Wigan Album
Market place Wigan
16 Comments
Photo: Dennis Seddon
Item #: 19983
Brewery waggon most likely delivering to the 'Top Legs'.
No M6 then,or double yellow lines.Cable shoe shop was a good place to meet because you could stand inside the window-doorway if it was raining.One of my mothers POSH friends bought her "skoowwns"from McCandish cake shop.On Sunday evenings we all walked round in circles and up and down the big arcade because we had no pocket money left,the memories go on and on.
those who can't remember the pre pedestrian era don't appreciate how busy the traffic used to be in the Marketplace and Standishgate.
The year I was born looks a lot better then!
I love the lady over to the left wearing the "new look" coat and high heels; she looks so elegant.
My Sister-in -law worked at Hunters before it was moved to the bottom of Standishgate....got my wedding ring from Bakers and a lovely red dress from Jax which is just out of sight on the right...so many memories that I could cry both from happy days and from those that have gone...lovely photo Dennis.
The shop at the bottom on the right was Roger Bolton hardware shop, in those days, before B&Q and the likes you could buy screws nails etc.,in penny numbers not forced to buy a shed load that you may never need again
Remember Bolton's well.
When I was a kid, they had a massive rip saw, about 7 feet long, hanging on the wall, presumably as an advertising gimmick. A kindly assistant took it down for me to handle, and I damn nearly wrecked the shop staggering around with it.
Maureen this is for you - This is the land of lost content
I see it shining plain
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again
AE Houseman
Linda, there is a museum called The Land of Lost Content at Craven Arms, Shropshire, and they have that poem on the wall. I THINK it's still open, and is unbelievable!
Thank you so much Linda..that is so very true...and what a lovely piece of poetry.
lovely pic denis and yes irene isnt the dress then so elegant i love looking incase i see myself coz i think i wonder if thats my mam and me as my mam was a very elegant lady then as were most women of that time she allways wore a hat and even in her 80s wore a hat .
Never been Irene but it sounds great. Have you been to Beamish in Durham? It's a working museum and it's like stepping back in time. You go into the Co-op shop and that smell we all remember. Slabs of butter waiting to be cut and the biscuits in front of the counter in tins with glass lids. And payment, just like in Pendlebury's, money goes into cannister and wings its way to cash office. Wonderful memories.
Yes, I have been to Beamish, Linda, and also the Black Country Museum, where they have a 1930s chippy selling the best fish and chips, cooked in dripping, that I have ever tasted!
harry barrow:The Preston By-pass was Britain's first motorway. The by-pass was opened on 5th December 1958 by the Prime Minister, Harold MacMillan. It later became part of the M6 motorway.