Wigan Album

Top Legs.

A little further on down the Acade was a book stall, in the early 1950s dad would buy me a book and sit me down on the LEGS steps why he had is pint, the book was a bribe, I wasn't to tell mam !. Now in my seventies I fondly remember the Little Arcade for this reason, oh yes, and for the box of Fireworks in November . Great Picture Frank, fond memories.

Its official name was Market Arcade although everyone called it the little arcade.

I loved this arcade, it had so much atmosphere. I remember the newsagent stall at the bottom from where I bought my "Mersey Beat" magazine every Saturday. My dad threw them all out when they moved house after I joined the WRAF. They could be worth a penny more than I paid for them now.

Many years ago a good friend of ours was a policeman at the time the legs of man was being demolished,on. the Friday night the man in charge of the demolition team asked him if he would keep an eye on the building that was half way through the pulling down.Of course he agreed ..but on the Monday he called to see the progress they'd made..the boss said "Come and look at this"they'd found a hidden room behind a door that had been bricked up,it was full of very old seating..chairs benches etc,also he showed him a book..inside was bed and board prices,a halfpenny for example.. He called the following morning to find the room was empty and the book gone..he asked him where they'd gone,to which the boss replied "Oh we burned them all" our friend couldn't believe it..all that history lost forever.

A lovely quaint arcade , full of character! You could spend all Saturday afternoon in those days ,just shopping and walking around, and still not see everything. The arcade was were you would buy nylons - usually 'American Tan' and then to Marks for suspenders to go with them! All 'gone with the wind' now.....

I remember the 'Little Arcade, you could buy almost anything in there, such a lovely friendly place..

Like everyone else,I just loved this Arcade,Mr Smith..Margaret Razaks..Gorners cafe where every Saturday afternoon after shopping my Mam and moi would go for our dinner,served by ladies in little black dresses with a white lacy apron ..I always get tearful remembering these happy days...never to come around again.

Tragic that Maureen and I bet it happened a lot.

I remember the man with the weighing scales and Gorner's Café. There was a shop that sold strings of paper bags and my Mam would buy me some to play "shops" with. The same shop sold loose fireworks in a big tub outside the door in October....can you imagine that happening today? It was a fascinating place and I'm so glad I knew it.

Wigan had that special atmosphere when we were young happy days never to return.

Hi Maureen, Gorners Café was the last time and place I saw your Michael, I was a neighbour of Margaret Razak. As a young lad I used to get a 'free' weigh on the jockey scales the man that operated them, was, or had been, my mums dancing partner.

You either love History, or it's completely meaningless... To me it's everything and seeing the pictures again,just shows everything that I wish could have been preserved.

Hello again Roy,how nice to hear from you..Our Michael would go anywhere were there was food.One day my Mam asked me where had I put the turnip she had bought the day before..I told her I hadn't seen it ..it turns out that our Michael had eaten his School dinner then gone home peeled the turnip sliced it then put it in the chip pan...he was a real character..and I miss him every day.
Re - the scales Roy..my Mam could not go past without getting on them..I think she just liked your Mums ex dancing partner. It's been nice to hear from you Roy.

I agree 100% Veronica.. Anyone with half a brain, would have preserved at least some of the many Treasures that was Wigan... I acknowledge some work would have been needed.. Other cities did it though, so why couldn't Wigan.. Wigan is now a place without a soul, a place of no significance.. Those are my thoughts anyway..

Veronica and Jouell..I totally agree with you both,Wigan has had its heart ripped out..places such as "The little Arcade" were jewels..lots more treasured shops have gone all in the name of high retail.. our memories of the old Wigan are priceless.,and I'm so glad that I was born when I was..I wouldn't have missed it for the world..I was brought up near to Wigan centre and I have priceless memories of my days of childhood there...as I say,I'm so glad I was around when we had the old Wigan...progress...it's rubbish.

Dead right Janet... There was a lot could have been preserved.... And around Scholes as well.

This is the land of lost content
I see it shining plain
The happy highways where I went and cannot come again

The Old Arcade was demolished soon after this was taken, I recall buying something at Bolton's in there around November 1970 and they were selling up then.

I always believed that the Legs had a bar that stretched the entire length of the Arcade - top to bottom. Think it was my dad who was codding me...:)

There was a passage that ran along the backs of the shops which connected the Top and Bottom Legs of Man

Remember the newsagents and my dad buying me a box of paints, and going to a shop in there with my mum to buy mousetraps haha, and the smell of Gorners cafe, happy memories.

The pub that George Lyon, the highwayman, planned the robbery of the Liverpool mail coach.

I never saw the Ghost in Legs of Man,but my pint mysteriously disappeared on a number of occasions! ????

Like everything in wigan our labour council have a policy of pull it down never mind the history behind it, disgraceful what there doing to wigan, no surprise it’s like a ghost town.