FIFTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK 17 - 23 AUGUST 1976
This week's many stories include the skateboard bans in St Helens, the Beecham's women's victory under the Equal Pay Act, the heatwave's increase in beer sales, St Helens Council campaigns to stamp out child battering, the two new park cafes, the Clock Face Road grid gutter thieves and the danger to children who bathed in St Helens Canal or old clay pits.
We begin on the 18th at a meeting in London of the Central Arbitration Committee when an equal pay case brought on behalf of 370 women workers at Beechams was considered. Their union claimed that the most the female staff employed at the Westfield Street factory could earn was less than the male minimum.
The Committee ruled in favour of the women, who were all members of the General and Municipal Workers Union, and they would now receive a pay increase of between £3.46 and £5.68 per week. The award was backdated until May, although the committee recommended that the company should voluntarily backdate it to December 29th 1975. That was when businesses had been obliged to implement the Equal Pay Act.
On the 20th the new Mormon chapel in Chester Lane (pictured above) held its first service. Officially known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, it had largely been built by members of their own congregation.
Under the headline "Smile, Please, We're Booming", the St Helens Reporter on the 20th described how beersellers in St Helens were doing very nicely in the heatwave:
"Thirsty beer swillers – sweltering in the hot weather – are causing a drinks boom in St. Helens. As the town basks in another hot spell, breweries and pubs are recording [a] rapid increase in sales. And it's the beer lovers who are drinking the barrels dry. A spokesman for Greenalls Brewery in Warrington said: “Large increases in sales are being recorded all over the district.”"
In a full-page feature, the Reporter discussed the dangers of the present heatwave, particularly to the children who bathed in the canal or in old clay pits. On July 11th a nine-year-old girl had drowned in the St Helens Canal and as the drought was causing water levels to drop, the risks of drowning were increasing. There was also the danger from water-borne diseases and other hazards, as the paper explained:
"Children swimming in the town's canals run the risk of disease and a greater chance of drowning . . . people and pets face a growing health hazard . . . and St. Helens Fire Brigade is going through the busiest period in living memory. And all this is due to the Mediterranean-style weather which sizzles on regardless. The grim warning about disease risks and possible drowning tragedies in local canals is handed out to parents and youngsters by the town's Public Safety Officer Derek Jamieson.
"He said: “There is an increased danger to children with the new bout of hot weather. Water is stagnating and the levels are dropping. The water is really getting dirty now and children could easily pick up diseases from it. Stomach upsets could be easily picked up by children swimming in infected water. As the water level drops, more mud will form, which could trap a child.”"
Harold Scruton, the Senior Fire Prevention Officer at the Parr Stocks Road station, told the Reporter that grass fires were a huge issue for firefighters: "The wheels on our fire appliances have never stopped turning over the last few weeks. For weeks now our machines have been going out to one fire after another. No sooner does one come back from a blaze than another goes racing out."
The Reporter described how two new cafes were going to be built in Sherdley Park and Taylor Park. The cafe at Sherdley would be built on a site adjacent to the existing building, which was an old pre-fabricated structure. And the venue planned for Taylor Park would be a single-storey building of rustic brick overlooking the lake. Its existing cafe had, for many years, been housed in the old boathouse and both buildings were expected to be completed by the summer of 1977.
The Reporter described how incidents of beatings and ill-treatment of children in St Helens, that had been reported to the authorities, were on the increase. As a result, St Helens Council was stepping up their campaign to "stamp out child battering" by taking on three more social workers. The Reporter added that one in every ten abuse cases that had been investigated had resulted in the child victim being taken into care.
Mary Binnington was pictured in the Reporter about to celebrate her 100th birthday in the geriatric ward at Peasley Cross. Mary had spent many years teaching at schools in Windle and Carr Mill before retiring in 1941 and told the paper: "Teaching was very hard work. St Helens is now very different. The buildings and schools are much better than they used to be."
The paper also said that Rainford County Councillor Audrey Berry had won her fight to get essential repairs carried out on a "killer" road. Councillor Berry had been campaigning to get work done on Ormskirk Road in Rainford, where an elderly woman pedestrian had died in an accident involving a police car. Although the Merseyside Highways Department said they would now resurface the road and widen footpaths, they denied that the road surface had been a contributory factor in the fatal accident.
A plague of grid thieving in the gutters of Clock Face Road was also reported. Fifteen 9 x 12 inch grids had been stolen in one night and, a few days later, eleven of their replacements were taken. John Gibson, Highways Engineer for the Council, said: "I am sure somebody must have seen the thieves in action. No one can steal 15 gutter grids along a busy road without being spotted." It was assumed that the grids had been stolen for their scrap metal value.
