Wigan Album

What a lovely poster submitted by Carol Coates. I remember this place, and what a fascinating place it was. When I was a tiny child, late 1930s, my dad had a win on the pools; he bought a 3-piece suite for the front room, and a 7-piece suite for the back living room, plus a bookcase - all from Pennington's. The 7-piece suite consisted of two fireside chairs (one was a lady's chair with very low arms to facilitate nursing the baby, knitting and sewing), a sofa (what would now be called a chaise longue), and four dining chairs. They were beautiful, and we were posh although poor. How I wish my parents had kept that furniture.

I asked my dad if "Penningtons" were related to us. He said not! But when I was in my teens I was told on many occasions that I had a "double" in Wigan. Never met her, but it transpired that she was a daughter of the Furniture people! Strange.

But how lovely that the building is to survive, and with the George Formby Jnr statue nearby.

My mother was born in Wigan and because her mother in 1912 was not married she was adopted by the Pennington family,she remembered going in the house on Millgate as a child,and we always wondered if Zion Pennington was her father.