Holland Street....

[Phil Blinkhorn]

Only the vehicles in the third shot and the litter prove you took those and they weren't stills from A Taste of Honey or another film of that era. Very atmospheric.

[Henry Mantell]

Aidan,great photos very atmospheric of wet Salford of my youth and the treads on the stairs show how well trod the bridge has been over the years. Countless thousands of factory workers have trodden there and since one of the last Lancashire clogmakers was still working in the 1960's in Whit lane, (Critchleys) we shouldn't forget the decades of workers crossing that bridge.
Apart from the graffiti litter and vandalism these could have been photos from several decades ago!

[aidanorourke]

It cheered me up to take those photos! It used to be that there were many places around Manchester and Salford that made you thoroughly miserable - as exemplified in the song by the Smiths 'Heaven knows I'm miserable now'.

But nowadays, all that decrepitude has been swept away - or most of it. It's important for people to know that 40 or 50 years ago, this was the dominant look and atmosphere of the urban landscape.

I could try to retouch the graffiti and modern vehicles out, but there's no point. I might as well leave them in. However I will try going to a few more bridges, warehouses or industrial sites to see if it's possible to frame a scene in the camera which excludes all modern elements.

[Phil Blinkhorn]

If you watched Life on Mars and are watching Ashes to Ashes you will know just how hard it is to use today's locations to give a genuine representation of even 25-35 years ago without the contemporary showing through.

The areas used for Life on Mars in and around Manchester (one or two of which still have me puzzled) were very limited - and so it has proved in London for Ashes to Ashes.

[selmer50]

Looking at your photos, it seems like a thousand years since I walked those streets!
I worked at the asphalt plant between the canal and the railway (Neuchatel then Amalgamated Asphalt(AMASCO) then Tarmac Roadstone then I left!
I used to go down Orchard St to Indigo St then turn left. There was a set of steps that led up to an iron gate in the wall, which led on to the canal towpath.
Along the towpath a bendy plank had been placed by the workers to enable them to get from one side to the other without having to go all the way to the road bridge at Langley Road. In the 6 years I worked there the plank was never removed or vandalised - no chance these days.
Next to the asphalt depot was a warehouse that stored old cloth/rags etc. so there was always an abundance of rats about. I remember the local ratcatcher coming down on his bicycle to lay poisoned sandwiches - he told me the rats were very clever and wouldn't touch anything unless they thought it was someones lunch that had been dropped, so the poison sandwiches had to be wrapped in paper to fool them!
There was always lots of litter about from U.M.P. - empty toothpaste tubes, hairspray containers etc. that they made.
Next to them was Barlow & Chidlaws gear works - I had a couple of friends who worked there.

I think the pub on the corner of Whit Lane & Gerald Road was The Clarence.
During my time at the asphalt plant, at Christmas, we would shut down the works at lunchtime then visit every pub on Whit Lane.

The bit of Taste Of Honey that I remember, is when she's on the bus, going past Salford Royal Hospital and you can see the statue at the junction of Oldfield road.

[Henry Mantell]

Originally Posted by selmer50

Along the towpath a bendy plank had been placed by the workers to enable them to get from one side to the other without having to go all the way to the road bridge at Langley Road. In the 6 years I worked there the plank was never removed or vandalised - no chance these days.


I think the pub on the corner of Whit Lane & Gerald Road was The Clarence.
During my time at the asphalt plant, at Christmas, we would shut down the works at lunchtime then visit every pub on Whit Lane.

Yes of course it was The Clarence! In the "Wakes" closures I used to sell newspapers on the steps in front of the metal gate to the Clarence front door 7 days a week. The wholesalers would deliver morning papers and the MEN and Pink afternoons, so you were popular at "chucking out time " and had finished before evening opening time. It was very lucrative if you got it and worth having permanently blackened hands for a fortnight!
I always wondered who had put that plank there.
UMP, well I worked a summer job there with one other male student. The whole of the rest of the factory floor was female except the machine engineers who came to fix breakages. I was paid handsomely to paint the yellow lines on the floor which were safety lines to allow people to move safely without injury from machinery. I imagine there were nearly a thousand women employed there and you can imagine what they did to teenage students Let's for sake of propriety say I was left alone after two weeks by a traumatised colleague who nowadays would have been to an industrial tribunal with a claim of sexual harassment ....times several hundred! This did produce overtime payments for me, painting is a costed job and if 50% of the workforce is absent.....As I recall I had to go to the tax office as I was close to eligibility for income tax.
As for the canal, well it would take a team of archaeologists a long time to excavate all the junk in there! That said a walk up to Agecroft along the tow path was positivly rural and beyond Agecroft (past the boarding kennels) you had no sense of city at all.

[tweek]

Hi, the pub on the junction of douglas green ,whit lane and corner of eny,s st was the CLARENCE, i lived at 17 enys st and used to fish out coins from the grill where the drunks used to drop them accidently down when going thru their pockets,on sundays me and my mate would sit out side the pub and the drinkers would throw pennies on the ground for us, we used long bamboo stick with chewing gum to bring up the pennies, whit lane was magic for a kid, there was the hair dressers for women, a bike shop. a sweet shop, and roberts the news agents where i had a paper round ,i went to st sebastions and st alberts,and the esoldo or the scala as most called it on sundays, spent most of my time in the charlestown library it had a distinctive smell, magic place, anyone remember?

[tweek]

Originally Posted by selmer50

In the mid 60's I used to walk to work every day to Whit Lane.
I came down Laundry Street, over Cock Robin footbridge (over the railway & canal) onto Holland Street. Immediately after the footbridge, on the left, was a factory. On the corner of the first block past the factory was a pub called the Beehive. Farther down on the opposite side was a chipshop where I often got my dinner. As I remember, all the houses were down from Orchard Street, which crossed Holland Street, onwards towards Whit Lane.
When the area was redeveloped, the terraced houses were demolished and the layout of most of the streets/roads was changed.
Holland Street still exists between Cock Robin bridge and where Orchard street was, now Langley Road and continues as Holland Walk.

Iremember the chip shop corner of holland and gill st further down was a fruit and veg shop, any one remember enys st like to here from any one who lived there in the sixties.

[aidanorourke]

Thanks tweek for the vivid descriptions of that area, you just seemed to capture the whole feel of how it must have been. Very different to today.

[Henry Mantell]

Originally Posted by tweek

spent most of my time in the charlestown library it had a distinctive smell, magic place, anyone remember?

Distinctive and some! I also used to spend quite a lot of time in there in my teens and Salford had a very efficient Library Service. I remember them stocking quite a selection of French and German literature in those languages when I asked if there was any possibility of. For a temporary prefab building I agree with you it was magic.
I remember a few of the Clarence drunks too, but for seriously profitable dropped money from drunks the Coach Stop in Glasgow on a Saturday night for the overnight coach to London takes some beating. Risky sometimes but profitable!It's amazing the quantities of money people lose when they are out of it!
You must remember the park and bowling green well then. We were friends with the park keeper and his son in law who lived in the parkkeepers house in Peel Park opposite Frederick Road Bus garage.Joe was very proud of his green and it was well patronised.
I remember Mr Critchley's clog shop in Whit Lane and the sadness when he retired. Some of his tools and clogs went from the shop straight into the street display at Peel Park museum. I think he was said to be the last clog maker in Salford. The passing of an old Lancashire tradition was at least preserved for later generations to see and experience.
You probably also remember the the local home made ice cream seller and his small van who traded around the little cobbled streets of Gerald Road and Whit Lane. No machine produced gunk but real home made ice cream! nly in Italy nowadays do you find that sort of local trade.