Mother Macs - 33 Back Piccadilly, Manchester, M1 1HP map
- A manchester ‘local’, Mother Macs is a proper pub and it makes no excuses. Hidden down a back street, just off Piccadilly Gardens, it proudly displays its Mancunian heritage on the walls in an almost museum-like way, photographs accompanied by historic descriptive text. Serving a small range of draught lagers, cider and bitter it also has occasional guest ales. Mother Macs, named after the old land lady, is a small pub that hasn’t changed over the years and is always full of friendly locals - many from a generation who have seen Manchester change drastically. It’s also one of the only pubs in the city centre to show off its allegiance to Manchester City FC.
- Real ale
- live sports (sky sports, bbc, itv, etc)
- darts
- manchester city fc pub
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Do you have any other photographs or information on Mother Mac’s. My mother, formerly Norah McLellan, was the daughter of the original Mother Mac. My mother married Alexander MacTaggart and we (my parents, sister and brother) moved to Canada in 1954. My grandmother died in 1968. I understand the pub was named after her when she died and that there was a tragic fire with the next landlord. My mother, father, brother and sister live in Edmonton, Alberta. I live in Red Deer Alberta, and I have two brothers living in Toronto, Ontario.
Sarah and I always enjoy a visit to mother mac’s, where we regularly consume mince n tatties washed down with a couple of non alcholic pints.
Adios from a warm and windy costa blanca.
I love the TATTIES and the quiz!
Enter at your own risk – incredibly smokey, you’ll come out stinking so much, you just want to go home and sit in a bath fully clothed. Clearly a locals place and it is like the scene in American Werewolf in London when the two lads walk into the ‘Slaughtered Lamb’.
If you want to go back in time, walk into Macs, through the smoke and to the bar, feel a dozen pairs of eyes looking in your direction, and try and relax. It isn’t threatening, but at the same time, hardly welcoming and it’s one experience you won’t forget!
Mother Macs has been a regular haunt of mine for many years. Its core business is its regulars. The first time I ever went in there, I was on my own. Within 20 minutes, I’d been introduced to the bar staff and Les and Marie, who’ve had the pub for years.
I’ll tell you – this is one pub where it never kicks off, rarely if ever runs out of favourites and welcomes newcomers ALWAYS. Until you’ve tasted Les’s twice fried chip butties (free on Friday evenings) you haven’t lived. They do loads for charity (Clare House Hospice and a local youth football team) and are very supportive of the OAPs who visit.
If you want a smoke free environment – go to Sinclairs. If you want piped ‘Oirish’ comedy while you’re stood at the urinal, go to Waxy O’Connors. If you want to spend a fortune on beer of a dubious quality, any of the Kro Bars will do.
If you want a little gem of a pub that embraces traditional values and does ‘what it says on the tin’… then have a brew at Mothers. Where else can you get butties for a quid and finney haddock and ribs and cabbage that doesn’t require a bank loan?
p.s. The twigs you saw on the ceiling are used to hang decorations from (Christmas lights, St Georges flags, birthday banners etc)
One of my favourite Manchester centre pubs, a ‘real’ pub in a city centre where such things are becoming rarer.
Maureen from Alberta mentions a tragic fire involving a later landlord. The story I’ve heard is that he murdered his wife and kids, set fire to their bodies in the cellar and then killed himself. Is their any truth in this story or is it just a myth?
After my last post I googled the words mother macs fire, I can’t seem to post the link, but this is the story as I cut and pasted it.
Many years ago there was a fire in Mother Macs which started mysteriously. Once the blaze had been put out, the fire brigade began their investigations into why and where the fire had originally started. The pub had a dumb waiter for moving food from one floor to the next. When the dumb waiter was inspected, the cut up bodies of the landords wife and children were found inside. The fire had been started deliberately but things had not gone quite as planned.
Does anyone else have thought or comments on this story?
I have heard the fire and bodies in the dumb waiter story many times. Does anyone know when the incident took place. I have searched the Net to no avail for more details. Having worked in Manchester City center for 30+ years I have heard many people tell the tale of Mother Macs fire and murders but nobody remembers when it took place nor any detail?
Cheers
Norah MacTaggart (formerly McLellan) daughter of the original Mother Mac, passed away on July 02, 2009. She was 89 years old and died from complications of pneumonia. She left behind 5 remaining children, Maureen, Norah, John, Kevin and Lawrence. Her husband Alexander MacTaggart died on February 29, 2008.