Black Country Living Museum Next door is Alfred Preedy & Sons tobacconist shop, established in Dudley in 1868. James Gripton's radio shop is from the 1920s and this reconstruction, set in 1939, contains 'new' and second radios. The brick tunnel and cart entrance provide access to a late 1930s kitchen with an electric cooker made by Revo of Tipton. There is a radio workshop behind Gripton's and then the stairs lead to two first floor living rooms and two bedrooms which are all set in the late 1930s and furnished with original 1930s style furniture and wall paper. The Cradley Heath Workers' Institute was
Black Country Living Museum Pawnbrokers Shop Black Country Living Museum Pawnbrokers Shop The Pawnbroker's Shop that has been reconstructed at Black Country Living Museum is one of a pair of cottages built in the 1840s, from School Lane in Himley. For an overview of Pawnbroking please see The History of Pawnbroking. Pawnshops prospered in areas where the wages were low and unstable. In the Black Country in 1870 there were 160 pawnbrokers in the area, Walsall had 15 and Wednesbury had 48. For a housewife with a large family to look after it was a constant struggle to make ends meet. It was not uncommon for