A brewery has renamed four of its pubs over accusations that they had racist undertones.
Greene King has changed the names of three pubs called The Black Boy, and another called The Black’s Head.
Managing director Wayne Shurvinton said there was a perception the names were “linked with racism”.
Dr Halima Begum, of The Runnymede Trust, welcomed the news, saying the names had been a continual reminder of a “history of oppression”.
The Black Boy pubs – in Bury St Edmunds and Sudbury in Suffolk, and Shinfield in Berkshire – along with the Black’s Head, in Wirksworth, Derbyshire, have been given new names, but Greene King says it will take a while for the signage to be changed.
It is believed there are about 70 pubs called The Black Boy in the UK, and there remains no consensus on where the name comes from.
Links to the mining industry and a nickname for King Charles II have both been cited as possibilities.
Another theory relates to Native American figures placed outside premises to sell tobacco.
Mr Shurvinton said “despite the obscure origins” there was a perception the names were “linked with racism, which is why we knew we had to take this step if we wanted to continue on our journey to become a truly anti-racist organisation”.
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