When I first took this photo this was The Roscommon Bar, a small unprepossessing Irish pub along the main road in Digbeth. At the time I hadn't been inside, but I'd walked by on numerous occasions.
It also seems to have the name 'Fitzy's Bar'.
In the intervening years I did visit one Saturday evening and, inside it is quite a bit bigger than it looks from the outside. As it was fairly early (about 10 pm) there weren't too many people inside, but the disco had started already!
I don't know when it changed to The Kerryman, but it has been this for a number of years now.
From the outside it has had a complete makeover and now looks much more appealing. Looking at the website for The Kerryman shows that it is also a B&B and puts on music like many of the pubs in this part of Birmingham. Also, I notice that the opening hours are from 8am most days and on Fridays and Saturdays closing time is 4am! That would be one hell of a session!
To me, this is a great example of what I was hoping to find when I embarked on this project showing how pubs evolve over the years to keep up with the changing times and stay popular with their clientele.
This is the twenty-fourth in my 'Birmingham Eastside' series.
I used to go there to listen to traditional Irish music around 1982 to 1985...I Think it was the Old Bulls Head then ( and some locals called it the Little Bull because it was very close to a larger pub called The Big Bulls Head)
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