This old photograph of mine dates from fifty years ago and it shows a mill fire escape somewhere in Halifax. The good old days, before all this health and safety nonsense, when your mill could catch fire at the drop of a fag end, and a swift exit down the fire escape would give you … Continue reading Some Escape
Category: Old Halifax
Temporal Adrenalin
Most of us respond positively to a challenge. I don't mean serious, grown-up challenges such as dry rot in your floorboards or your wife running off with the milkman, but life-enhancing challenges such as climbing a mountain or collecting matchbox labels. For some people it is pedalling a bike backwards up a very steep hill … Continue reading Temporal Adrenalin
Hunting A Finisher
Old Haligonians in their hundreds came forward yesterday to pin down the location of the photo of, what I though was, Gaol Lane: it appears that it was, in fact, most likely the adjacent Ann Street. During the day I was sent several old maps of this particular part of Halifax, and the fascinating exercise … Continue reading Hunting A Finisher
Go To Gaol
At some stage in the late 1960s, large sections of the bottom end of Halifax were demolished. These were the streets that ran from Market Street, down to the appropriately named Winding Road. They are etched into my youthful memory - longer, grander, greater than they undoubtedly were - but their names are largely lost … Continue reading Go To Gaol
Salt, Pepper And Hillside
I must have taken this photograph in the late 1960s or early 70s. The two Halifax cooling towers - affectionately known as Salt and Pepper - were demolished in 1974. The first attempt to blow them up was remarkably unsuccessful, and a giant wrecking ball had to be brought in to complete the job. Between … Continue reading Salt, Pepper And Hillside
Station Steps
The last two negatives on this particular strip from the 1980s feature Halifax Railway Station. I have always been fascinated by stone steps. The area around my home town of Halifax has an abundance of hills and stone, and therefore stone steps are as common as hop houses in Kent. This fine example is, I … Continue reading Station Steps
Halifax Before Eureka 2
The second of two of my photographs from the 1980s showing that area of Halifax close to the Railway Station, which is now the home of Eureka! The National Children's Museum. When I took this photograph, the remnants of the old railway sidings were still in place. The street above the large stone wall is … Continue reading Halifax Before Eureka 2
Greetings From Holywell Green
I acquired this old photograph a couple of weeks ago. It's a rather fine photograph of a large Edwardian family posing outside a terraced house. My interest in it was sparked in particular, by the address printed on the reverse - like so many photos of that era it was printed as a postcard - … Continue reading Greetings From Holywell Green
Halifax Before Eureka 1
This is the first of two photographs that explores that part of Halifax near the railway station before the building of the National Children's Museum (Eureka!) in 1992. I must have taken these two photographs in the 1980s, well before the building that now houses the museum was constructed. Geographical logic tells me that this … Continue reading Halifax Before Eureka 1
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