Craddocks Shoes had a large advertisement in the Reporter that said their Church Street shop would now be known as Peter Lord. The latter chain store had bought out Craddocks in 1968 but for the last eight years they had continued to trade under their old name. The advert stated that the shoe shop had been in existence in Church Street since the turn of the century.
The Reporter explained how St Helens' stores Baby World and Helena House had both effectively banned skateboards due to their potential danger to children, as they had no brakes. David Gornall, the co-proprietor of Baby World in Ormskirk Street, commented: "We have never stocked them because they are too dangerous – and have no intention of stocking them."
The Reporter said skateboards were the latest riding craze in Australia and the USA and so far in 1976, twelve American children had died from skateboarding accidents. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents had called on the government to stop retail sales to schoolchildren and to consider an import ban.
And Rodney Davies of Helena House's Toy Department said: "They were first manufactured about six or seven years back and I have not seen any around since. The rider has no control over them whatsoever – and I doubt whether we will stock them again."
And finally, on the 22nd at the ABC Savoy, 'The Slipper and The Rose' replaced ‘Kelly's Heroes' while the Capitol Cinema retained 'Tommy' for a second week.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the declining chimney sweep business, Bold Colliery holds its Centenary Open Day, the water restrictions being imposed and the fears over the opening of a new secure unit at Rainhill Hospital.
We begin on the 18th at a meeting in London of the Central Arbitration Committee when an equal pay case brought on behalf of 370 women workers at Beechams was considered. Their union claimed that the most the female staff employed at the Westfield Street factory could earn was less than the male minimum.
The Committee ruled in favour of the women, who were all members of the General and Municipal Workers Union, and they would now receive a pay increase of between £3.46 and £5.68 per week. The award was backdated until May, although the committee recommended that the company should voluntarily backdate it to December 29th 1975. That was when businesses had been obliged to implement the Equal Pay Act.
Under the headline "Smile, Please, We're Booming", the St Helens Reporter on the 20th described how beersellers in St Helens were doing very nicely in the heatwave:
"Thirsty beer swillers – sweltering in the hot weather – are causing a drinks boom in St. Helens. As the town basks in another hot spell, breweries and pubs are recording [a] rapid increase in sales. And it's the beer lovers who are drinking the barrels dry. A spokesman for Greenalls Brewery in Warrington said: “Large increases in sales are being recorded all over the district.”"
In a full-page feature, the Reporter discussed the dangers of the present heatwave, particularly to the children who bathed in the canal or in old clay pits. On July 11th a nine-year-old girl had drowned in the St Helens Canal and as the drought was causing water levels to drop, the risks of drowning were increasing. There was also the danger from water-borne diseases and other hazards, as the paper explained:
"Children swimming in the town's canals run the risk of disease and a greater chance of drowning . . . people and pets face a growing health hazard . . . and St. Helens Fire Brigade is going through the busiest period in living memory. And all this is due to the Mediterranean-style weather which sizzles on regardless. The grim warning about disease risks and possible drowning tragedies in local canals is handed out to parents and youngsters by the town's Public Safety Officer Derek Jamieson.
"He said: “There is an increased danger to children with the new bout of hot weather. Water is stagnating and the levels are dropping. The water is really getting dirty now and children could easily pick up diseases from it. Stomach upsets could be easily picked up by children swimming in infected water. As the water level drops, more mud will form, which could trap a child.”"
Harold Scruton, the Senior Fire Prevention Officer at the Parr Stocks Road station, told the Reporter that grass fires were a huge issue for firefighters: "The wheels on our fire appliances have never stopped turning over the last few weeks. For weeks now our machines have been going out to one fire after another. No sooner does one come back from a blaze than another goes racing out."
The Reporter described how two new cafes were going to be built in Sherdley Park and Taylor Park. The cafe at Sherdley would be built on a site adjacent to the existing building, which was an old pre-fabricated structure. And the venue planned for Taylor Park would be a single-storey building of rustic brick overlooking the lake. Its existing cafe had, for many years, been housed in the old boathouse and both buildings were expected to be completed by the summer of 1977.
The Reporter described how incidents of beatings and ill-treatment of children in St Helens, that had been reported to the authorities, were on the increase. As a result, St Helens Council was stepping up their campaign to "stamp out child battering" by taking on three more social workers. The Reporter added that one in every ten abuse cases that had been investigated had resulted in the child victim being taken into care.
