Photo-a-Day  (Friday, 14th July, 2023)

Makes the blood boil what has gone - only for the ‘not so old’ to be ‘ripped’ out. The individuality of the old can never be replaced….wherever you go nearly every town has the same boring identity.

I remember once coming back from Saudi and asking Bakers watch shop to put a new battery in my watch, and they told me it would take 3 days, thank god Wigan got modern and  lad in the brand new market hall started doing them while you wait.

And sacrificed...for what ? A pile of modern bricks that are now becoming a heap of dust themselves. What a travesty, makes you want to weep at whats been lost.
On a lighter note the bottom photo looks like it was taken very early 1950s maybe....ladies wearing the fashionable ' Princess ' style coats.

Irene its the 1940 Weekend Heskin Hall this Sat & Sun.
Get your hat down from the top of the wardrobe.

Slowly they are killing our beautiful Wigan, such lovely buildings and memories destroyed.

Sacrificed.....for what, my heart bleeds. Lovely comparison Dennis.

Love it!

Thankyou so much for the reminder about the 1940s event, Mick....not sure yet if we are able to attend but I very much appreciate your mentioning it. I have also put a comment on today's p-a-d quite early this morning but it doesn't seem to have appeared yet. I'll re-post it later.

Not too sure if the old photo is 40s or 50s, but more people shopping then, the Internet shopping has declined people from the modern photo.
Sad to see Wigan being broken up.

Well, I added a comment early this morning but it doesn't seem to have been included. It was just to say that I would love to be "Garry Sparrow" out of "Goodnight Sweetheart" and go "Back in Time" for just for one day to The old Wigan. I think that is the entrance to The Old Arcade in between Baker's Jewel Casket , and the ironmonger's shop. We owe a lot of thanks to the people who took the old photos of Wigan so that at least we can look back; I'm sure Dennis and all our p-a-d photo contributors are doing the same for future generations.

It was certainly worth it to get ready to go ‘up Wigan’ in those days. You could spend a good few hours looking around from one shop to another. You could always get fixed up whatever you needed. Might be a new frock from Joan Barrie’s or three or four more dress shops. We were spoilt for choice - never in our wildest dreams would we ever have thought we would land in a situation where you couldn’t find a shop for anything you wanted….Then again there was always the forerunner of technology the Grattan Catalogue to fall back on and pay weekly! It was a nice change to browse in that big fat catalogue.. my dad used to say”you’re paying through the nose with that caper “. What the heck! 2s/6d for the first dress I bought from the catalogue and I remember it well. …

You're right Irene, saying how marvelous it is what the PAD photo contributors are doing for future generations.
I've noticed that the contributor named Wigan Mick has also been making videos of Wigan and putting them on a youtube channel.

Dennis, not sure if Waterworths and Hunters were sacrificed for Marketgate. I seem to remember (Hunters I think) becoming a branch of a Yorkshire based chain of tailors shops (the name escapes me). Of course, I could be mistaken.

Re my earlier comment on what was Hunters Chemist becoming the site of a branch of a chain of tailors - I have just remembered that their name was Hepworths.

It's funny the memories that photos bring back. When we first went over to decimal money I was going home from work one dark, cold teatime and there were daffodils outside Waterworth's shop, (shown in the above photo), priced 9p per bunch. An old lady pointed them out to me and was treating herself to a bunch as "they're only ninepence"....she was so pleased. I realised that she thought they were 9d, (old money), and I explained that, in the new decimal money, they were nine new pence, so were actually 1/9d in old money. She kept saying "No love, they're only ninepence", and I realised her pension wouldn't go far as she obviously hadn't grasped the new system. I was only 19 and I can remember that she stayed in my mind for a long time and I hoped she was okay. I have never forgotten her.

Yes 'Harold' , Mick is just super isn't he ?

The comment at 0915 isn’t from me.

Great now and then Dennis, I know which Wigan I prefer, a great pity it got to be ruined, but the council never did listen to the people, or take any notice of the petitions that thousands signed against the new town centre, and the new market hall too. Here's another old photo of Hunter's chemist, I only seem to remember Hunter's chemist at the bottom end of Standishgate, I don't know when they had moved to there. https://www.wiganworld.co.uk/album/photo.php?opt=3&id=21963&gallery=Shops+in+and+around+Wigan&offset=0

I don't think that Waterworth's ever did replace those black tiles around the edges of their window and door, I seem to remember that every time I would go past they would have lots of yellow melons piled up outside - did they ever sell any?

Derek B - Hepworth's became Next.

Irene , have you read or watched Alan Bennett’s ‘ Dinner at Noon’ ?

