Thomas Hardy's influence on pulic houses

Taken with my not very good camera phone yesterday at a local pub. Aldbrickham is Thomas Hardy's name for Reading. Neither the barman or the two locals knew anything about it, but the landlady did know the Hardy connection. It's a beer award for beer in the wood, whatever that is.

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The locals told me the pub had another tenuous claim to fame. The widow of ex-soccer legend Robin Friday worked there as barmaid till recently. There was a biography written of Robin Friday called The Greatest Footballer You Never Knew.

At "The Eight Bells" in Hatfield, Herts there is the plaque reminding everyone about Dickens character Bill Sykes calling in there after murdering Nancy.
I bet he left quick as the beer is terrible.

I'll look out for it if I'm ever in Hatfield.

One thing that bothers me about the notice is that the pub, The Forresters Arms, does not have an apostrophe. I walked past another public house yesterday called The Queens Head. It has just been renovated and had a new sign painted, but they painted it without an apostrophe. If ever I run a pub, I will call it The Pedant's Arms, or maybe even The Pedants' Arms, although not if it is an old pub with a historic name, because I hate it when old pubs are given stupid names.

My father's GHQ when I was a child, was "The Hand & Flower" pub opposite the Olympia in Fulham.
Last time I went I think it was called the " Harvey Wallbanger."
Dad would have turned in his grave!

You think that's bad. I cycled past and on the way back stopped for a drink at a country pub called The Pineapple. It was an old fashioned pub with a thatched roof and wooden beams. There was a notice inside saying that the pub was over 900 years old and mentioned in The Domesday Book. It further said that the pub used to be frequented by shepherds and drovers. I bet when they dropped by the pub wasn't named after a tropical fruit they'd never seen or heard of. To make it even more ridiculous, the picture on the sign was a pine cone, not a pineapple. Maybe it's me who's being stupid. Maybe a pineapple is an old name for a pine cone.

Oops, hoisted by my own petard (whatever a petard is).
A pineapple is late 14th century word for pine cone (link).