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Crooke

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Crooke Canal Tunnel
Crooke Canal Tunnel
Photo: Paul Dowd
Views: 3,207
Item #: 33225
This appeared in the Observer in September 1975. It shows canal bargemen from around the year 1900 using their feet to pass through the tunnel.

Comment by: Veronica on 2nd August 2021 at 15:45

It looks like Laurel and Hardy hired a boat for the day!;o)) I bet their boots didn't last long doing that sort of work.

Comment by: Cyril on 2nd August 2021 at 16:32

Made me laugh did that Veronica, though they had a change of headwear with flat caps instead of bowlers.

Is this tunnel over the cutting that came from the John Pit, or was it located elsewhere?

Comment by: Veronica on 2nd August 2021 at 17:55

I love Laurel and Hardy Cyril, my favourite was when they were taking that piano up all them steps, you just knew what was going to happen...AND they always seemed to be in the same bed, Nobody turned a hair about that....;o))

Comment by: Cyril on 2nd August 2021 at 18:20

This tunnel is shown on the map that Gaffer posted on a thread on Communicate entitled Local Pit. Scroll down page to map.
https://www.wiganworld.co.uk/communicate/mb_message.php?opt=f2&msd=505388&offset=&subject=local%2520pit

Tunnel Canal Bridge on Wigan Lower Road, it's just before where the mineral line went over the road to the Crooke coal tipper.

I've read about it and how the miners dug the tunnel to the canal so as to get the barges up to the pit to be loaded with coal and back to the canal, but forgot where it actually was located.

Comment by: Cyril on 2nd August 2021 at 20:13

I can't say that I have a particular favourite Laurel and Hardy film Veronica, as I enjoy them all. Their films are being shown on Talking Pictures TV on Saturday and Sunday afternoons at the moment. I was recently reading an article on The Music Box and it was saying that a stuntman was in the piano box steering it as it went down those steps, on one take when it reached the bottom of the steps it was narrowly missed by a truck coming up the road from the right, thankfully no one got hurt. It didn't say if the stuntman was wearing padded clothes, though if he wasn't he'd have been black and blue with all that bumping about.

It is strange how in that day and age they actually got away with being shown in a bed together, though even then it was all slapstick.

Comment by: Veronica on 2nd August 2021 at 22:22

Innocent times - in films anyway. I watch a lot of old films from the 40's and 50's on ytube Cyril.. and I've seen Laurel and Hardy on Talking Pictures as well. Also the film about their lives on Netflix... very sad when Oliver Hardy died after they tried to make a comeback... I personally don't think they should have done. Some things are best left in the past and they had their hey day. They still make me laugh though!

Comment by: WN1 Standisher on 3rd August 2021 at 09:27

I believe Stan Laurel was still writing Laurel & Hardy sketches long after Ollie died and that an Hal Roach contract caused a lot of problems in the comic relationship. Incidentally Eric and Ernie were also able to get away with the bedroom sketches and nobody batted an eyelid. Totally innocent comedy with no innuendo

Comment by: Barrie on 3rd August 2021 at 09:48

According to the chapter relating to the Standish mining industry in "The Industrial Railways of the Wigan Coalfield" pt2 chapter 23, the Standish Coal Company drove this canal tunnel 600 yards to the coal seam and was completed in 1807.
The tunnel was stated to be 11feet high & 10 feet wide. The open cut canal was a further 700 yards long to connect with L&L canal by Crooke Bridge. The article continues that by the early 1850's the tunnel was abandoned as it was too high to reach the better coal seams. It remained as a drainage channel. Eventually it fell under the ownership of the Wigan Iron & Coal company. Can anyone say what became of the tunnel after 1910 as it is not shown on the maps in the book.

Comment by: Scaramouche on 3rd August 2021 at 10:23

Veronica, Cyril, Standisher, PLEASE stick to the original topic All this talk of Laurel and Hardy is irrelevant to the original image.

Comment by: Veronica on 3rd August 2021 at 12:48

That's my fault because the men reminded me of them. Have to admit they do look very funny on their backs pushing themselves along. It just would not happen in these days.

Comment by: Veronica on 3rd August 2021 at 13:18

Mind you Scaramouche you can't help going 'off piste' sometimes ..amongst friends.

Comment by: Cyril on 3rd August 2021 at 14:57

Barrie, does it show in the book that the channel cutting went through the village to Crooke Bridge along the same route that the later mineral line would run. I was under the impression that the channel cutting from the tunnel would have joined the canal around which later would become Crooke Marina - it seemed to be the obvious route after the road bridge as the areas off Wigan Lower Road and off Crooke Road always looked marshy.

The original Crooke village school which was off Crooke Road actually sank in the marsh, which on the photo does look to be a canal cutting, photo of it in the Album: https://www.wiganworld.co.uk/album/photo.php?opt=5&id=1049&gallery=Crooke&page=1

Veronica, and for those interested, obviously not Scaramouche, TPTV Saturday and Sunday at 4pm, afternoons with Laurel & Hardy. Sat. begins with Hog Wild, Sun. begins with The Flying Deuces.

