Regulars worried as 200-year-old listed pub closes

The current Royal Oak on Oldham’s Union Street opened in the 1870s

A Grade II listed pub is to close its doors for the final time after almost 200 years of serving a town's drinkers, leaving its regulars disappointed and fearful for the building’s future.

The Royal Oak on Oldham’s Union Street opened in 1825, refronted and extended in 1872 and refitted in 1929.

It is one of the Greater Manchester town’s oldest pubs, but it has been sold by its current owners, pub management firm Inglenook Group, to an unnamed buyer, who has called time on its life as a hostelry.

That decision comes only five years after its chiselled features, which include a curved mahogany bar with etched glass panes, were given listed status.

The pub has hosted many groups and clubs in recent years, including a regular folk night

Beautiful as those feature might be though, it also has a roof and windows in need of repair.

Nevertheless, licensee David Sweeney said he was left shocked when he was given two weeks’ notice of the closure.

"I've been here for 16 years now and I've enjoyed every minute and the people that have come in here,” he said.

“It's just Oldham people, they're so nice, but it's not my pub, it's their pub, isn't it? But not no more."

He said he understood the need to sell though.

“It's just not viable for them to continue,” he said.

“It's the overheads and repairs mainly.

“The walls are bellying, but the walls have been bellying for 150 years.

“There's only so much money you can pour into it."

Hannah Wood said if the pub was in Manchester, "it would have been transformed into something fantastic"

The pub has been home in recent years to numerous clubs and groups.

Folk club member Harry Basnett said it would be missed.

"It's awful. It's a massive disappointment,” he said.

“The way the whole thing has happened seems to have been very, very quickly.

“Apart from a folk session here it is also a meeting point for the [Royal Antediluvian Order of] Buffaloes, a local choir and the Royal British Legion.

“It's very much community-focused and, of course, a lot of people are looking for other locations.

“It's a terrible, terrible shame."

The pub was given listed status in 2018

The uncertainty has also left regulars concerned about the future of the building, as its listed status means the new owner will be severely limited in what changes can be made.

Hannah Wood, who works at the pub, said it was “a shame that somebody hasn't bought it who would like to breathe new life into it and make it something decent”.

“If this pub was in Manchester city centre, it would have been transformed into something fantastic,” she said.

She said she was worried about any future plans and was trying to raise awareness about its protected status.

"It's a criminal offence to remove anything from the inside of it,” she said.

“My fear is that builders are going to come in and rip out the heart of this building and I don't want that to happen."

Jay Ganley said the closure was "a very sad, sad day"

The Royal Oak is one of a diminishing number of pubs in Oldham town centre and drinkers view this as just the latest sign of the area's decline.

Jay Ganley, who has been a regular for more than 50 years, said it held some treasured memories, as it was “always the first stop” on a pub crawl.

"It was one of those pubs that we used to come to with the lads when we were doing a tour of Oldham,” he said.

"At one time, there was a load of industry round here and there was the Oldham Chronicle newspaper next door and all those guys came in here.

“There's faces in here today who I haven't seen for a lot of years and people have had to come back and visit it under the pretext that it is about to be shut down.

“It's a very sad, sad day.”