord of the Brown Cow before the First World War. Born in Fotherby in 1878, as a young man Arthur worked with his father who was the Ostler and looked after horses at the King’s Head Inn (which was an up-market establishment).

Arthur was listed as landlord of the Brown Cow in 1909. He married his wife Alice in 1908, and it is likely that this was the time that they took on the Brown Cow Beer House. But by 1913 the landlord was John Trevor; Arthur Wright served in the Army Veterinary Corps during the First World War – his experience looking after horses at the King’s Head must have been invaluable. After the war Arthur and Alice moved to Leicester.

So my guess is that the photo was taken some time between 1908 and 1912, and that the woman standing by the gate is Mrs Alice Wright.