Also, in some of the tunnels on canals the crew still have to lie on their backs and leg their way through, because with having no proper ventilation there can't be any fumes from running engines unless they are electric powered, rather them than me.

Comment by: mary. on 4th August 2021 at 08:57

This was quite common in canal tunnels,it was called"legging" it. I agree please stick to the topic.Thank you.

Comment by: Veronica on 4th August 2021 at 09:53

If you took the time to look you will see I have taken the blame.Would you like us to wear sackcloth and ashes? At least we take the time to comment favourably or unfavourably unlike yourselves. No need to repeat what has been said and noted. Thank you .

Comment by: Rev David Long on 4th August 2021 at 13:48

Cyril - I don't know of any tunnels which are legged, although there are some tunnels which are not on through navigations which can only be used by electric boats (Dudley comes to mind).
When they re-opened the Standedge Tunnel (Longest, deepest, narrowest on the system) on the Huddersfield Narrow Canal they would only let boats go through under tow from an electric tug - and all the crew had to get off their boats and travel in a passenger compartment attached to the tug - and their boats were dragged through in a row. That soon stopped, as the boats being towed swung about and hit the rocky tunnel sides - they had protective pads on the front of their cabins - but that wouldn't stop the sides hitting the tunnel as they swung about.
Now boats go through under their own steam - but with a volunteer steering them. My boat still got some paint scrawped when we went through last month.

Comment by: Cyril on 4th August 2021 at 14:58

David, I'll put the blame on a television programme that I've seen and which showed the presenter and others legging the boat through the tunnel, as though it was still an everyday occurrence, it may have been Mark Williams as he did a history type documentary on canals, an electric boat was also shown along with the explanation about the engine fumes and poor ventilation through the tunnel.

Scrawped - that's a good dialect word isn't it and we all know what it means, and yet (for some reason only known to southerners) a dictionary definition of it is either a Croyden or Essex Facelift i.e. tying the hair back tightly.

Comment by: MikeW on 4th August 2021 at 17:44

I have seen this image in numerous publications with an equal number of references against it. Although undoubtedly similar in construction and appearance there is no evidence whatsoever this photograph is of the actual Crooke tunnel

Comment by: Pe on 4th August 2021 at 17:45

Fred Dibnah once did it,but I forget where.

Comment by: Rev David Long on 4th August 2021 at 21:56

Cyril - my first encounter with 'scrawped' was when I was a guard on the Liverpool buses - it was used to describe the practice of a bus following another down the route.. but keeping far enough back to allow the bus in front to take the load... only passing it a few stops from the terminus, when people were getting off, rather than on... so the crew on the scrawping bus got a few minutes extra break at the terminus.
You didn't do it with lads from your own garage....
The association with chunks being taken off a boat's paintwork is a bit obscure... but someone will have the link....

Comment by: Chris Southworth on 5th August 2021 at 09:48

That isn't Crooke canal tunnel. By the time that photo was taken in 1900, the canal tunnel had been long abandoned and was collapsed and impassable due to mining subsidence.

Comment by: WN1 Standisher on 5th August 2021 at 11:08

What ever floats your boat Scaramouche. ( can you see what I did there :) )

Comment by: Barrie on 5th August 2021 at 12:04

Cyril, the book maps only show a an outline of the tunnel & canal as it ties into the L&L Canal. I have been looking on line at some of the old OS 6" maps that have a clearer detail. By 1907/08 the tunnel & canal are shown to the RHS of the rail bridge that spanned Wigan Lower Road on a skew. The Tunnel is shown as disused and the canal spur has been filled in. Link-https://maps.nls.uk/view/126521222
On the 1892/94 map both are shown in blue and out fall to the canal by Crooke Hall and a chemical works.
Coincidentally, between 1938-39, my parents and young sisters lived in a house on Wigan Lower Road close to the entrance to John Pit and the old rail bridge. If you look at the Standish map, #33231, I put on WW Album this week, in the lower LH corner you can see the rail line feeding the old pits to the canal at Crooke

Comment by: Cyril on 5th August 2021 at 13:56

This photo on the Album shows the bridge going over Wigan Road and a stretch of water that could be the remains of the canal spur on that side of the road before being filled in and developed.
https://www.wiganworld.co.uk/album/photo.php?opt=5&id=1847&gallery=Standish+Lower+Ground&page=1

Comment by: Barrie. on 8th August 2021 at 00:06

Further to my comments above, I have re-examined the old maps online and the 1960's Geographia Street Plan of Wigan which I have, plus Google maps (aerial view), and you are correct Cyril in that where the marina is now was part of the old canal exiting into the L&LC. Surprising that the map of Standish I've uploaded to the Album hasn't shown that outline. I have noticed that on the 1892 map, alongside Wigan Lower Road there is a stream called Mill Brook that either connected into the canal or ran along side it. That is shown on todays' maps still. I must have a drive over there soon and have a look at the Marina and Crooke as I didn't venture that far 2/3 years ago when I went searching for the house my parents lived in at the start of the war and I found it. The books I mentioned were published in 1992 and I managed to track both volumes down on the net and purchased them in the past 2 years in mint condition.

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