Wigan Album

Orrell's D Tease !

That should be Frank Orrell of course.

Bus stop, wet day
She's there, I say
Please share my umbrella … .
The Hollies at Wigan Emp' in '66, … or had it been in '67.

More people out in the 'bad weather' than there is now in Wigan on a good day. That song made me think of my girlish days Philip..

Blimey! Philip, you was on to that one like a shot!

The Hollies, my favourite group Philip. I lived in a house named Holly House for 20 years. Only seen them 3 times though, Manchester, Southport and Canberra, and NO, I didn't travel to Oz just to see them. The Southport one was a quite expensive affair as well as Canberra, I got booked for speeding on the way home, lol.
Brilliant photo whoever was responsible for it very atmospheric.

The time of your life Veronica, when your girlish charm, alone, brought the curious lad nearer and nearer.

This photo of DTease's: Where could the old boys who gave identity to those handrails have been, I wonder.
Perhaps the biting weather had sent them to their nearest bookie's shop to see if Kempton was still on, and others to their greenhouses to sow those early seeds - a strange comfort is a warm greenhouse in winter.
Brollies 4 and 5 from the right seem to tell more about the biting weather than do the others.

Thanks Roy. I'd seen them live on just one occasion. At the Emp. I'd also bought their Greatest Hits/Best Of? LP, and I can't recall them having made a bad record.

Great band Philip !
Then Graham Nash left them for America. Remember buying their first record - Searchin'
I knew an alta mater of ours at Upholland who was in their fan club and met them.

Great photo DTease. It would test my artistic capabilities to reproduce it.
Many's the time I've congregated around those handrails outside Woolies with others, chattin' and watchin' the antics of fellow Wiganers !

We have had no snow this winter, but I don't know what year this photograph was taken. It was 1982 at the earliest, and 1987 at the latest when the new bus station opened and buses stopped going up Standishgate. The GMT bus is a 1981 Northern Counties bodied Leyland Atlantean, 8458 SND458X on the 626 Beech Hill route. There is also a small Mk2 Ford Transit van, not a big one with higher roof and double rear wheels. Woolworths is out of the picture that closed in 1984, that became John Menzies the following year. Then there is Burtons and Marks and Spencers that have been there years that have closed down, the latter just last year.

That's right John: So much to see from those handrails back in the day. And although I easily recall the TV ad that said 'Put a tiger in your tank', I struggle to recall one that said 'Put a tiger in the cab'.

This must be 1960's I remember the Scean's well from that time.1963 was a bitter cold snowy winter.

EMc it can't be from the 1960s because buses with that paintwork were only used from about 1981 or 1982. Also transit vans like th eone in the picture werent around in the 1960s

the double shop on the right was focus television rentals closed mid/late eighties,a friend of mine worked in that shop.

I took this picture in the mid 1980s but can't say exactly when. As regards the interest in the Hollies, I'll post a picture taken of them at the ABC Ritz in 1966 plus a few more concerned with this time of year.

This photograph is definately 1980s. The style of bus (the famillar orange painted GMPTE models) & the transit van support this theory.

Woolworths on Standishgate closed in 1984 and became John Menzies, but because its out of the camera angle it doesn't give us an idea. Throughout the 1980s, the UK did endure snowfall most winters except during the last couple of years of the decade. There are no other vehicles in this photograph which suggest that Standishgate was going through its 'pedestrianised' phase at this point which was again mid 1980s. The old bus station closed in 1986 along with the old market hall which was demolished immediately. During the transition period, temporary bus stops were put along Market Place until the new bus station opened.

The original opening of the present bus station site (which was rebuilt in 2017) might give us some idea of this photograph's date because GMPTE changed their routes - no buses ran along Standishgate once the station opened.

Well it isn't 1963 it was two way traffic then and the snow was much worse than this. That type of Transit van came out around 1978 to 1984-5. That type of Leyland Atlantean bus from around 1980. I would guess 1980-1986.