Hello Mark. No, I haven't seen or read "Dinner at noon". I have looked for it on Youtube but it doesn't seem to be on there, and I didn't realise it was in book form. I have also looked for Alan Bennet's "Sunset Over The Bay" but with no luck. My Wigan dinner is always at noon, though....I refuse to call it "lunch"! And my Wigan evening meal is my tea, and always will be.

Cyril, I think you are thinking of Phillips chemist if you mean the one which was next to what was still called Pendleburys, even though it had gone into The Debenhams group many years before.

Yes, Pendlebury's belonged to Debenhams in 1948 but kept the name on as Wiganers were used to it and thought of it as their own. And yet, even though I worked at Debenhams 1973-1976, I still think there was a "different" feeling to the store when it was trading under the name "Pendlebury's" in earlier years as I was growing up .....a more "old-fashioned" atmosphere seemed to prevail in those days.

DerekB, the one I'm thinking of was the one next to the alley between Mark Williams, it was there for quite a while and then became a Lloyds chemist.

Cyril, I thought it was Hunter's Chemists next to Mark Williams, after it moved from the place shown on today's photo, but I am happy to stand corrected. Derek B, I don't recall a Phillips' Chemists at all, but we are all of different ages on here and remember different shops. I find it fascinating to read other people's memories. I believe there was a wine and spirits shop adjoining Debenhams/Pendlebury's at one time, right on the bend of Standishgate/Crompton Street, where the Cosmetics shop is now, and yet I don't recall the wine/spirit shop at all, although I know it existed as I have seen a photo of it. It's amazing what changes in Wigan over a couple of years, leaving some people with a clear memory of a certain shop, and others just drawing a blank!

Irene - The wine and spirits shop was called Maltbys.

Irene, these may be of interest to you.
Alan Bennett. Dinner at Noon, is on iPlayer: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00pcbqf/alan-bennett-dinner-at-noon

Alan Bennett. Sunset Across The Bay, is not available on BBC iPlayer, though an episode of 1 hour and 10 minutes can be viewed on YouTube: https://youtu.be/_MSHrZjrBBE

A chat about Morecambe being the setting of Sunset Across The Bay.
https://morecambeology.wordpress.com/2018/03/27/morecambeology-episode-35-sunset-across-the-bay-by-peter-wade/

Veronica, you made me laugh at your dad's saying, " you're paying through the nose, with that caper" that's just what mine use to say. A friend of mine was talking to one of the demolition workers, and he told him he had done that job for year's, and had never before had he knocked down a building so young!!!

Irene someone will have already said, but it was Maltby's that was on the corner, when a cousin was holding her wedding reception at St George's Hall I remember going with my uncle to Maltby's, they were supplying the beer, wine and spirits, and they also supplied all the glassware too. No idea why it got to be demolished, but the corner area was boarded off for years afterwards. Found this photo on the Album, I remembered it being a black and white building, but I'd forgotten how wonderful it did actually look.
https://www.wiganworld.co.uk/album/photo.php?opt=1&id=115&gallery=St+Mary%27s%2C+Wigan&page=1002

I was told the other day of a comment made on Facebook of what a visitor to Wigan had left, she had visited after not being here for years and was shocked at the changes, and more or less said that Wiganers kept on voting back in the ones who are ruining Wigan, and finished by saying Wiganers you have got the town that you deserve. True, I suppose, but some have petitioned against the changes and also tried over the years to make our voices heard by using our votes, but if the majority of Wigan voters are always happy with the town we have got, and will eventually end up with, what more can be done?

Carolaen, Thankyou. I wonder if Maltby's was there when I was growing up and I just don't remember it??
Cyril, thankyou but we don't have access to iplayer. However, I will look on Youtube for Sunset Across The Bay, although I have looked in vain in the past. I am a bit lost with all the letters and numbers, eg, MSHrZ etc etc....I'm not very technical! But I'll have a go later today.

I remember it as a teenager so it would have been there when you were growing up Irene. It seemed old fashioned to me with all the bottles in the window display. Wigan town centre used to remind me of engravings in Charles Dickens’s “The Old Curiosity Shop”.
I imagine Councillors hate this site showing all the old photos of Wigan which many people still remember. I noted on a photo recently on album a younger person admitting she
“was born in the wrong era” .

Edna my dad hated anything by paying weekly or hp..but he like a bet on the horses!
Oh! That wasn’t wasting money…oh No! Bless him!

Thanks Veronica....it would have been there but is just lost in the mists of time for me!

Cyril, Phillips chemist was between Maltbys and Pendleburys. In my teens I had an after school and saturday morning job there washing medicine bottles. They had another branch next to Jackson and Smith's men's outfitters , almost opposite the top of King St, where I had to collect my pay every week.