FIFTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK 7 - 13 OCTOBER 1974
This week's many stories include the second general election of the year, the St Helens Reporter goes compugraphic, the Eccleston church clock that struck 17 times, the vandalism in St Helens toilets and why a tiger had strolled across a zebra crossing in Corporation Street.
We begin on the 7th when for a week the Pilkington Musical Society presented 'Finian's Rainbow' at the Theatre Royal, which they described as a "musical comedy for all the family". There were four bands of ticket prices from 50p to 70p, with children and OAPs paying 35p or 40p.
The Liverpool Echo on the 7th described how a Liverpool-bound train needed to be halted at Rainford earlier in the day when thieves put signals and points on a stretch of track out of action. They stole a quantity of cable between Rainford and Fazakerley, which meant single line working could not be operated in the area.
The 6.05 am service from Wigan to Liverpool had to be terminated at Rainford, with its passengers transferred to the next scheduled train thirty-five minutes later. That had to be guided through by a "pilot", a railwayman called in when automatic workings on a stretch of track had broken down.
On the 10th a general election was held. Sunshine led to a strong early turnout at the 80 polling stations in St Helens, which were manned by 180 Town Hall staff with a further 90 council employees charged with carrying out the count. This was the second general election of the year with Leslie Spriggs in February having romped home for the Labour Party with a majority of over 20,000. The former railwayman, who had been the town's MP for 18 years, was, as expected, re-elected and increased his majority to 22,066 on a 67% turnout.
I believe that Eccleston Church's ancient clock no longer has to be rewound every seven days. But it certainly did in 1974 when the Parish Council decided to have Christ Church's near 200-year-old timepiece repaired. That was after it had been behaving rather erratically – including striking 17 times!
The hand-wound clock had been built in 1795 but its weights were in such a dangerous condition it was said they could easily fall out of the works. So this week the Parish Council agreed to spend a maximum of £200 having the clock repaired and if any extra cash was needed they hoped that the Church Council would cough up.
As we know there are very few public toilets within St Helens these days. However, in the early 1970s, the town had seventeen. The cost of vandalism was one reason why they were closed. In February 1970 it was revealed that the Corporation's efforts to vandal-proof the public toilets in Haresfinch were proving unsuccessful. Their windows had been smashed so often that special "brick-glass" panes had been installed.
However, the Corporation's Building Manager, Joseph Appleton, reported that some of the new anti-vandal windows had already been broken. In 1972 it was revealed that vandalism to Haresfinch's public loos over the previous two years had cost £2,000 in repairs and alterations. That's about £30,000 in today's money. As a result a concrete roof was going to be installed and the pipework would be concealed.
At this week's meeting of the Environmental Health Committee, the councillors heard that the "vandal proof" toilets at Haresfinch had last year been completely wrecked. In one attack doors had been ripped off, toilet bowls and washbasins smashed and the walls disfigured by aerosol sprays. And at Derbyshire Hill their toilets had needed to be demolished because they had been wrecked so badly.
Recently the new public conveniences in the Birchley Street car park had also been vandalised. Vernon Lewis, the Deputy Director of Technical Services, told the committee: "We've got to make them as indestructible as possible. We may have to provide facilities which are not ideal, but which stay there and don't get vandalised."
Later Leonard Cundy, the council's Cleansing Manager, said it was costing thousands of pounds a year to repair the damaged toilets. On the Birchley Street damage he said: "We were surprised with it being so close to the police headquarters. We thought it would be the one place where it would be fairly free from vandalism." Mr Cundy added that it appeared that females were the worst culprits, with one of the lady attendants at Birchley Street having been physically threatened by two or three girls.
In 1876 the St Helens Newspaper announced that a new invention was making headway in the production of newspapers. They called the device a "writing machine", although we know it as a typewriter. On the 11th of this week, nearly 100 years later, the St Helens Reporter described how they were embracing a new technique in newspaper production that they called "compugraphic". The paper wrote:
"It is a new method of producing newspapers via a computer, and photographing directly on to metal printing plates. It is quicker and cleaner, and it should produce a superior newspaper." Compugraphic production would replace Linotype which they said was the "time-honoured method of producing newspapers from molten lead. It is dirty and not really healthy."
But they would not be introducing the new system straight away but phasing it in over a number of weeks. That, they said, would mean some pages would be compugraphic and others "hot metal": "During this interim period, your paper may look odd. It will be something of a hybrid. We ask our readers, correspondents, advertisers and newsagents to bear with us. The final product will be clean and modern – well worth waiting for."