Mary Binnington was pictured in the Reporter about to celebrate her 100th birthday in the geriatric ward at Peasley Cross. Mary had spent many years teaching at schools in Windle and Carr Mill before retiring in 1941 and told the paper: "Teaching was very hard work. St Helens is now very different. The buildings and schools are much better than they used to be."
The paper also said that Rainford County Councillor Audrey Berry had won her fight to get essential repairs carried out on a "killer" road. Councillor Berry had been campaigning to get work done on Ormskirk Road in Rainford, where an elderly woman pedestrian had died in an accident involving a police car. Although the Merseyside Highways Department said they would now resurface the road and widen footpaths, they denied that the road surface had been a contributory factor in the fatal accident.
A plague of grid thieving in the gutters of Clock Face Road was also reported. Fifteen 9 x 12 inch grids had been stolen in one night and, a few days later, eleven of their replacements were taken. John Gibson, Highways Engineer for the Council, said: "I am sure somebody must have seen the thieves in action. No one can steal 15 gutter grids along a busy road without being spotted." It was assumed that the grids had been stolen for their scrap metal value.
Craddocks Shoes had a large advertisement in the Reporter that said their Church Street shop would now be known as Peter Lord. The latter chain store had bought out Craddocks in 1968 but for the last eight years they had continued to trade under their old name. The advert stated that the shoe shop had been in existence in Church Street since the turn of the century.
The Reporter explained how St Helens' stores Baby World and Helena House had both effectively banned skateboards due to their potential danger to children, as they had no brakes. David Gornall, the co-proprietor of Baby World in Ormskirk Street, commented: "We have never stocked them because they are too dangerous – and have no intention of stocking them."
The Reporter said skateboards were the latest riding craze in Australia and the USA and so far in 1976, twelve American children had died from skateboarding accidents. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents had called on the government to stop retail sales to schoolchildren and to consider an import ban.
And Rodney Davies of Helena House's Toy Department said: "They were first manufactured about six or seven years back and I have not seen any around since. The rider has no control over them whatsoever – and I doubt whether we will stock them again."
And finally, on the 22nd at the ABC Savoy, 'The Slipper and The Rose' replaced ‘Kelly's Heroes' while the Capitol Cinema retained 'Tommy' for a second week.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the declining chimney sweep business, Bold Colliery holds its Centenary Open Day, the water restrictions being imposed and the fears over the opening of a new secure unit at Rainhill Hospital.
This week's many stories include the skateboard bans in St Helens, the Beecham's women's victory under the Equal Pay Act, the heatwave's increase in beer sales, St Helens Council campaigns to stamp out child battering, the two new park cafes, the Clock Face Road grid gutter thieves and the danger to children who bathed in St Helens Canal or old clay pits.
We begin on the 18th at a meeting in London of the Central Arbitration Committee when an equal pay case brought on behalf of 370 women workers at Beechams was considered.
Their union claimed that the most the female staff employed at the Westfield Street factory could earn was less than the male minimum.
The Committee ruled in favour of the women, who were all members of the General and Municipal Workers Union, and they would now receive a pay increase of between £3.46 and £5.68 per week.
On the 20th the new Mormon chapel in Chester Lane (pictured above) held its first service.
Officially known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, it had largely been built by members of their own congregation.
Under the headline "Smile, Please, We're Booming", the St Helens Reporter on the 20th described how beersellers in St Helens were doing very nicely in the heatwave:
"Thirsty beer swillers – sweltering in the hot weather – are causing a drinks boom in St. Helens. As the town basks in another hot spell, breweries and pubs are recording [a] rapid increase in sales. And it's the beer lovers who are drinking the barrels dry.
"A spokesman for Greenalls Brewery in Warrington said: “Large increases in sales are being recorded all over the district.”"
In a full-page feature, the Reporter discussed the dangers of the present heatwave, particularly to the children who bathed in the canal or in old clay pits.
On July 11th a nine-year-old girl had drowned in the St Helens Canal and as the drought was causing water levels to drop, the risks of drowning were increasing.
There was also the danger from water-borne diseases and other hazards, as the paper explained:
"Children swimming in the town's canals run the risk of disease and a greater chance of drowning . . . people and pets face a growing health hazard . . . and St. Helens Fire Brigade is going through the busiest period in living memory. And all this is due to the Mediterranean-style weather which sizzles on regardless.
"The grim warning about disease risks and possible drowning tragedies in local canals is handed out to parents and youngsters by the town's Public Safety Officer Derek Jamieson.
"He said: “There is an increased danger to children with the new bout of hot weather. Water is stagnating and the levels are dropping. The water is really getting dirty now and children could easily pick up diseases from it.
