I distinctly remember mine, it was a tiny shop called Richmonds on Midworth Street in Mansfield just up from (appropriately enough) the fishmongers. I think Brian Richmond started the business but it was his son Dale who I tended to see more often.
He'd usually be whipping an eye on a rod or something like that and the shop had that distinctly overpowering smell of ammonia from the maggots, everything about it shouted fishing and I loved it!
If you went in and asked for half a pint of maggots it would often be met with his catchphrase 'Where ya going kid, tu't dam?'
This was reference to the local town centre mill dam where us kids often ended up, sometime during the early to mid-eighties Chub suddenly began to show and it was rumoured that they'd found their way back from the Trent via several large dustbins in the back of a van and which in turn may have boosted the takings of a local tackle shop's bait sales... All unsubstantiated rumour of course and I haven't heard anyone complain, there are still Chub in there to this day and it certainly sorted out the hordes of sticklebacks and minnows.
I still see the old premises now and think about the tackle shop that was every time I go by it, somehow the premises have managed to survive on going redevelopment all around it but I don't know for how much longer.
I wish the shop was still going, I always enjoyed going in and much prefer the more earthy, individual experience as opposed to the sterile, supermarket type offerings that seem to be popular with many these days.
Following on from that myself and a mate had heard that a new tackle shop had opened on Milton Street and so one school lunchtime we trecked over there and, baring in mind these were the Trent matchfishing halcyon days with the stick float kings regularly going head to head, who should be standing behind the counter?
None other than John Dean himself!
John was a household name back at the time and it was like opening the door, walking in and seeing God staring back at us... Happy days!
