IT was a bustling, thriving pub and a magnet for music-loving youngsters wearing what the posh shops called mini culottes but which were better known as 'hot pants'.

But the ring road put an end to all that.

The Red Lion on the corner of Hereford's Eign Street and Victoria Street had two 'lives' and the second and final chapter began to come to a close in the spring of 1971 when the once-popular haunt put up the shutters.

The pub had provided valuable accommodation for visitors and its regular discotheques were among the most popular in Hereford.

Licensee Don Woodbridge was convinced his inn had lost trade through being cut off by the busy ring road. "We are not a town pub anymore," he bemoaned.

He said the five double bedrooms had frequently been empty and the traffic noise had hardly made the building an ideal spot for a restful night's sleep.

"Only the disco was keeping the place going. We had become a young people's pub," added the forlorn mine host.

The first Red Lion, which was demolished in 1907, was known to have existed as far back as the 17th Century and became renowned for its 'rabbit warren' of rooms with low ceilings.

In her research on the old inn, the late Anne Sandford, Curator of Hereford City Museums, discovered that many people stayed there overnight while visiting the market on Wednesdays and Saturdays.

Amazingly, one man came each week for half-a-century and stayed in the same room!

The building came to grief under the sledgehammer because its foundations gave way on the side of the Old Eign Brook and the extensive repairs required were declared out of the question.

So the comings and goings at the two Red Lions are now just history and the disco dancers of three decades ago are now grandparents. But at the least the name lives on in the form of Red Lion Court, the flats now standing on the site.