OneGuyFromBarlick

I missed John by five minutes! My fault not his. He left me the book, a bunch of small sweet tomatoes and a tin of Erinmore Flake. We've spoken and he is coming again for a general natter. His book is very good, see the reading topic.
Dry weather was a good thing for women in long skirts as the hems weren't trailing in the mud of the unsealed roads but it brought its own problems. Dust was a nuisance and remember it contained faecal matter, animal and human. Much food was on display uncovered and it's not surprising that public health reports of the time talked of a constant low level of diarrhoea. Summer was a time of epidemics of stomach and bowel ailments as levels of dust rose and food deteriorated very quickly, no refrigeration. In contrast a hard frost was seen as cleansing. As late as the 1950s my mother still referred to cold dry weather as 'healthy weather. and a common saying was 'A Green Winter means a full churchyard". Many researchers say that the arrival of cheap Chloride of Lime and chlorine bleaches resulted in an instant depressing of general levels of infection. Dry toilet buckets were routinely dusted with chloride of lime when the pail was emptied by the night soil men. A considerable innovation for those times.....

I saw this on a piece of waste ground in the town one day and never snaffled it. Pity because it's the only original night soil bucket I have ever seen.....
When all water had to be carried and there was a drought the weekly bath became a problem even though the same water was used for all the family. It was no bar to cleanliness, as Florence Nightingale once said "Given a quart of water and adequate privacy any woman can maintain personal hygiene". The solution was a stand up rub down of the nooks and crannies with warm water, soap and a face cloth. If someone was handy to do your back so much the better. I once read that miners reckoned that the heart shaped patch of skin between the shoulders where you couldn't reach and so never got cleaned properly was a protection for the lungs. There's a thought for today's shower freaks who have multiple showers each day......

One forgotten corner is the lifting of heavy weights in everyday jobs. A 1cwt sack (1cwt = 112lbs=51kg) was common, flour and grain were usually 240lbs and hire sacks could hold almost 300lbs of things like beans. A galvanised steel milk kit holding 12gallons was 168lbs and in my youth I had to lift hundreds every day. All these would be illegal now under modern H&S regulations. At the mill, shovelling 4 or 5 tons of coal was accepted every time we had a delivery, we had to get the overspill into the bunker to close the boiler house door. No wonder we were all fit and had bad backs!
I once asked Johnny Simpson why he used a number 3 shovel for muck and he said that he could move just as much with that as a number 12, the largest size. He was right, we favoured a number 8 for coal and used to sharpen them on the grindstone in the tackler's cabin, they were easier to use if they were clean and sharp. All this has been lost today and a good thing too!

My Forgotten Corner today is an old mate of mine, Danny Pateman. This pic of him is him visiting me in Bancroft Engine house in 1977. Danny was a big bloke! His overalls always wore out first at the front where his belly rubbed against the steering wheel. A driver all his life I first got to know him when we were tanker drivers at West Marton. I remember having a conversation with him one day about the fact that when we had a day off and someone else had driven our tanker we could feel a difference in the smoothness of the action of the gear lever. He told me that when he was learning to drive his teacher told him that when changing gear you should always imagine you had a live mouse in your hand and the object was to effect the gear change without injuring the mouse. I know that sounds fanciful but it works! He was a good driver and when I was in the garage at West Marton we had to change the break linings on his Leyland tanker annually, not because they were worn out but because he used his brakes so lightly that he polished the linings to the point where they became inefficient!
His vice was beer and one armed bandits..... I've seen him go into the Green Street Club on pay day and put a large part of his wages into the bandit, I think he was addicted to them. Vary fond memories of him nevertheless, we got on well together and I miss him. He died many years ago. That's one of the bugbears of old age, you lose your mates as they drop off the perch!

The old Albion tanker at Marton in 1968.

