Belmont Local History

LEFT: 

the original California public house - the California Arms, Brighton Road.

Circa 1885.

The landlord when this photograph was taken was William Gibbons, the elder son of the man who had built the pub - John Gibbons.  

This is the earliest photograph of the pub I have come across. 

This image shows the California before it was heavily extended in about 1900. 

The pub was severely damaged by a German bomb in WW2 but rebuilt, on a site further back from the road, in the 1950s. 

Regrettably, it was renamed in the 1980s; it is now the Belmont carvery restaurant /bar. 

The pub’s original name lives on, however, in the nearby block of flats, California Court, and also the recent California Close development in Belmont village.