Wigan Album

I remember that paper well...there's more news on that front page, than todays observer.

Re the item in bottom left hand corner of Observer page - 'Death of Sporting Greats'.
Jim Sullivan and Billy Riley, if I remember rightly. Both died in the same week.

The Editor in 1966 was Fred Dove and his assistant Jack Winstanley, they helped to re-design the Wigan Observer from adverts to front page news, it was modeled on the Daily Telegraph.

When did the Observer start being printed as a tabloid paper ? I remember it being a 'proper' newspaper, it seemed huge & very important to me as a child.

Your right Helen, it was a top quality broadsheet newspaper. The Observer changed to tabloid in 1984, soon after Woods St closed, it was smaller than todays paper.
In those days at Woods St, everyone was committed to the job, they knew Wigan and it's people.