This tanker was a good example of what the state of wagons was before the 1968 Traffic Act which brought in proper testing of heavy vehicles. This tanker was new in the 1930s and was driven by the man who was Transport Manager for Associated Dairies in the 1960s. Apart from its other shortcomings it had no brakes worth speaking of and we were always complaining about it. It was a major achievement getting it from third gear into top, the gearbox was so worn. When compulsory brake testing came in after the passing of the Act it was found that the handbrake was more efficient than the foot brake! That did it! The old Albion was retired and scrapped and nobody shed any tears for it. The thing was that it never had an accident. As Danny Pateman said, you just drove according.....

Today's forgotten corner is a man called Wallace Neave. I got to know him at West Marton where he was mechanic in the garage and worked with him a lot especially when I was in the garage with him for about six months. I learned a lot from him. He had no formal training but lots of experience and was a competent man.
However Wallace had one characteristic that we could all have done without, he was possibly the most fiery tempered man I have ever known. Today he would be sent off on an Anger Management Course but in those days we had to put up with it. He was noted for his temper, at one time he did the Barlick Town milk delivery in the early morning to the milk chaps and shops that sold milk. One morning Ned Town had the temerity to ask him for an extra crate of milk in pint bottles, Wallace threw one at him!
I was careful and got on well with him but even so his temper still popped out every now and again. I remember him being in a bad mood one morning and found out later the reason why. For a while his sleep had been disturbed by the yowling of the feral cats at night, we had a lot in the village. The bedroom of his cottage opposite the dairy was level with the gardens at the back because of the rising ground. On this particular night the cats woke Wallace but he was prepared! He had loaded a couple of 12 gauge shotgun cartridges with peppercorns and had them handy. When the cats started in the back garden he got out of bed, loaded his shotgun with the two cartridges and let fly with both barrels. He said later that he knew immediately from the way the gun kicked that he had made a mistake. That's right, in the dark he had picked up the wrong cartridges and had blown a lot of glass out of his beloved greenhouse! I've seen him lose it when a rat hid under the dropping board in one of his hen huts. He lay down on his side and stabbed it with his pocket knife. Doesn't sound much but would you do it?
Funny thing is that Mrs Neave was a lovely lady and mothered the whole village.....
I don't have a pic, I suppose I never plucked up the courage to take one of him.......

Elslack reservoir in 2005. Out of sight, out of mind. I wonder how many people in Barlick know that this is where most of our water comes from in Barlick?

I was asked the other day what the origin of Hague was for the farm between Kelbrook and Foulridge. This intrigued me for years and many of the explanations I found tended towards a variant of 'ague' the old name for the fevers associated mainly with low lying land. The proximity of Salterforth Bottoms which were very extensive at one time seemed to support this but I was always a bit leery about it. Then I found out that 'hey' and the variants of it were all from Old English and Saxon and broadly indicated boundaries but more specifically in this area hedges used as boundaries instead of the usual stone walls. Very often they are on bottom land where stone is thin on the ground and growing hedges was easier than carting stone. So I have plumped for the origin of Hague being hedge and that will do me until I come across a more convincing explanation. You can never be sure with interpretations of place-names but some are better than others and you go with your instinct.
To get an idea how complicated it can get have a furtle into the etymology of 'ing'. It's a minefield but keeping it simple in a place-name it usually refers to a meadow or an indication of tribe as in 'Birmingham'. You pays your money and takes your choice! I'll go for meadow in Long Ing in Barlick.......

Out of curiosity I looked up the origin of the surname Haig and found this:
Anglo-Saxon origin, and may be either a topographical name from residence by an enclosure, deriving from the Olde English pre 7th Century "haga", cognate with the Old Norse "hagi", hedged field; or locational from Haigh in West Yorkshire, or in Lancashire. Haig

That's my understanding also Tiz. Hey Farm was enclosed by hedges...... some of them very old, lots of species.

Today's forgotten corner is not in the manor, it's at Ellenroad. During our refurb of the building I realised that there was a void under the floor of the lobby at the entrance to the engine house but nothing corresponding in the cellar. As I was blessed with plenty of labour I told the lads about the mystery and asked if they would like to help me solve it. Unanimous approval so I set them on cutting a hole in the wall in the cellar.
We found a perfectly serviceable room but it had just been used as a void for dumping rubbish in. So we cleared it out, painted it and installed a door from the cellar. We ended up with a very useful secure storage space.
What intrigued me was why they hadn't done this when the place was built? It was just left to become a real forgotten corner.

