History Project
1940 - 1980
War & Post War
Arthur Wilcox Born in Sheffield, he lived in the village for 5 years, working for the railway. He died 23 July 1943.
Warhurstfold Bridge (Gladys Yarwood)
Arthur Peacher
Bernard Lyth
Gladys Yarwood
After the war houses were gradually modernised, with fireplaces replacing the old ranges, and in the 1950s, with the introduction of mains sewage indoor bathrooms were added. Tom Shufflebotham and Tom Parry remember tins baths and outside toilets until the 1960s. Modernising was not always easy: Gladys Yarwood recalls how difficult it was getting modern wallpaper to stick over years of whitewash. She made herself an ambitiously large rag rug in preparation for setting up home. As her mother warned, it proved to be so heavy that it was hard to get over a washing line to be beaten clean without breaking the line.
The streets were still largely stone setts, though New Street was dirt. It was paved in the 1960s. Gladys remembers the street as a playground where children could run about and dig. ‘These were the streets and these were our nurseries.’ The photograph (right) of Graham Yarwood on New Street was taken the night before the street was tarmaced. Washing was hung across the streets, but had to be moved to let delivery vans through. If you didn’t move your washing, it ran the risk of being dirtied. Children in the 1950s could still play football on the main road without risk of much traffic. Memories of childhood in the village at this time are very warm, with a sense of freedom and closeness, with room to play, good facilities in the shops and plenty for children to do, playing out or taking part in sports.
Many people remember the village as rather run down and dreary until the 1970s when there were grants for renovation.
Because of the mill closures, there were plenty of houses for rent in the village. Over the next 25 years, the population of the village gradually shifted in composition though it remained at around 1,000 between 1950 and 1970. It had fallen by nearly a half since 1911.
Most of the cottages in the core of the village were bought by a Kate Russell from Oldham in the 1930s, who rented them and then gradually sold them off. The empty Broad Mills burned down in 1947. A wood yard was then based in one part of the site.
During the war some families came to the village to escape the bombing. Some returned to Manchester after the war ended, but others settled. Evacuees from Openshaw were sent to the village during the war. Ida George remembers watching their arrival on the train as she sat on a wall below the station, with their gas masks and labels round their necks. They were assembled outside the Conservative club at the bottom of the Gibble Gabble to be allocated.
Gladys Yarwood’s widowed mother brought her four children here from Bolton during the war to escape the bombing because she knew there were houses for rent. The family settled in New Street and when Gladys married Tom Yarwood, they rented and then bought another house on New Street and over time set about modernising it.
Some of the people who lived or moved here had long family connections with the village, like Joyce Winterbottom, whose grandfather had lived here and whose father was born at ‘New York’ on Long Lane. Bob Parry’s mother moved from 16 Spring St to number 14 when she married. Arthur Peacher married into a local family in 1947; his wife’s grandfather had built the row of houses at West End. In the late 1950s, Bernard Lyth and his wife Elsie bought a house on Old Street; they had been visiting Elsie’s relations in the village on the train from Manchester. ‘We fell in love with the place.’ Bernard and Elsie bought their house on Old Street in 1958 for £150. It needed completely renovating and this was done over years with the help of family
Working lives
The Railway
Until the 1960s the railway through Broadbottom ran steam trains and went onto Sheffield and Marylebone in London. It was a busy, noisy presence in the village. There were goods trains passing through at night with fish and mail. There was still coal coming in down the ‘shunts’ underneath the railway arches. Joyce Winterbottom recalls that the Royal train went through occasionally and the schoolchildren were assembled to wave flags as it passed. The station was often packed with people travelling in and out of Manchester for work and leisure.
Railway viaduct with steam train (Gould family)
Broadbottom Station 1950s (Gould family)
CHANGES
Some streets, Brick Street and Bottom Street, were demolished in the 1970s and Old Street might also have been swept away but was reprieved after a vigorous local campaign. Houses and shops were cleared opposite Temperance Street and created a small green.
Hill End House was empty. Village children like Joyce Winterbottom remember getting into the house to play, and going into the great ballroom with mirrors around the walls. Hill End House was demolished in 1970 to build modern houses. Only a lodge is left and parts of the garden walls.
Gradually the population of the village changed, with more new families moving into the village over the 1970s. The Community Association was formed and a carnival started in the late 1970s. The picture on the right shows a carnival float passing Lymefields Mill.
The village is always changing and evolving. Over the years the numbers of shops have reduced so that now there is only the post office and village store; there are only two pubs when once there were over a dozen pubs and beer houses. Chapels have closed. Most people work outside the village. We still have our school and facilities for children have become more structured with our pre-school and toddlers' groups. New houses are still being built, though in small numbers. There is less informal communal life than there was once, when most people had fewer choices and less money. We have to continue to build and develop communities within the village.
Old and new carnival float passing Lymefield Mill 1980s (Gould family)
Graham Yarwood outside New Street - (Gladys Yarwood) - Brick Street can be seen in the background
Lower Market Street 1960s (Gladys Yarwood )