"“Stomach upsets could be easily picked up by children swimming in infected water. As the water level drops, more mud will form, which could trap a child.”"
Harold Scruton, the Senior Fire Prevention Officer at the Parr Stocks Road station, told the Reporter that grass fires were a huge issue for firefighters:
"The wheels on our fire appliances have never stopped turning over the last few weeks. For weeks now our machines have been going out to one fire after another. No sooner does one come back from a blaze than another goes racing out."
The Reporter described how two new cafes were going to be built in Sherdley Park and Taylor Park.
The cafe at Sherdley would be built on a site adjacent to the existing building, which was an old pre-fabricated structure.
And the venue planned for Taylor Park would be a single-storey building of rustic brick overlooking the lake.
Its existing cafe had, for many years, been housed in the old boathouse and both buildings were expected to be completed by the summer of 1977.
The Reporter described how incidents of beatings and ill-treatment of children in St Helens, that had been reported to the authorities, were on the increase.
As a result, St Helens Council was stepping up their campaign to "stamp out child battering" by taking on three more social workers.
The Reporter added that one in every ten abuse cases that had been investigated had resulted in the child victim being taken into care.
Mary Binnington was pictured in the Reporter about to celebrate her 100th birthday in the geriatric ward at Peasley Cross.
Mary had spent many years teaching at schools in Windle and Carr Mill before retiring in 1941 and told the paper:
"Teaching was very hard work. St Helens is now very different. The buildings and schools are much better than they used to be."
The paper also said that Rainford County Councillor Audrey Berry had won her fight to get essential repairs carried out on a "killer" road.
Councillor Berry had been campaigning to get work done on Ormskirk Road in Rainford, where an elderly woman pedestrian had died in an accident involving a police car.
Although the Merseyside Highways Department said they would now resurface the road and widen footpaths, they denied that the road surface had been a contributory factor in the fatal accident.
A plague of grid thieving in the gutters of Clock Face Road was also reported.
Fifteen 9 x 12 inch grids had been stolen in one night and, a few days later, eleven of their replacements were taken. John Gibson, Highways Engineer for the Council, said:
"I am sure somebody must have seen the thieves in action. No one can steal 15 gutter grids along a busy road without being spotted."
It was assumed that the grids had been stolen for their scrap metal value.
Craddocks Shoes had a large advertisement in the Reporter that said their Church Street shop would now be known as Peter Lord.
The latter chain store had bought out Craddocks in 1968 but for the last eight years they had continued to trade under their old name.
The advert stated that the shoe shop had been in existence in Church Street since the turn of the century.
The Reporter explained how St Helens' stores Baby World and Helena House had both effectively banned skateboards due to their potential danger to children, as they had no brakes.
David Gornall, the co-proprietor of Baby World in Ormskirk Street, commented:
"We have never stocked them because they are too dangerous – and have no intention of stocking them."
The Reporter said skateboards were the latest riding craze in Australia and the USA and so far in 1976, twelve American children had died from skateboarding accidents.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents had called on the government to stop retail sales to schoolchildren and to consider an import ban.
And Rodney Davies of Helena House's Toy Department said:
"They were first manufactured about six or seven years back and I have not seen any around since. The rider has no control over them whatsoever – and I doubt whether we will stock them again."
And finally, on the 22nd at the ABC Savoy, 'The Slipper and The Rose' replaced ‘Kelly's Heroes' while the Capitol Cinema retained 'Tommy' for a second week.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the declining chimney sweep business, Bold Colliery holds its Centenary Open Day, the water restrictions being imposed and the fears over the opening of a new secure unit at Rainhill Hospital.
We begin on the 18th at a meeting in London of the Central Arbitration Committee when an equal pay case brought on behalf of 370 women workers at Beechams was considered.
Their union claimed that the most the female staff employed at the Westfield Street factory could earn was less than the male minimum.
The Committee ruled in favour of the women, who were all members of the General and Municipal Workers Union, and they would now receive a pay increase of between £3.46 and £5.68 per week.
Officially known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, it had largely been built by members of their own congregation.
Under the headline "Smile, Please, We're Booming", the St Helens Reporter on the 20th described how beersellers in St Helens were doing very nicely in the heatwave:
"Thirsty beer swillers – sweltering in the hot weather – are causing a drinks boom in St. Helens. As the town basks in another hot spell, breweries and pubs are recording [a] rapid increase in sales. And it's the beer lovers who are drinking the barrels dry.
"A spokesman for Greenalls Brewery in Warrington said: “Large increases in sales are being recorded all over the district.”"
