The Boulevard c1955, Blackburn
The Boulevard c1955, Blackburn Ref: B111001
Memories of The Boulevard c1955, Blackburn
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Blackburn & local memories
Read and share memories of Blackburn and Lancashire inspired by Frith photos.
Childhood Memories in Blackburn
My first school was St Michaels and All Angels in Whalley New Road. We all had to have our gas masks over our shoulders and hang them up on our own little peg. I can remember we all had school dinners, I don't think we paid, we had no money. Also all the very young children had a sleep for a couple of hours in canvas beds so we had to creep around. My father Harold buck and his friend Edmund kept pigs, so they came after dinner to collect the food that was left over to feed the pigs, they called it pig swill. I used to hide when they came. There was a wall at the bottom of the playground with a big drop on the other side down into the brook(Blackwater), we would climb down sometimes, cross the brook and go up the other side to the Tizer where soft drinks were made. Also on the same land was a big lake we called Granny Green Teeth,... Read more
World War Two
At some point during the Second World War I was sent to what was called a convalescent home in Blackburn. I was a bed wetter and was sent there by the people that took me in as an evacuee. They never told my mother that I was being moved, and the shock to her was awful. Fortunately she rescued me as soon as there was a lull in the bombing of London. I am wondering if it was the old nurses' home or the Infirmary. We used to have to wear funny rough dresses supplied by the people that ran the home if your own clothes were inadequate. On Saturday evenings we lined up to be given some sort of "opening" medicine. I only had to take it once, because the only time I was given it, I had a shocking accident in the night, and to say that I made a mess of the bed is putting it mildly. I was 6 or 7 at the time, and... Read more
First Stay in Infirmary
I was 8 years old when on November the 5th I was not at all well. My mum was at work in the cotton mill in Lower Darwen, my sister and brother were out at the bonfire across the street, Dad was sitting with me. Mum finished work at 10pm and came home to find me very distressed. In the early hours of the morning I was taken to the Infermary. It was appendicitis, I remember it well. I was told that I was the youngest person to be admitted into the Infirmary with appendicitis.
Rain, Cold And Fun.
Memories of shopping with my parents, Jack and Ellen, when I was 9 years old is always a pleasant thought, although it was not all pleasant, when it was raining the water off the canvas covers would drip down your neck, and if it was windy it would blow the canvas up and you got more than you had bargained for (ah, the good old days. It was not all doom and gloom though, there was always the Easter fair, although at my age I only got to have a go on the little wheel, but little did they know, when I was playing out I was spending my hard earned errand money on the big wheel,helter skelter and waltzer. The freedom I had as a child will always be remembered when I see a picture of the clock at Blackburn market...
Shopping Days
This photo is as I remember Church St when I was a little girl. I had three younger brothers and when Mother took us to town she often went into Woolworths. We were told that if we became lost we had to find the weighing machine. It was huge and stood near the doors. She said that if we waited there she would find us. I don't remember any of us ever getting lost in the store. We also were taken to the toilets facing Woolworths doors, which can also be seen in this photo. It was always fascinating having to go down below ground level to the toilets. It is so sad that it is all in the past now.
Nurse Training
I started my SRN training in 1973. In those days the Nurses' Home still exsisted but the view was obscured by the more recent additional buildings to the Infirmary, which included the Education Centre. However the Home was still well used. Some nurses still 'lived in' in this building but we all used the building too. We all had lockers in a room in the basement there. When we went on duty we kept our gaberdines and bags in our lockers where we also stored our clean uniform. We had to wear clean uniforms every day so dirty laundry was put into laundry bags, also kept in the locker and sent off to the laundry on our given laundry day. When we worked on night duty, which was quite often then, we had to congregate in the Sitting Room and be told which ward we were to work on. In the main corridor down near our locker room there were information boards... Read more
School Speech Days
When I was a pupil at 'Blackburn High School for Girls' we used to go to Blackburn Cathedral for the morning sevice on Speech Day. In those days the Cathedral was dark and dismal with masses of dark wood and lots of box pews. I particularly remember walking over what I believed were graves - scary to an eleven year old! We always sang the hymn 'Now Thank We All Our God' and I always associate that hymn with the Cathedral. The modernised, light and airy Cathedral is a joy to visit and bears no resemblance to the Cathedral of my schooldays. I was so delighted to find your photos of the 'old' Cathedral's interior looking more like my memories to show to my children.
