Page 405 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

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The Capital of the Federation.
to the arranging of excursions in summer. Thus there is now an
excursion department which, acting on behalf of local societies, is
ready to take, and does take, parties of co-operators to various parts
of the British Isles and the Continent.
From the great saleroom at Manchester a private wire goes to
the C. W.S. Liverpool offices. As we have seen, both cities have been
associated with the C.W.S. since 1863, when it seemed as if the
federation would make its headquarters in the port. The weight of
circumstances caused the choice to be otherwise; but from 187G
there has been a steady effort to bring the Liverpool Docks as near
as possible to the Manchester Saleroom. The present-day Liverpool
Branch enables orders to be booked at Balloon Street and executed
from the port on the same day. The Liverpool provision, corn, and
produce exchanges are attended daily ; and the offices at 1 1 Victoria
,
Street, in the heart of the city, and in touch with the whole Une of
docks, are also Hnked by private wire veith the C.W.S. dockside
warehouse at Regent Road. Besides the wire to Manchester,
despatch bags pass between the branch and the headquarters hourly.
In 1912 over 80,000 tons of C.W.S. goods were dealt with at
Liverpool, and nearly half a milHon was paid in tobacco duty. The
Society first rented offices in Victoria Street in 1898—at No. 1
whence it transferred to No. 7, and now No. 11. The Regent Road
warehouse, although constructed for the C.W.S. in 1899, is held from
the L. and Y. Railway Company on rental; adjoining it is a smoke
and games room for the dinner-hour comfort of employees, and this
is C.W.S. property. Since the first day of 1904 the branch has been
under the control of Mr. W. L. Kewley, formerly of the Manchester
offices.
Manchester still remains the capital of the federation. Behind
Glasgow, Birmmgham, and Liverpool in the number of people
living under one municipahty, Manchester forms, nevertheless, the
natural centre for a population greater than that of London, and
distinct from that of the metropohs in its industrial character and
environment. Inferior to Liverpool in its site, and to Birmingham
in the attractiveness of its central area—outwardly dingy, ugly,
and given over to trade, Manchester, for all that, has been the
germinating centre of social, political, industrial, and economic
movements ever since Peterloo. Manchester draws to itself from the
surrounding manufacturing districts. East Lancashire and Cheshire,
West Yorkshire, North Derbyshire, and North Staffordshire, and
the type of character thus reinvia;orated is, in the main, homely,
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