A Halifax Roof
I’m not sure exactly where or when I took this photo, but – this is a Halifax roof. Unconventional, different, with a twisted sense of humour. Well-worn, hard worked – but as strong as a stone quarry.
Looking Down On Elland
South Lane climbs out of Elland up towards the top of Blackley, but loses interest in the task and peters out amongst some soulless brick factories. Back in the 1970s, when I took this photo, you could still look down on the power station and Gannex Mill. These days industrial units and new housing developments fill up some of the […]
Ring Them Bells
The Ring O’Bells, located next to Halifax Minster, supposedly dates back to either the 13th or the 15th century; although that is “dates back” in the sense that an inn has been around here since those distant times. The current manifestation was, in fact, built in 1720; which is quite old enough for most respectable people. At one time it […]
Green Clough
One of my photographs from the late ’60s shows the cobbled lane leading from Woodside Road down to Old Lane and Dean Clough. The lane still exists, but these days it is lined by a canopy of trees – and grey has been replaced by green.
Monochrome Valley
This is an illustration from a book I have yet to write, which – in my own mind, at least – is entitled “Monochrome Valley“. It shows Bank Bottom in Halifax in the early 1970s. Square Church spire and Halifax Parish Church fight to be seen through the industrial smoke. I have a feeling that I took this photograph from […]
Stone Trough, Stone Dead
This is a new scan of a photograph I took over 50 years ago, and it shows the Halifax Charity Gala parade in 1965 passing the old Ramsden’s Stone Trough Brewery building (RIP) at Ward’s End, with the ever-present Victoria Theatre in the mid-distance.
Dark Forgotten Mills
A strip of medium format negatives dating from the 1980s is the next to go on my scanning machine. I took these photographs whilst on a walk down Shaw Lane in Halifax, at a time of transition for the town. The last of the mills that had been at the heart of the economic and social life of the town […]
Words
Slubbing Dyeing = The dyeing of textile fibres prior to spinning Melange Printing = Printing of textile fibres with bands of colour alternating with unprinted areas
Old Lane And Dean Clough (1971)
A classic Halifax scene which has been recorded by many better photographers than I. The grey chimneys fading into the grey skies make good photographers of us all. I must have taken this photograph in 1970, back in the days when Dean Clough was still producing carpets by the acre. The great photographer Bill Brandt walked these same street forty […]
