Clik here to view.
Walking the River ......... the scenic route
A short series taken from one day when I walked along the River. Back then the Thames was still a place to to earn a wage and watch as ships, and barges plied the way on the water.* Location; the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A Chorlton Chartist, Alexander Somerville, well almost
I think I am close to finding my Chorlton Chartist. Or in fact two, although having said that neither was born here or lived here, but one passed through in 1847 and the other one was born in Didsbury...
View ArticleClik here to view.
One canal …… 18 pictures ……. 47 or so years ago …… walking the Rochdale in 1979
A shortseriesbringing together for the first time pictures I took walking the Rochdale Canal from Princess Street to the Castlefield Basin.Most have appeared before but not together in the order in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
One canal …… 18 pictures ……. 47 or so years ago .......... walking the...
A short series bringing together for the first time pictures I took walking the Rochdale Canal from Princess Street to the Castlefield Basin.*Most have appeared before but not together in the order in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
When we made cider and perry here in Chorlton in 1847
Back in 1847, the journalist Alexander Somerville had walked the lanes of Chorlton looking for evidence of potato blight, that disease which had destroyed the crops in Ireland, and was already in parts...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Crossing the Thames at Woolwich on the Will Crooks
This is one of the old ferries which plied the crossing taking thousands to work and not a few just to see north Woolwich. The crossing is still one of those things I like to do although it is usually...
View ArticleClik here to view.
One canal …… 18 pictures ……. 47 or so years ago ..... walking the Rochdale in...
A short series bringing together for the fist time pictures I took walking the Rochdale Canal from Princess Street to the Castlefield Basin.*Most have appeared before but not together in the order in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The lost orchards of Chorlton
Today I went looking for the Newbridge pear and the Rose of Sharon apple. They had been grown here in the 1840’s and had caught the eye of the journalist Alexander Somerville who reported that both...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Walking the Woolwich markets …….. 1914
Now I don’t usually just lift someone else’s work directly off the page, but today I am breaking that rule.And I am breaking it because the description of the Woolwich markets back in 1914, from The...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Half a century of Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre ….. the exhibition
Yesterday I dropped into the major new exhibition celebrating fifty years of storytelling through costume, craft and performance at the Royal Exchange Theatre.It’s a sobering thought that I have pretty...
View ArticleClik here to view.
When your life comes packaged in just eight pages…….
It’s a silly title really but it sprang to mind after seeing Michael Kay’s post featuring the brochure for Manchester Polytechnic.It is dated 1970 and must have been produced just a few months after I...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Kickety Brook, Stretford, once a vital part of our flood defences
I first walked the Kickety Brook with my old botanist friend, David Bishop. It doesn’t look much but it was vital in its day for protecting the Duke’s Canal at Stretford. The Canal dates from the 1760s...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The lost Eltham & Woolwich pictures ...... no.10 the ferry or the tunnel?
A short series on the pictures of Eltham and Woolwich in 1976. For four decades the pictures I took of Eltham and Woolwich in the late ‘70’s sat undisturbed in our cellar. But all good things...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Amberleigh ... 1953-1997 ........ that prep school on Wilbraham Road
Sometimes you encounter a story which is well beyond your own experiences.The Oaks, Wilbraham Road, 1929And so today I plunge into that world of private education and in particular the schools and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Osibisa, the old Till & Kenendy Building and a memory
Now for no particular reason I played Woyaya by Osibisa.Osibisa and Mr. Righton The LP has sat on the shelf with a shed load of other vinyl which I treasure but seldom play. And within the time it...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Travelling on LCC tram number 1622 with memories of the Old Kent Road and...
Now I missed travelling on a tram by just a matter of years, but had I been born a little earlier I might well have been on this one that rattled its way up from the Old Kent Road to Westminster. And...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The not so dusty records of Woolwich ……..
Now for many years those of my friends who share my love of Eltham, Woolwich and Plumstead have sung the praises of the two volumes of “Records of the Woolwich District”. * Down an alley from Woolwich...
View ArticleClik here to view.
When only the pubs were left ........
It is pretty true that during many of the urban redevelopment schemes of the 1960s and 70s, it was the pubs which remained long after the homes of their customers had been bulldozed downNow I have been...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Voices from Chorlton ……… 179 years ago
In the summer of 1847 Alexander Somerville had come looking for potato blight, that disease which had ravaged the crops of Ireland and had been reported just a little further south in Derbyshire and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
More history from Chorlton Book Festival with Brian Groom .... tomorrow
Part of theChorlton Book Festival 2026 collectionChorlton LibraryManchester, Greater ManchesterThursday, September 24 6 PM - 7 PMOverview"Chorlton Book Festival presentsWe are so excited to welcome...
View Article
