Heads pulled off, arms, legs here and there, Wookey Hole general manager Daniel Medley told the BBC: 'About 100 bears were caught up in this frenzied attack, some were merely little chews, whereas some of them had some quite devastating injuries.
'Heads pulled off, arms, legs here and there, it was a total carnage really. I've never seen such a mess, there was stuffing, fluff and bear bits everywhere.' Barney also caused an estimated £20,000 damage to other bears in the collection. Other teddies worth about £20,000 were damaged Security guard Greg West, who was on duty at the time, is at a loss to explain what happened to make Barney go so 'berserk'. Mr West, 36, of Totterdown, Bristol, said: 'Barney has been a model guard dog for over six years. I still can't believe what happened.
'Either there was a rogue scent of some kind on Mabel which switched on Barney's deepest instincts, or it could have been jealousy - I was just stroking Mabel and saying what a nice little bear she was.' The attraction said Barney's future with them was 'uncertain'.
It was a tradition that saw her grandmother buying a pram for her children - and her grandmother's mother doing the same - going back more than a century. Irina and David Green, who have run Hurwoods for the past two years, blame the shop's closure on issues including the Broadmead redevelopment and a planned showcase bus route, which will run right past.
'We have suffered from competition since Mamas And Papas opened in Eastgate,' 'Parking has always been a big problem, and now there are these plans for a new bus route. 'Mamas and Papas is in a better position as regards parking, while we are out of the way. 'It is a shame we have to close. Everyone is upset - the customers as well as the staff - but we live in a very competitive world.
'The store has been running for more than 100 years and our regulars say they like to shop here.' During their centenary celebrations around seven years ago, Hurwoods received many grateful letters from former customers. 'It has been nice to keep up this long tradition,' added Mrs Green, 'but the internet has affected us a lot. 'We even get people coming in, deciding what they want, and then buying it more cheaply on the internet.'
The Greens - who are keeping the store open for a few weeks while they sell off their remaining stock - have three assistants who will also be losing their jobs when they finally shut up shop. It's all very sad because, before the Second World War, Old Market was thriving. In fact, it was once one of the city's main shopping areas, allied to the shops in Wine Street and Castle Street, which were all lost in the Bristol Blitzes.
It was also a major tram alighting point for people travelling from East Bristol, who would start their Saturday 'shop' here, walk over to Castle Street (what's left of it is now under Castle Park) and then go on through town to the 'posh' shops of Park Street and Clifton. Everyone came downtown and the shops - providing a blaze of lights - would stay open until late on Saturday nights.
Old Market had become a centre for entertainment in Victorian times and this continued to be the case in the years between the wars. The Empire Theatre, the Kings Cinema and the Methodist Central Hall were all popular venues, catering for different tastes. The loss of Castle Street/Wine Street, and then the Corporation's postwar decision to build the city's major new shopping area in Broadmead, was a warning for the beleaguered traders in a slowly decaying Old Market.
Then, in the early 1960s, came new road plans which traders said would finally cut them off from the rest of the city shops. The much-loved Empire Theatre, where a youthful Cary Grant had once entertained with the Pinder group, was demolished in 1964 and some years later the roundabout and underpass we see today were built. The demolition of many long-established shops, businesses and pubs for the new highway - plus the increased traffic that poured into the area to link up with the new ring road - caused many traders to call it a day.
Even the Kings Cinema, a survivor of the 1960s demolition gangs - but which had by now resorted to showing 'adult' films - finally closed in 1976 and was later demolished. A steep decline set in and, as many premises became derelict, the council considered demolition to be the only option. But the growing conservation movement was slowly turning the tide against this sort of corporate vandalism and in the 1970s many of the area's attractive but dilapidated 17th and 18th-century buildings were not only saved but restored and let out to small businesses.
By the 1980s, Old Market had been designated a conservation area and this new status meant not only protection from demolition but the attraction of Government grants. A major programme of restoration followed. The Methodist Central Hall has long been converted into apartments, as has, more recently, the 100-year-old Gloster's Drill Hall opposite.
With these new residents, plus an influx from a rebuilt St Philips nearby, things can only get a better. Unfortunately it will be too late for Hurwoods.It's believed that Veal's tackle shop is the only survivor in a street that, having endured enormous change, deserves a break.
Fact 199: TIME GENTS, PLEASE
2006 - As the new owners of the much-loved Brewery Tap gutted its award- winning interior last month, the Campaign For Real Ale commented bitterly that 'the last bit of Smiles left in Bristol' had gone. We take a look at the Bristol brewery's troubled history Last orders: Regulars are aghast after the fiercely traditional Smiles Brewery in Colston Street had its famous interior ripped out by its new owners WHEN the popular Smiles brewery, based in Colston Street, was sold off a few years ago it was thought that, under new owners City Centres Breweries Ltd (who also said that they were looking to buy 20 or so pubs within the Bristol area) its future would be bright.
