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Waites Music Store, Kingston Road
1948/49 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1951 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1953 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1956 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1958 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1960 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1962 Waites Kingston Road Mrs V Taylor 97 Kingston Road?????
1964 Waites Kingston Road L A Pearce 97 Kingston Road
1976 Waites Kingston Road Mrs V Taylor 97 Kingston Road
From the Portsmouth NEWS 24th March 2010
They sold mainly and had a vast range of sheet music and small musical instruments like recorders
Music lovers in Portsmouth and beyond will remember fondly this shop which traded for more than 60 years in the city.
Waites Music Store sold instruments and sheet music between the 1920s and 1980s.
And Chris Taylor has sent us these four pictures from his late mother's collection which will stir memories for many of you.
He said the shop was owned by members of his family from 1933 until it closed in the late 1980s.
Chris said: `My mother, Mary Taylor, was the last owner from 1961.
`She would have been 90 on March 31, but sadly passed away last December.
`The store was a genuine music shop, selling sheet music, books, and small instruments, but largely ignoring any form of recorded music such as records and tapes. Many customers would spend hours browsing through the carefully catalogued folders.'
Chris said he occasionally helped in the shop from an early age.
`I can remember three shop assistants: Barbara Pitt, who must have worked there for at least 50 years; Betty Pitt (her sister), and Maureen Boyce. They were always referred to only by their surnames - in an Are You Being Served? style.'
He said the shop was originally owned by a Harry Waite, and dates back at least to the early 1920s when the original premises were in Hyde Park Road, Southsea.
The store later moved to Russell Street, Southsea but was destroyed by bombs in the Second World War. It re-opened at 97 Kingston Road after the war.
Chris added: `My grandfather, Leonard Pearce, had worked for Mr Waite and bought the shop from him in 1933.
`As well as his part-time job as church organist in Portsmouth and Gosport, he ran the store until just before his death in 1961.
`My mother then took over and ran it until it finally closed. They always resisted any modernisation and every sale was written by hand in a cash book, rather than trusting an automated cash till.'
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