ONE of Whitefield's most famous pubs is to be sold.

The Junction Inn became well-known because for a time the publican was the country's official hangman.

And although for sale, the pub will not close.

The business, at Besses junction, Bury New Road, is just one of 69 pubs throughout the North West being sold by owners Allied Domeq Pub Company Ltd and is on the market as a working pub alone or with others.

A spokesman for Allied Domeq explained: "The Junction is for sale with others as part of an ongoing rationalisation of all our properties.

"It is being offered for sale as a going concern, a business still in operation."

The spokesman would not comment on reports in the financial press that the company had suffered massive losses nationally.

ZThere has been a public house on the site now occupied by the Junction for at least 200 years.

Originally known as the Stone Pale Tavern - a converted farmhouse - the first mention in local documents was in 1780.

The pub became the Junction Hotel in 1881 and the present building was constructed in the 1950s - uniquely being built around the old building so that it could remain open.

The pub had its most famous period from July, 1952, to October, 1953, when the landlord was Mr Harry Bernard Allen, Britain's official hangman.

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