In 1972 Albert Hart, the owner of Hart's large department store in St Helens, had died at the age of 76. Albert had begun his working life on a stall in St Helens Market and then in 1934 he had opened a small shop in Church Street. Over the years the business was expanded and at the time of Mr Hart's death it was employing 100 staff. The two-storey premises covered 30,000 square feet and then had 44 departments and later in 1972 the store was sold to Lewis's.
In this week's Reporter Lewis's were advertising a range of "super specials". These included their own-brand cassette recorder for £12.50; a Sanyo 14 inch black and white portable TV for £49.95 and a rocking chair for £29.99.
In a recruitment advert in June 1974 for their new Merton Bank supermarket, Moneysave said full-time female checkout operators and shelf fillers could earn £18 per week at the age of 20, with their part-time equivalents earning 40p per hour. Girls and boys undertaking Saturday work aged at least 16 would receive £3 a day.
In the Reporter this week Moneysave was advising shoppers to "forget the town centre crush" and pick up bargains at their Merton Bank store. These included a large sliced white "Wonderloaf" at 10½p; a ¼lb of Typhoo tea for 7p; Smith’s family-size crisps costing 10p and a giant pack of Omo washing powder at 22½p.
Under a rather unusual photo in the paper the Reporter also wrote: "It isn't every day you see a tiger on a zebra crossing in the middle of busy Corporation Street, St. Helens. Holding that tiger were Museum Curator Denise Hillhouse and technician Geoffrey Burrows, who stopped the traffic on Wednesday. They decided to move the children's favourite museum piece back from the theatre workshops in Corporation Street, where it had gone for a stripe-lift, to a nice new bamboo cage in the museum foyer after dozens of requests from anxious young visitors."
And finally, the Reporter also described how a group of St Helens councillors had been "taken for a ride" this week as part of their official duties. They had been to Bolton to discuss purchasing a replacement vehicle to serve as the mayoral car. That was because the current Daimler was spending more time in the garage being repaired than on the road.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include Pilkington's deferral of their controversial float glass scheme, the school headmaster convicted of indecency, Radio City prepares to launch and the criticism of St Helens Ambulance Service by its own boss.
We begin on the 7th when for a week the Pilkington Musical Society presented 'Finian's Rainbow' at the Theatre Royal, which they described as a "musical comedy for all the family". There were four bands of ticket prices from 50p to 70p, with children and OAPs paying 35p or 40p.
The Liverpool Echo on the 7th described how a Liverpool-bound train needed to be halted at Rainford earlier in the day when thieves put signals and points on a stretch of track out of action. They stole a quantity of cable between Rainford and Fazakerley, which meant single line working could not be operated in the area.
The 6.05 am service from Wigan to Liverpool had to be terminated at Rainford, with its passengers transferred to the next scheduled train thirty-five minutes later. That had to be guided through by a "pilot", a railwayman called in when automatic workings on a stretch of track had broken down.
On the 10th a general election was held. Sunshine led to a strong early turnout at the 80 polling stations in St Helens, which were manned by 180 Town Hall staff with a further 90 council employees charged with carrying out the count. This was the second general election of the year with Leslie Spriggs in February having romped home for the Labour Party with a majority of over 20,000. The former railwayman, who had been the town's MP for 18 years, was, as expected, re-elected and increased his majority to 22,066 on a 67% turnout.
The hand-wound clock had been built in 1795 but its weights were in such a dangerous condition it was said they could easily fall out of the works. So this week the Parish Council agreed to spend a maximum of £200 having the clock repaired and if any extra cash was needed they hoped that the Church Council would cough up.
As we know there are very few public toilets within St Helens these days. However, in the early 1970s, the town had seventeen. The cost of vandalism was one reason why they were closed. In February 1970 it was revealed that the Corporation's efforts to vandal-proof the public toilets in Haresfinch were proving unsuccessful. Their windows had been smashed so often that special "brick-glass" panes had been installed.
However, the Corporation's Building Manager, Joseph Appleton, reported that some of the new anti-vandal windows had already been broken. In 1972 it was revealed that vandalism to Haresfinch's public loos over the previous two years had cost £2,000 in repairs and alterations. That's about £30,000 in today's money. As a result a concrete roof was going to be installed and the pipework would be concealed.
At this week's meeting of the Environmental Health Committee, the councillors heard that the "vandal proof" toilets at Haresfinch had last year been completely wrecked. In one attack doors had been ripped off, toilet bowls and washbasins smashed and the walls disfigured by aerosol sprays. And at Derbyshire Hill their toilets had needed to be demolished because they had been wrecked so badly.