It was hoped that a new injection of cash would make Smiles the major brewery in the area - beating off old competitors such as Butcombe, about to expand under new owners RCH at Hewish, and the aggressive newcomer Bath Ales, based in Webbs Heath in Mangotsfield, which was already branching out into pub ownership in the region. Smiles had been running many West Country pubs, including the popular Highbury Vaults on St Michaels Hill, Le Chateau (now the Bristol Ram) in Park Street, the Old Inn in Congresbury and The White Hart at Littleton-on-Severn. But as far as the public were concerned, it somehow all went horribly wrong, and now even that doyen of real ale pubs, The Cornubia in Temple Back, which belonged to Smiles, has shut its doors and faces an uncertain future.
Smiles founder John Payne (who chose the name Smiles because he didn't want Courage Brewery in Bath Street to take him too seriously) set up the business in Colston Yard in April 1978. But within months he had a serious rival in the shape of former Courage managing director Simon Whitmore, who had decided to leave the security of the giant operation to set up the tiny Butcombe Brewery, deep in the heart of the North Somerset countryside. But this was the heyday of the small-is- beautiful, anti-keg, real ale brigade, and there was surely room for all. John's interest in brewing had started way back in the 1970s when, as a student in Scotland, he had started dabbling with the then popular home-brew beer kits. Living on a farm which grew barley, he decided to start brewing 'properly', using 'real' ingredients rather than kits. As he said himself: 'When you change from kits to the natural ingredients, you enter another world.'
John came south to attend a management course in Bristol, and in his spare time helped to set up the popular Bells Diner in Montpelier. But what made this restaurant so very different from many others was the fact that 'real' beer was brewed in the back of the premises, a novel idea at the time, and you could order it to drink with your meal. It's difficult to imagine now just how ground- breaking this was, or just how difficult it was to get a table at Bell's, the trendiest eatery in town. John then decided to take his 'hobby' one step further, and found premises for a real ale brewery in what was then a pretty seedy and derelict looking Colston Street.
The owners of the property had recently gone bankrupt, and John paid just a few pounds a week in rent. He bought up some second-hand brewing equipment, hired two helpers and then found three pubs willing to take their only brew - Smiles Best Bitter. These were The Seahorse, just across the road from the brewery and popular with nursing staff from the BRI, The Ship in Lower Park Row and The Cutter, a new, trendy pub situated between Bedminster Bridge and Temple Meads. Two of these closed long ago - The Ship is a survivor. It was an opportune time to set up as an 'independent' as the giant breweries, such as Courage, were being instructed by the Thatcher Government to sell off a proportion of their 'tied' pubs to break up the regional monopolies which had developed over many years.
A lot of these pubs became 'free houses', with independent landlords, and Smiles was in a good position to supply them. In 1982 the brewery decided to buy its first pub, a run-down watering hole in Cotham known as Highbury Vaults. Smiles had trouble over the renewal of the licence, but won through in the end, turning the Vaults into a relaxed, informal local with the additional attraction of a decent 'real ale' pint. It became very popular. Smiles' philosophy was no juke boxes, no pool tables, no video games and no fruit machines. Instead of noisy amusements, drinkers found good, cask-conditioned ales, home-cooked food and homely comforts. Following on from this success, the brewery then bought a country pub, the White Hart at Littleton-on-Severn, as well as The Seahorse. Soon Payne's 16-man operation - having built up a reputation for quality and reliability within the real ale market - was supplying beers to a network of 130 other pubs across the West Country.
In 1991, Smiles decided to open a new pub within the Colston Street brewery, called the Brewery Tap. This unique place, with its ash furniture, hopsacks on the walls, a slate bar and black and white tiled floor, was a breakthrough in licensing terms. It was the first pub to have its doors open all day but, although breakfast was served from 8am, you couldn't actually buy a pint until 11am. The Campaign For Real Ale was ecstatic, giving it an award and labelling it the 'best new pub in Britain'. By this time, £2 million had changed hands, and Smiles became the property of an accountant by the name of Ian Williams. He liked the beer so much, he bought the brewery. They were by now producing an incredible 8,000 barrels a year (in 1978 it had been just 500) and employing a staff of 115.
How it had grown. But by the late 1990s the brewery had fallen on hard times, losing money as intense competition within the real ale market took its toll. In 1998 it sold its flagship pub, the Highbury Vaults, and two years later announced it was going to sell its portfolio of 17 pubs for £5.8 million. The idea was to clear debts and concentrate on beer production. The brewery has changed hands a few times since then, and the new owners, Close Venture Management, has planning permission for a microbrewery and nine flats on the Colston Street site.
But some people are now questioning the commercial viablity of a new brewery here with newcomer Zerodegrees, which also brews its own beer, just across the road. Smiles beer is now brewed by Highgate Brewery 100 miles away at Walsall in the West Midlands. Richard Brookes, chairman of the Campaign For Real Ale in Bristol, has expressed horror that 'the last bit of Smiles left in Bristol' has gone.
