Wigan Album

Thankyou so much for these fascinating photos of a lost time, Ron. I well remember women kneeling with a bucket, a cloth and a "donkey-stone", "doing the front", and woe betide any children who stepped on her newly-mopped step! The donkey-stone often came from the rag-bone man in exchange for a few rags, and Adams' Stores in The Market Hall sold them as well.

The careworn women of yesterday. Their workload was far more heavier for them than today’s women with every gadget at their disposal. You never see a step being cleaned these days…although I-do give my tiled step a wipe over when I give the door a wipe down.