Recently the new public conveniences in the Birchley Street car park had also been vandalised. Vernon Lewis, the Deputy Director of Technical Services, told the committee: "We've got to make them as indestructible as possible. We may have to provide facilities which are not ideal, but which stay there and don't get vandalised."
Later Leonard Cundy, the council's Cleansing Manager, said it was costing thousands of pounds a year to repair the damaged toilets. On the Birchley Street damage he said: "We were surprised with it being so close to the police headquarters. We thought it would be the one place where it would be fairly free from vandalism." Mr Cundy added that it appeared that females were the worst culprits, with one of the lady attendants at Birchley Street having been physically threatened by two or three girls.
In 1876 the St Helens Newspaper announced that a new invention was making headway in the production of newspapers. They called the device a "writing machine", although we know it as a typewriter. On the 11th of this week, nearly 100 years later, the St Helens Reporter described how they were embracing a new technique in newspaper production that they called "compugraphic". The paper wrote:
"It is a new method of producing newspapers via a computer, and photographing directly on to metal printing plates. It is quicker and cleaner, and it should produce a superior newspaper." Compugraphic production would replace Linotype which they said was the "time-honoured method of producing newspapers from molten lead. It is dirty and not really healthy."
But they would not be introducing the new system straight away but phasing it in over a number of weeks. That, they said, would mean some pages would be compugraphic and others "hot metal": "During this interim period, your paper may look odd. It will be something of a hybrid. We ask our readers, correspondents, advertisers and newsagents to bear with us. The final product will be clean and modern – well worth waiting for."
In 1972 Albert Hart, the owner of Hart's large department store in St Helens, had died at the age of 76. Albert had begun his working life on a stall in St Helens Market and then in 1934 he had opened a small shop in Church Street. Over the years the business was expanded and at the time of Mr Hart's death it was employing 100 staff. The two-storey premises covered 30,000 square feet and then had 44 departments and later in 1972 the store was sold to Lewis's.
In this week's Reporter Lewis's were advertising a range of "super specials". These included their own-brand cassette recorder for £12.50; a Sanyo 14 inch black and white portable TV for £49.95 and a rocking chair for £29.99.
In a recruitment advert in June 1974 for their new Merton Bank supermarket, Moneysave said full-time female checkout operators and shelf fillers could earn £18 per week at the age of 20, with their part-time equivalents earning 40p per hour. Girls and boys undertaking Saturday work aged at least 16 would receive £3 a day.
In the Reporter this week Moneysave was advising shoppers to "forget the town centre crush" and pick up bargains at their Merton Bank store. These included a large sliced white "Wonderloaf" at 10½p; a ¼lb of Typhoo tea for 7p; Smith’s family-size crisps costing 10p and a giant pack of Omo washing powder at 22½p.
Under a rather unusual photo in the paper the Reporter also wrote: "It isn't every day you see a tiger on a zebra crossing in the middle of busy Corporation Street, St. Helens. Holding that tiger were Museum Curator Denise Hillhouse and technician Geoffrey Burrows, who stopped the traffic on Wednesday. They decided to move the children's favourite museum piece back from the theatre workshops in Corporation Street, where it had gone for a stripe-lift, to a nice new bamboo cage in the museum foyer after dozens of requests from anxious young visitors."
And finally, the Reporter also described how a group of St Helens councillors had been "taken for a ride" this week as part of their official duties. They had been to Bolton to discuss purchasing a replacement vehicle to serve as the mayoral car. That was because the current Daimler was spending more time in the garage being repaired than on the road.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include Pilkington's deferral of their controversial float glass scheme, the school headmaster convicted of indecency, Radio City prepares to launch and the criticism of St Helens Ambulance Service by its own boss.
This week's many stories include the second general election of the year, the St Helens Reporter goes compugraphic, the Eccleston church clock that struck 17 times, the vandalism in St Helens toilets and why a tiger had strolled across a zebra crossing in Corporation Street.
We begin on the 7th when for a week the Pilkington Musical Society presented 'Finian's Rainbow' at the Theatre Royal, which they described as a "musical comedy for all the family".
There were four bands of ticket prices from 50p to 70p, with children and OAPs paying 35p or 40p.
The Liverpool Echo on the 7th described how a Liverpool-bound train needed to be halted at Rainford earlier in the day when thieves put signals and points on a stretch of track out of action.
They stole a quantity of cable between Rainford and Fazakerley, which meant single line working could not be operated in the area.