Infirmary Memories
My first memory of the Infirmary is when I was four years old. I had my tonsils and adenoids removed because I was very, very deaf. After the operation I could hear but it would be many years before I learned that I only had hearing in one ear. When I was six I had another operation to remove a tumour from my neck. It was a long procedure and I was an in-patient for six weeks. I had my seventh birthday while I was there! At that time the 'New Wing' had not been built and we children used to play outside. There was a large grass slope which we used to roll down and have great fun. At the age of nine I fell over and broke my leg requiring a plaster cast for six weeks. I refused to walk with it and my mother shortened the long brush to make me a crutch - no wonder she had... Read more
Cherry Tree Village Life
I lived in Cecilia Road, Cherry Tree (1930-1945), going in the navy in 1941. Blackburn Grammar School 1935-1941. Happy memories of St. Francis Church and the Rev. Egerton Ward and family, they had a daughter called Angela.DOES. ANYONE KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO THIS FAMILY? My first school was Witton Stocks Primary, then the very tough St.Aidan's, Mill Hill. I am 88 and live in Lincolnshire.
How Blackburn Saved my Life
I came up from London in 1959 to work as a pianist in the Jeff Oaks Band who was the the resident band at the Mecca Locarno, who after a while was moving on to another place. I was offered a job then in the trio for in those days, they had a revolving stage and after a short time formed my own trio to which I sometimes added other musicians and went under the name The Barton Three, and then the Ralph Barton Sound, and what a fantastic place it was. Brian Gee was the manager and the the band then was then the All Bennet Orchestra. Yes, those were the days, when we were packed 6 nights a week with dancers having a fabulous time on tea, coffee, and soft drinks as there was no drinking licence in those days. Then came the very special time in Blackburn as at the Hall I met and married Ann and we had two children, a son and a daughter. I... Read more
Anvil St.
I suppose it's my age, but I am getting a little nostalgic about my youth. I used to live in Anvil Street (no longer exists) and remember well my first day at school, St John's on Altom Street, now a mosque. I certainly have some well etched memories of those times. I now live on 30 miles north, but do enjoy a visit back to Blackburn and a walk around town to see all the old places, corp' park, used to fish there hidden in the bushes and get chased by the 'parky', great weather in those days, long hot summers, freezing winters, and sledging in the street for weeks on end, played a lot in 'the brook' (Blakewater) very dangerous, and got up to some crazy things there, amazing no one injured really, but we never gave it a thought! My dad would build us 'flattys' wheeled wagons, if you had a few shillings, you could get wheels from Shirlys scrapyard. Yes I do remember the 'tank' on Revidge, a long... Read more
William Hopwood Street.
Me and my mates had so much freedom to "play out". We all lived around William Hopwood Street in them days. I'd just left Audley Secondary Modern School, to begin an apprenticeship at Foster Yates & Thom, (Dad & brother worked there too). Met my first serious girlfriend, her dad was a cobbler and clog maker on nearby Audley Range. We danced our weekends away at the 'Mecca' in Peter Street (not in clogs!). Looking at your photos it now takes me back to seeing how nice a place Blackburn was, with its fine buildings and down to earth people. I visited Blackburn last week (Nov. 2010). William Hopwood Street is still there, our old terraced house is long gone, there is a Medical Centre where our 'back yard' used to be! My sister still lives in Shakeshaft Street. I always thought it was 'posh', because it had a 'bay' window (not so in William Hopwood Street!). Blackburn has gone through tremendous changes since last I lived... Read more
