OneGuyFromBarlick

A walnut from the tree that stood outside Barlic Bites on Albert Road until this year when it was removed because the roots were damaging the nearby buildings. That being the case, this walnut is unique and there will be no repetition. It is a late tree and a forgotten corner.

The gala procession forming up on Wellhouse Road at the end of Bank Street in about 1920.

This enormous ash tree stump that still stands at the back of Colin Street reminds us that 500 years ago Barnoldswick was a prime source of very large timbers for building water mills and other large buildings. We have direct evidence of this in Manorial Court Rolls and the accounts of Bolton Priory.
I often think of this tree when I see the way trees are taking over in Barlick again after centuries of exploitation. Look at any photograph made in the district in the last century and the main feature is how the modern version of the same view is dominated and sometimes even obscured by trees.

Milldam lead mine in Great Hucklow. Still existed in the 1940s when I met the owner Mr Chapman but now long gone and a forgotten corner.

Bankfield as it used to be with the boiler and engine houses and what used to be the biggest weaving shed in the country. Completely changed now and a forgotten corner.

A Nelson and Colne College event on the lawn at Gawthorpe in 1979 when the Hall was used as an extension of the college. I doubt if this could happen now.... a forgotten corner.

The Onward building at Nelson and Colne College in 1982, refurbished after the fire of 1980.

The western portal of Foulridge Tunnel. That's not the forgotten corner. The building in the background stands of the site of a beer house famous with the navvies who dug the canal and tunnel. It was called The Grinning Rat.

Was the Grinning Rat not what is now the house a bit further along towards Higher Wanless Farm? Fay Oldland's The Story of Foulridge shows it as this one in the picture. I thought the building, in your pic, was where the 'leggers' waited to take boats through the tunnel. 'Small buildings at either end of the tunnel provided stabling and were used by professional leggers waiting to provide their services'

You could well be right and I would trust Fay, she was a good woman.

This is an image of the cast iron ribs supporting the vaulting of the cross tunnel between the two original railway tunnels at Standedge. It is still covered with soot from the years of smoke from steam engines passing through the three and a half mile long tunnel. When the tunnel was completed a dinner was held here for the Directors of the company and their guests. The floor is paved with encaustic tiles. Technically it is illegal to go in the tunnels but in 1979 a group of us decided to break the law and walked in from the Marsden end to the centre. It's still there but inaccessible to the public and so is a forgotten corner.

On a lighter note.

I came across this forgotten corner today - I'd forgotten I'd joined Vimeo - and especially forgotten that I 'follow' Daniel Meadows

Just watched one of his creations - the one about the bus, and enjoyed it. He's one of the good guys.

Thanks Stanley for making us aware of him - and making me buy his book.

PS Watch the one about the pig. I doubt it will ever happen again in this country - I'd like George Monbiot to see it.

You're welcome David....

Postcard dated 1905 of the entrance to the tunnel into Rainhall Rock quarry that gave access to the quarry by canal boats. It subsided I think in the 1960s, I remember Cross Lane being closed for a while.

I fished it regularly, some good Perch in there then. You could walk through the tunnel at the Barnsey end and also the other under Salterforth Lane. I'm actually lucky to be here as I went through the tunnel on the same day that it collapsed later in the day!

Salterforth Lane was closed for a while until they backfilled it and remade the track. Local traffic to Rainhall Farm was diverted via Barnsey to get to the other side of the hole.

What was the date of the cave-in Ian, I haven't been able to get an accurate date.

Cant remember exactly Stanley but It would be a Saturday or Sunday.

Another local event that needs remembering......

I remember going to Queensmead to look for conkers. Do kids even play conkers anymore?
Probably have to wear PPE if they do

I doubt if they do Mick.

Queensmead used to be a Royal British Legion convalescent home back in the 60's. My dad was secretary of SSAFA and organised for ex servicemen and women to go there for R&R.

Ah, I didn't know that. There is quite a lot on the site on Queensmead if you search and I was certain I had transcribed John Griffin's autobiography, 'This Is My Life' and posted it but I can't find it. Can you have a search please Ian and see if there's any trace?

This might be a repeat, if so I apologise. These small sheds perch on the side og the railway cutting where the line crosses Heaton Moor Road in Stockport. There were only three when I was a lad and this was where we would hang over the railings train-spotting on the way home from school. It was a serious business in those days.
The shads are still there and have no utilities but survive as businesses. The end one of the three in 1945 sold aero engine parts for model aircraft and kits for building planes.

Some forgotten corners are bigger than others! This view of the hillside above Hollins on the top road to Blacko is a good example. The sub-medieval collapsed wall is only the most obvious feature, when John Clayton and I walked the bank we found what we finally decided could only be habitation and cultivation signs that pre-date the glaciation 10,000 years ago. In other words, this landscape was inhabited long before the Pyramids were even thought of.
That's a proper forgotten corner for you....

I can't remember who gave me this image but it's a reminder that once of a day if you wanted water you had to dig your own well. This is an old well on Ben Lane.