Wigan Album

Reverend. Is this map dated?. We lived in the house where the number 114 is, until 1938.

The map was published in 1908.

I lived just below Albert in Moss St until I was 20. Never realised that the tracks used to go so much further than the coke works and on to mines on what we called "the Moss". The sidings off the end of Moss St were no longer there but in retrospect the garage that stood there was probably old railway property.

Somewhere in my memory I seem to remember a Fyffes banana warehouse, opposite Moss Street, Spring View. The building shown on the map, next to the mentioned railway line, leading to the coke works mentioned by Brendell

Yes Albert. Cunninghams Fruit & Veg wholesaler was right next to the railway line and he kept bananas in his cellar for ripening (and the enormous spiders). My dad would sometimes go to the station to collect the bananas in large crates for Mr Cunningham and I sometimes went with him, but not down the cellar.

Brendell. The last banana I had for the next five, or six years, I had the day, at the start of the 2nd World War. In my hand I was eating a banana, just running out of the back door. I heard my dad shout to my mam. “ Hey Dolly, we’re at warr wi Germany” Didn’t mean much to me at the time. Surprising what sticks in your mind.