11-00-70 Newcastle Killingworth Norgas

Gas gets on with it…

Famed for its futuristic and unusual architecture, the Northern Gas development is a major part of Killingworth, an industrial township in Newcastle upon Tyne. With its high concentration of industry and huge number of waged and salaried workers, the NORGAS site is seen as the ideal spot for Martins to open a branch, which it does in 1965. More of a table top in a corridor really, Killingworth NORGAS is a sub branch under the direct control of Newcastle upon Tyne City Office.

In Service: 1965 to 28 December 1995

Image © Barclays Ref 0030-1489

The NORGAS sub-Branch has special – somewhat complicated - opening arrangements, and these are listed in Martins Bank’s 1968 “Green Book” branch directory as follows:

“Monday and Thursday 10.00 to 12.00 and 25^th monthly

(or previous Friday if this date falls on a Saturday or a Sunday)

10.00 to 12.00 for the exclusive use of employees of the Northern Gas Board”.

(We imagine all this would have been extremely difficult to fit on a normal opening hours sign!) The Killingworth NORGAS sub-Branch is taken over by Barclays in 1969, and remains open until the end of 1995. Martins opens another sub-Branch is in the Stephenson Industrial Area of Killingworth in 1967, and whilst this too makes it through the merger with Barclays, it is scrapped in 1975.