In a full-page feature, the Reporter discussed the dangers of the present heatwave, particularly to the children who bathed in the canal or in old clay pits.
On July 11th a nine-year-old girl had drowned in the St Helens Canal and as the drought was causing water levels to drop, the risks of drowning were increasing.
There was also the danger from water-borne diseases and other hazards, as the paper explained:
"Children swimming in the town's canals run the risk of disease and a greater chance of drowning . . . people and pets face a growing health hazard . . . and St. Helens Fire Brigade is going through the busiest period in living memory. And all this is due to the Mediterranean-style weather which sizzles on regardless.
"The grim warning about disease risks and possible drowning tragedies in local canals is handed out to parents and youngsters by the town's Public Safety Officer Derek Jamieson.
"He said: “There is an increased danger to children with the new bout of hot weather. Water is stagnating and the levels are dropping. The water is really getting dirty now and children could easily pick up diseases from it.
"“Stomach upsets could be easily picked up by children swimming in infected water. As the water level drops, more mud will form, which could trap a child.”"
Harold Scruton, the Senior Fire Prevention Officer at the Parr Stocks Road station, told the Reporter that grass fires were a huge issue for firefighters:
"The wheels on our fire appliances have never stopped turning over the last few weeks. For weeks now our machines have been going out to one fire after another. No sooner does one come back from a blaze than another goes racing out."
The Reporter described how two new cafes were going to be built in Sherdley Park and Taylor Park.
The cafe at Sherdley would be built on a site adjacent to the existing building, which was an old pre-fabricated structure.
And the venue planned for Taylor Park would be a single-storey building of rustic brick overlooking the lake.
Its existing cafe had, for many years, been housed in the old boathouse and both buildings were expected to be completed by the summer of 1977.
The Reporter described how incidents of beatings and ill-treatment of children in St Helens, that had been reported to the authorities, were on the increase.
As a result, St Helens Council was stepping up their campaign to "stamp out child battering" by taking on three more social workers.
The Reporter added that one in every ten abuse cases that had been investigated had resulted in the child victim being taken into care.
Mary Binnington was pictured in the Reporter about to celebrate her 100th birthday in the geriatric ward at Peasley Cross.
Mary had spent many years teaching at schools in Windle and Carr Mill before retiring in 1941 and told the paper:
"Teaching was very hard work. St Helens is now very different. The buildings and schools are much better than they used to be."
The paper also said that Rainford County Councillor Audrey Berry had won her fight to get essential repairs carried out on a "killer" road.
Councillor Berry had been campaigning to get work done on Ormskirk Road in Rainford, where an elderly woman pedestrian had died in an accident involving a police car.
Although the Merseyside Highways Department said they would now resurface the road and widen footpaths, they denied that the road surface had been a contributory factor in the fatal accident.
A plague of grid thieving in the gutters of Clock Face Road was also reported.
Fifteen 9 x 12 inch grids had been stolen in one night and, a few days later, eleven of their replacements were taken. John Gibson, Highways Engineer for the Council, said:
"I am sure somebody must have seen the thieves in action. No one can steal 15 gutter grids along a busy road without being spotted."
It was assumed that the grids had been stolen for their scrap metal value.
Craddocks Shoes had a large advertisement in the Reporter that said their Church Street shop would now be known as Peter Lord.
The latter chain store had bought out Craddocks in 1968 but for the last eight years they had continued to trade under their old name.
The advert stated that the shoe shop had been in existence in Church Street since the turn of the century.
The Reporter explained how St Helens' stores Baby World and Helena House had both effectively banned skateboards due to their potential danger to children, as they had no brakes.
David Gornall, the co-proprietor of Baby World in Ormskirk Street, commented:
"We have never stocked them because they are too dangerous – and have no intention of stocking them."
The Reporter said skateboards were the latest riding craze in Australia and the USA and so far in 1976, twelve American children had died from skateboarding accidents.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents had called on the government to stop retail sales to schoolchildren and to consider an import ban.
And Rodney Davies of Helena House's Toy Department said:
"They were first manufactured about six or seven years back and I have not seen any around since. The rider has no control over them whatsoever – and I doubt whether we will stock them again."
And finally, on the 22nd at the ABC Savoy, 'The Slipper and The Rose' replaced ‘Kelly's Heroes' while the Capitol Cinema retained 'Tommy' for a second week.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the declining chimney sweep business, Bold Colliery holds its Centenary Open Day, the water restrictions being imposed and the fears over the opening of a new secure unit at Rainhill Hospital.