This was Butts beck a year ago...... At the moment a forgotten corner! The beck has only a trickle of water in it. Bad times if you were running a water mill! We forget how important water power was!

No sooner had I spoken than we got flow again. The power of Oneguy!



Still on water.... I wonder how many people are aware that this small piece of waste ground behind the railings between the joiner's shop and the chapel in Wapping is actually the course of the culvert that takes Gillians Beck from Clough dam site down to the Pigeon Club.
I've always thought that opening this culvert up and making a water feature in what is now the Clough play area would be an asset to the town and make it easier to ensure that the culvert under the road is kept clear. This is one of the choke points in our water management in the town and blockage of this was the trigger for flooding in Wapping in July 1932. Lest we forget.........

Butts Beck yesterday after the rain. In the days of water power this would be a respite for the millers because work could start again! In the early days of the industry there was a saying; "One foot in the field and one in the shed". This referred to the fact that when low water stopped work in summer there was always the possibility of seasonal employment on the harvest. Many manufacturers had land holdings for this reason.

When I puzzle over forgotten corners I often go back to the maps, you always learn something. My mind went to what is now Valley Road between Skipton Road and Long Ing. This is the First Edition OS 1853 and as you can see pre-dates Wellhouse Mill which was building in 1853. It repays some careful study!

This is the bit that fascinates me. Same map in 1892. Look for the changes that have happened but also those still to come. Wellhouse Road is not adopted yet and Valley Road is only a footpath. All the housing is yet to happen.

Interesting to note that we both live in a couple of the earliest terrace houses built in the town. I am still hoping to find a picture of the short row of 4 houses that used to stand at the top of Robert Street. They were there on the 1853 map and only demolished in the 1960's. I cant understand why I don't have any memory of them.

Here's the best resolution I can get on the Croft and the adjoining area Ian. This is the 1853 map.



This is the 1892 25" map......

Yes they are there on the 1853 along with what is now Croft Cottage and the first row of terraced cottages on St James Square. We discussed this at length in another thread when Matt Swinscoe was looking for information about his cottage property. There must be a photo somewhere.

Hi from a new member

Annoying isn't it..... These things usually become clear after a time but in some cases they continue to nag you.



This stonework in the side of the beck at Paddock Laithe is a good example. I know it's something to do with the original 18th century course of the beck at that point but have never been able to work it out!

Annoying isn't it..... These things usually become clear after a time but in some cases they continue to nag you.



This stonework in the side of the beck at Paddock Laithe is a good example. I know it's something to do with the original 18th century course of the beck at that point but have never been able to work it out!



I went digging for an earlier map but couldn't find one. However, I tripped over this 1930 6" map of the Butts area and unless I am mistaken those cottages are still there Ian.

They were there in 1963 also, clearly visible on the aerial series of the town. Holy Trinity taken from above the coal yard shows them side on behind Croft Cottage.

Here is a zoomed section:




I would like to see a front ground level view from St James Square.

It's a puzzle..... I've looked on my original 1963 negs and no better info.....

Until they were demolished sometime in the mid 60's and the road remodelled there was only pedestrian access to the houses on the Croft from St James Square. According to Donald Harrison the path ran in front of Croft Cottage up onto the back street of East View Terrace. Vehicle access to Robert, Alice and Bessie streets Pleasant View and our row on the top would have had to be via Commercial Street.

That would work.....



You can always learn something from close study of maps! Here's the 1892 25" of Calf Hall and Butts. Remember me saying that the masonry at Paddock Laithe intrigued me. The answer was there all the time. There was a kink in the original course of the beck before the road was realigned and the bridge built. In case you're wondering, the grey object at the back of Butts Mill is the gasometer, they were coking coal and making their own gas for illumination.