EVERY picture tells a story. So does every clock, each ashtray and all 100 beer mats.
It is 10 years today since Vaux Breweries closed its doors in Sunderland, but for one man it was only the start.
Brewery enthusiast Richie Morgan has painstakingly built up a “shrine” to Vaux by converting his garage into a museum, complete with a working bar and a collection of memorabilia which not only spans decades but revives memories and honours 170 years of great beer.
Illuminated beer founts jostle for space in his Fulwell outhouse alongside serving trays, ashtrays, clocks, photographs and certificates, each a reminder of beer, breweries, pubs and people.
In a display cabinet, special Vaux bottlings – still full – commemorate the 1966 World Cup Final (Russian Linesman Ale), Roker Roar and the last beer produced at the brewery – Time Gentlemen Please.
The brass plaque that hung at the office door is as shiny now as the day it was first screwed to the wall.
Richie never worked at Vaux but has latterly been training engineers on machinery for manufacturing piston rings. “But being Sunderland born and bred I always drank Vaux beers,” he says.
“I was walking past the brewery site a couple of years after it closed. By then the shipyards had also gone, the coal mines had gone, Coles Cranes – there was nothing left.
“The demolition men were throwing some signs out and I asked if I could have one. The collection started from there. When I told my wife Isabel she thought I was absolutely nuts. Then I was given more memorabilia from friends who had worked at Vaux and got more from car-boot sales and from eBay.”
Richie’s collection is highly impressive. The minutiae of pub life includes display material inviting customers to drink Norseman Lager, Frisk Lager, Samson, Vaux Mild and Gold Tankard.
And, business mixed with leisure sees carefully-folded flags that fluttered above the building, Vaux-sponsored (and signed) Sunderland football programmes and mirrors from the 1950s and 60s.
Richie, who once had a passion for collecting Beatles memorabilia, says: “Some Vaux china mugs go for £50 on eBay – which is probably more than they’re worth. I’m a good collector but a bad seller. Brewery memorabilia is massive and you’re often bidding against lots of collectors.”