'The pub's absolutely gutted, the bar is smashed, there's rubble on the floor,' he told the Post. 'You are not talking about a minor renovation here.' Brewery Tap regular, David Jane, said: 'It was a very friendly pub and a very cosy place to go.' But Will Fraser-Allen, a director of Close Venture Management, said: 'It was quite a long time ago that the pub won an award, and if an interior lasts 10 years it is usually doing well.' 'The former Smiles brewery wasn't economically viable in the centre of Bristol. 'There is the potential for the site to become a brew-pub.
What cannot continue to operate is a decaying, tiny pub which is losing money.' Could this be the sad end of the Smiles
Fact 200: MISERY AND WOE OF THE WORKHOUSE
It was a strange experience for seven-year-old Jennifer Worth to be taken to a workhouse to visit a 'disgraced' aunt. Here is her harrowing story POOR Cissy. She went mad, you know,' the grown-ups said, and these words burned themselves into my memory. Our family were poor, hardworking farming folk. Cissy, a servant girl working in a big house near Bristol, was just 15 when she became pregnant, was dismissed and then sent to Stapleton Workhouse. When the baby was born it was taken away from her. Cissy, nearly mad with shock and grief, was described as 'weak-minded and excitable, with hysterical outbursts,' and confined to the lunatic asylum.
When she became calmer, she was put among 'women of morally degenerate character'. She never saw her child again and never left the workhouse where she was to die many years later. Could this be a story from Victorian times, from Dickens' pen perhaps? No, it all happened in 1924 when having an illegitimate baby was so shocking that a girl could expect no mercy. My mother visited Cissy and on one occasion took me with her. I have a clear memory of a long grey corridor, locked doors and people in grey uniforms holding keys.
We were taken to a huge room in which were a lot of old ladies in nightdresses - or so I thought. But, as I understood later, it was the uniform of the inmates, not nightclothes, and the 'old ladies' were probably not very old at all.
The place was huge, cold and alien, and, being surrounded by strangers, I was frightened. I was introduced to my aunt, but became tongue-tied and burst into tears. She put her arm around me but I pulled away screaming. Our meeting was not a success. It may not have been a good idea, taking a small child to such a place to meet an unknown aunt, but I am glad my mother did, because I have never forgotten my poor, sad, aunt Cissy. Thoughts of her stayed with me for years and I became determined to find out more about the workhouse system and why it drove people to madness or despair.
The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 led to large workhouses being built all over the country. Families were split up, food was scarce, there was little heating in winter and the huge dormitories had little privacy. On top of this, hard manual labour was required from the inmates. Rules, regulations, discipline and harsh punishments were the norm. With inmates locked in the workhouses became prisons. The crime? Poverty. 'The workhouse should be the place of last resort,' said the state, but once there the most vulnerable people in society - the old, the sick, crippled, mentally defective people, children and unmarried mothers - suffered most dreadfully. After many damning government reports, in 1930 the workhouses were finally shut down.
But, the sad thing is, they didn't really close, they just changed their name and carried on much the same as before, with the same staff - whose traditions and mind-set remained firmly entrenched in the 19th century. Unmarried mothers were stigmatised, and made to pay for their 'sins', until well after the end of the last war. The elderly were herded into workhouse wards, re-named 'old people's homes' and children were housed in large orphanages run by a disciplinarian staff. The vast mental asylums were the last to go, closed by the Thatcher government in the 1980s. The workhouses' dark shadow fell over the whole of Victorian Britain - and then continued right up to the reign of our present Queen - 150 years of social history that should never be forgotten. When I was a young nurse and midwife in the 1950s I met several people who had been workhouse inmates and I collected their real-life stories together in a book called Shadows Of The Workhouse. Jane was a pathetic, dithering wreck of a woman of 50 when I knew her. She had been brought up in a workhouse, a bright and brilliant child whose spirit had been utterly crushed when she was only eight. Her 'crime' was to imagine that one of the lordly guardians of the workhouse was her father. She called him 'daddy' and for this the workhouse master beat her almost to death.
She never recovered from the abuse. Old Mr Collett was all alone in the world, his family having died during both world wars. But he was a courageous, dignified old man of 80 when I knew him. Yet he ended his life in a place little more than a relic of an old workhouse, sleeping 70 to a dormitory, never going outside, his life regimented and institutionalised. He deserved better than that - after all, this was 1950, not 1860. Mrs Jenkins' sad story is told in an earlier book, Call The Midwife. When her husband died, she and her five children were sent to a London workhouse. Here the children were taken from her and she never saw them again. One by one they died and she didn't go to any of the funerals.
When I knew her she was half-demented - the workhouse had darkened her whole life. Most of the old workhouses have now been demolished or adapted to other uses. Stapleton workhouse has been retained for its fine architecture, and is now part of Bristol University. But the ghosts of the past still linger, and every time I see the building I think of my aunt Cissy, who spent her life there for the crime of having an illegitimate child.
Jennifer Worth is author of 'Call the Midwife' (2002) and the recently published Shadows Of The Workhouse, from which this story is extracted. Both are available at £14.99. The publisher is Merton Books.
