End Of An Era

A Memory of Morley.

In 1944 I was a 13 year old pupil at Morley Grammar School. One beautifully sunny Sunday evening I walked from my house at 16 Albion Street (now Morrison's carpark) and about 40 yards East of the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene (since rebuilt). I climbed the old quarry tip at the junction with Corporation Street -now the site of the police station I believe.
From this high viewpoint I looked out across Morley, and saw that the textile mill chimneys were beginning to smoke, as the "engine men" started stoking up the boilers ready for the Monday morning return to work. I believe all Morley mills at that time were steam powered, so the Sunday evening firing up was a ritual with which we had grown familiar throughout the growth of Morley's 'shoddy' wool trade development. I started counting the smoking chimneys and reached over 40 before returning home.
Now, I wish I had recorded the names of all those firms, and I imagine their names must exist somewhere, perhaps in an old trade directory...but I doubt if a single textile manufacturer survives as a production unit. Some of the names I do recall are Benn and Webster, where my father Clifford worked as foreman spinner for 25 years. There was Greenwood and Walsh, Prospect Mills, Queen Mills, Wellington St Mills, Albert Mill, The Crank, Rhodes's, Leathley and Saville, Hartleys, Bruntcliffe Mill, Peel Street Mills, The Glen and The Bantam.
Still standing is Wesley Street Mill, where my grandfather Ben taught my father wool spinning, and apprenticed his other 7 children into various woolmaking skills - weaving, piecening, tuning and so on. Most of Morley's mills have been demolished, but a few still survive as warehousing, storage units, mixed workshops, and even as markets, restaurants and apartments.
Wesley Street Mill is now head office of the Groundwork Trust, and overlooks that magnificent mural of Beryl Burton in the small garden of rest dedicated to her memory. As Morley's world-beating champion racing cyclist, it is to be regretted that Beryl has never been accorded the fame and recognition her incredible achievements deserve.