#046 Queens Arms, Highgate : 1998 to 2011 (RIP?)

In 1998 the Queen's Arms on Barford Street was a pub I'd never been in, but had passed many times to and from work.

A few years after this picture was taken I did actually venture in to the Queen's Arms one evening. Inside it was a simple, basic pub with a handful of drinkers in the bar. The room on the right was the only bar that was open and I was concerned at the time about the prospects for its survival as this was a Saturday night.

However, it was the site of a curious meeting. Sitting at the bar was a bloke who said to me, "Don't you do the quiz at the Colebrook?" I didn't recognise him (one of the 'curses' of being a quiz master - they all know your name, but there are too many of them to possibly remember their's!) but he'd been a regular quizgoer until he moved to this side of the city. It is less than 10 miles between the two pubs, but in a city the size of Birmingham what are the chances of such a meeting?

Moving on to 2011 and it looks like the demise of the Queen's Arms is almost complete.

Still attractively painted on the outside, it is currently closed and has been this way for quite some time.

This is the twenty-first in my 'Birmingham Eastside' series.