Wigan Album

A LOVELY PHOTO GLENYS DONT KNOW WHERE IT IS THOUGH BUT ITS SO GOOD TO SEE A PLACE SO MUTCH LIKE WHERE I LIVED AS A CHILD IT LOOKS LIKE BACKS OF YORK ST HR INCE I KNOW ITS NOT BUT IT JUST TOOK ME BACK LOVELY.

What a lovely smile!
There's got to be a story behind this one.
Maybe she got her boyfriend to take this before they went out for a date...she's got her watch on and is holding her purse or a little bag.
Maybe she wanted a picture of herself in her nice new shoes.
Thanks for letting us see this one Glenys, but give us a clue, where did Tommy live and work and what year was he born?
Happy New Year!

Yes, there's got to be a story with this pic.
A happy smiling girl, ready to be off somewhere....wonder what the women in the background were commenting on !

PS.
I meant to comment on the alley ( my son says its a ginnel ?) what a tidy place it looks...not one of those nasty wheelie bins that clutter up everywhere these days.

tommy was my dad he was born and lived at 188 belle green and went to st williams rc school, he served his time as a plumber up to the 2nd w.w. enlisted in 1939 in the army (lanc. fus.}and in 1943 went into the a.a.c {paras} after the war he went back to plumbing, got married to sarah quinn who lived at 188 ince green lane lived with her for 12months then moved to langdale ave ince where me and two sisters were brought up.

sorry cathy, he was born in 1919 and had two sisters rose and mary.his dad also named thomas was in the army in the 1st world war

Thanks for all that Tony. I hope someone will recognise a family member from your lovely photographs.
They are so true to life showing the people and places in Wigan as they really were.
Look how clean those 'backs' are in the picture. People obviously had more pride then, while our lazy generation just waits for the council to come and pick up the bottles and cans that equally lazy people chuck on the ground.
I guess that if it snowed they would be out there with their spades shifting it - and having fun too!
Sorry for that New Year rant!

Well said Cathy !!

hi tony & glenys , i would say this pic is somewhere at top of bell green lane its so familiar to me of those backs the smaller buildings on each house was the outside toilet or the petty as we called it and as your dad lived up there it possibly is he must have lived just before the bush or just after it on same side as my grandma lived at 207 bell green lane a few doors before the prince of wales pub and we lived in york st sort of back of my grandmas although she lived in york st before moving on lane.

hi josie mi dad lived about 4 doors up from the corner shop (ernie prescots)well before the bush and the petties were in a block behind the houses (communal}

HI TONY,I KNOW WHERE YOU MEAN AND THE BACKS WERE LIKE THAT THERE MY GRANDMAS BACKS WERE THE SAME, BUT OUR PETTYS WERE IN OUR OWN BACK YARD JUST LIKE THE PIC WE DIDNT SHARE, WE MUST AV BEEN POSH HA HA,THE ROOFS ON THE PETTYS SEEMED TO BE LIKE BIG PAVEING FLAGS NOT TILES THEY WOULD BE WORTH SOMETHING TODAY.YOUR DAD WASNT FAR AWAY FROM WHERE WE LIVED, SO MAYBE IT WAS SOMEBODY HE KNEW FROM FURTHER UP THE LANE?OUR SIDE OF YORK ST HAD OUR OWN PETTY,BUT OPPOSITE SIDE WAS COMUNAL,I THINK THERE WERE ONLY A COUPLE OF BACKS THAT WERE LIKE THIS PIC,

tony,dont know if you have seen the lovely photo on places,under ince,your dads house can be seen (bell green lane crossing) did you ever live there tony?i knew terrance& olwen fillingham on that row, funilly enough their mam or dont know if she was step mam stood for me for my confermation at church& i still have the childs prayer book she gave me.i think she was a friend of my mam.

yeah josie i got the photo ages ago and printed it off and placed it 1st in my family tree album, as for living at 188 belle green lane no but are alwyn and terence did, their mum aunty mary died young she was only 39 lovely woman, uncle harry married again to margaret ? never knew her surname we use to call her peg, are alwyn died at the same age tradgic

oh inever knew alwen had died how sad she was alovely girl, she wouldnt have been mutch older than us a couple of yrs?& isnt it funny me knowing about peg not being their mum i recall her name now you have said.isnt it funny how things stick in ur mind when you think back .when i saw that pic of bell green lane it was amazing to me , although we lived further up under the bridge, i have walked up and down that lane thousands of times to school and back sometimes we had to wait as a train was comeing and the gates were shut we loved it , i had a lovely childhood of sutch innocents up the lane we had nothing but we had everything in those days we moved in about 1962 ,our houses were being demolished ,sad.

hi josie ive just remembered up where you used to lived was ronny mc colls house i only went in once there were cats everywhere they must have had a dozen i worked with kenny his brother for a while at john englands eng good lad funny

hi tony,yes they lived in frances st,it was a closed up off licence,very dark and dismal in shop part,their dad was a merchant sea man i think i only saw him once the lads had unusual stuff to play with what their dad brought home,they were two nice lads,not seen them for yrs,frances st was at the bottom of our st.

hi tony
a was sorry to hear about olwen
i remember your mam and dad very well from when we lived in Langdale.
happy days werent they.
i was chatting to mick winston just before christmas and he tells me he found loads of relatives in Ireland that they didnt know about.
best wishes
peter

hi peter nice to hear from you ,this snow is like we use to have in the sixtys and long hot summers in the school holidays going over (cut} swimming ,with a bottle of water and a sugar butty,we didnt need the water by the time we d swollowed half of cut mi mam telling mi take a towel and dry yourself proper never the dead cats un dogs we must have been mad, happy days