OT Old Job Descriptions

Many electricians had shops much later than that - I can remember several in Aberdeen in the '50s. Selling batteries, torches, cable, plugs etc. As well as taking the order for house wiring work.

There was retail price maintenance in those days, so no cheap supermarket batteries. Or supermarkets, come to that. If was also fairly common for a plumber/electrician shop, selling baths and basins etc as well as electrical stuff. Had a relation who owned one.

"Electrical Engineer" used to cover a multitude of jobs from installing distribution plant to making and repairing all forms of electrical items. In the case of the Sorrells, I'd guess they were what would now be considered contractors, working from either a small shop premises with the office in the shop or their home with the office in the front room, installing electrical works in old and new housing.

It would help if you could expound on your source for "shown to occupy premises in Bethnal Green". Eg in 1921 Bethnal Green was still a distinct registration district so if that is what you meant then it covered a pretty big area[1] and not just what today might be seen as Bethnal Green. If you don't have an address you could try one of the sites which try to index the area. Eg you clould search for him and/or his professed occupation at

rewinding and servicing motors and dynamos? Designing and installing electrical systems for businesses?

and another Scottish phenomenon was fishing tackle and tv sets.

Source is here:

would be my suggestion. It's a bit like the uk.d-i-y of genealogy.

Present day shop :-

Unfortunately that link drops me in a login page for Sky drive.

If it's link to a picture showing the only Hare Street in London now (In SE18, AKA Greenwich), it's the wrong one, anyway. Hare Street in Bethnal Green seems to have been renamed or removed since 1921, and the area is very indistinct on the August 1945 aerial pictures. Brick Lane still exists, but none of the other streets referred to in the directory listing do, since the area was rebuilt after The Blitz flattened that bit of London. Hare Street apparently sort of followed the current Cheshire Street's course, with No. 80 being not far from the existing Three Colts Corner.

It's interesting the way that locality names survive in London long after their reason for being called by that name.

Sounds a little early for charging radio batteries, though that's how Comet started in the 1930s

All of those. Many electricians (or more usually their wife) ran a shop selling electrical goods as well as providing a repair service for radio and TV sets, domestic appliances etc. Work during the day would often be rewiring or wiring, repairs took place evenings and weekends.

Those sort of shops survived up into the 70's.

Some countries have some very odd combos like that - usually some good reason. I guess people get hooked on TV?

Yes - Hare Street has been renamed, IIRC. Now, inasmuch as it exists, Cheshire Street.

Up to a point. There are other streets near there which have kept their names. Eg Sclater Street (which is sort of the continuation of Hare Street on the West side of Brick Lane and is listed in the 1921 Directory). Ditto Bethnal Green Road. And while the blitz did a great deal of damage there are a fair few buildings surviving nearby, including in Cheshire Street the mildly infamous Carpenter's Arms.

Yep - Hare St was what is now the Western part of Cheshire Street - as the OP can see on the Bartholomew's of the time thanks to

I have been advised, rather sniffily, that they do *not* resort to angle grinders - not even when faced with a really overgrown memorial inscriptions :)

Power washers, then?