site of Woodnook mill Jan 2010
 

Latest views - taken today

Nos 1, 2 and 3 show the disappearing mill
No 4 - general view of site
No 5 - the curved doorway with rubble nearby shows what I am led to believe was the entrance to the siting of the water wheel.

Re: Woodnook mill.
 

Well, the old colliery office/Woodnook Bleaching office now gone - they kept the frontage till the very end! Was told the stones were "special" and that someone had bought them.

Re: Woodnook mill.
 

I've been telling my daughter they were waiting for somebody to turn up with the key for the front door. Sort of spoilt it now :D

Woodnook mill RIP
 

I could have sworn there was once a huge factory on this site? :rolleyes:

Re: Woodnook mill RIP
 

When.

Retlaw.

Re: Woodnook mill.
 

This thread has brought a lot of memorise back to me. I lived on Higher Antley St in the 50’s & 60’s and my Mum use to work in a small Mill on the factory bottoms opposite another mill that use to do dying of either cotton or velvet. She use to go to work well before we went to school (St Oswalds) and lock the door then pop the key though the letter box. When our kid and me were ready for school we’d lock up and took the key down to our mum and had breakfast with her in her lunch break.
Attarah, in you last pic. I remember the hill in the back ground leading up to the houses with no trees on the slope. I use to walk right passes those houses to play in the Clough and catch minnows, newts and frogs in the Mill lodge.
Thanks to everyone involved with recording what to me is a sad event.

Re: Woodnook mill.
 

John, the hill you refer to is Riley's Hill.(My mum still lives there)
I lived on that hill and Priestley Clough was where we played.
My Grandma and Grandad lived on Higher Antley St.
You may even have known my brothers.....Peter, Michael and Philip Duxbury.

Re: Woodnook mill.
 

Hi Margaret, the names don’t ring a bell but there again I’m not very good with names. We lived at 157 just in front of a Methodist Church and a bit of spare ground. My sister was called Maureen there was only 11 month between us. I lived there form being about 8 or 9 until I was 28 and got married and move away.
I remember there was another little dell that ran up the side of you hill, just before you entered the cough, it ran up into the Park. I seem to remember as kids with called it Blue Bell Wood, we use to play there at lot and make dams in the little stream.

Re: Woodnook mill.
 

I have just discovered that Woodnook Mill is part of my history as it was run by Broadley, Carter and co. I don't know when they acquired it but in 1861 in the Blackburn Standard one of the members of the board is shown leaving. Thomas Broadley is listed. He was a bookkeeper in the censuses, so I hadn't realized he had another life. He was superintendent of the Sunday school at Christ Church. One of the other Board members is Robert Holt, married to Thomas's sister, Jane. They are not my direct ancestors, because I am descended from John Broadley the postmaster who founded the printers, but Thomas Broadley was the son of James who was John Broadley the postmaster's uncle (or half uncle). Is the 1999 book still in print? bye Marie

Re: site of Woodnook mill Jan 2010
 

[quote=Atarah;778190]Latest views - taken today

Nos 1, 2 and 3 show the disappearing mill
No 4 - general view of site
No 5 - the curved doorway with rubble nearby shows what I am led to believe was the entrance to the siting of the water wheel.[/q

Although I never visited the Mills, I had a long attatchment to them from over 40 years ago when I used to buy all the cotton and flannelette sheets for my 4 shops in Hampshire and Surrey. We sold so many that we used to have our own labels printed for them.
It is a tragedy that our cotton mills have disappeared and the trade is no more! I am glad that I no longer have this responsibility as all our cotton goods now seem to come from abroad. I would find it very hard, when I remember that names like Highams, Horrockses, Dorcas and Sparwick ( later Sparva) have all but disappeared.