The 6.05 am service from Wigan to Liverpool had to be terminated at Rainford, with its passengers transferred to the next scheduled train thirty-five minutes later.
That had to be guided through by a "pilot", a railwayman called in when automatic workings on a stretch of track had broken down.
On the 10th a general election was held. Sunshine led to a strong early turnout at the 80 polling stations in St Helens, which were manned by 180 Town Hall staff with a further 90 council employees charged with carrying out the count.
This was the second general election of the year with Leslie Spriggs in February having romped home for the Labour Party with a majority of over 20,000.
The former railwayman, who had been the town's MP for 18 years, was, as expected, re-elected and increased his majority to 22,066 on a 67% turnout.
I believe that Eccleston Church's ancient clock no longer has to be rewound every seven days.
But it certainly did in 1974 when the Parish Council decided to have Christ Church's near 200-year-old timepiece repaired.
That was after it had been behaving rather erratically – including striking 17 times!
The hand-wound clock had been built in 1795 but its weights were in such a dangerous condition it was said they could easily fall out of the works.
So this week the Parish Council agreed to spend a maximum of £200 having the clock repaired and if any extra cash was needed they hoped that the Church Council would cough up.
As we know there are very few public toilets within St Helens these days. However, in the early 1970s, the town had seventeen. The cost of vandalism was one reason why they were closed.
In February 1970 it was revealed that the Corporation's efforts to vandal-proof the public toilets in Haresfinch were proving unsuccessful.
Their windows had been smashed so often that special "brick-glass" panes had been installed.
However, the Corporation's Building Manager, Joseph Appleton, reported that some of the new anti-vandal windows had already been broken.
In 1972 it was revealed that vandalism to Haresfinch's public loos over the previous two years had cost £2,000 in repairs and alterations. That's about £30,000 in today's money.
As a result a concrete roof was going to be installed and the pipework would be concealed.
At this week's meeting of the Environmental Health Committee, the councillors heard that the "vandal proof" toilets at Haresfinch had last year been completely wrecked.
In one attack doors had been ripped off, toilet bowls and washbasins smashed and the walls disfigured by aerosol sprays.
And at Derbyshire Hill their toilets had needed to be demolished because they had been wrecked so badly.
Recently the new public conveniences in the Birchley Street car park had also been vandalised. Vernon Lewis, the Deputy Director of Technical Services, told the committee:
"We've got to make them as indestructible as possible. We may have to provide facilities which are not ideal, but which stay there and don't get vandalised."
Later Leonard Cundy, the council's Cleansing Manager, said it was costing thousands of pounds a year to repair the damaged toilets. On the Birchley Street damage he said:
"We were surprised with it being so close to the police headquarters. We thought it would be the one place where it would be fairly free from vandalism."
Mr Cundy added that it appeared that females were the worst culprits, with one of the lady attendants at Birchley Street having been physically threatened by two or three girls.
In 1876 the St Helens Newspaper announced that a new invention was making headway in the production of newspapers.
They called the device a "writing machine", although we know it as a typewriter.
On the 11th of this week, nearly 100 years later, the St Helens Reporter described how they were embracing a new technique in newspaper production that they called "compugraphic". The paper wrote:
"It is a new method of producing newspapers via a computer, and photographing directly on to metal printing plates. It is quicker and cleaner, and it should produce a superior newspaper."
Compugraphic production would replace Linotype which they said was the "time-honoured method of producing newspapers from molten lead. It is dirty and not really healthy."
But they would not be introducing the new system straight away but phasing it in over a number of weeks. That, they said, would mean some pages would be compugraphic and others "hot metal":
"During this interim period, your paper may look odd. It will be something of a hybrid. We ask our readers, correspondents, advertisers and newsagents to bear with us. The final product will be clean and modern – well worth waiting for."
In 1972 Albert Hart, the owner of Hart's large department store in St Helens, had died at the age of 76.
Albert had begun his working life on a stall in St Helens Market and then in 1934 he had opened a small shop in Church Street.
Over the years the business was expanded and at the time of Mr Hart's death it was employing 100 staff.
The two-storey premises covered 30,000 square feet and then had 44 departments and later in 1972 the store was sold to Lewis's.
In this week's Reporter Lewis's were advertising a range of "super specials".
These included their own-brand cassette recorder for £12.50; a Sanyo 14 inch black and white portable TV for £49.95 and a rocking chair for £29.99.
In a recruitment advert in June 1974 for their new Merton Bank supermarket, Moneysave said full-time female checkout operators and shelf fillers could earn £18 per week at the age of 20, with their part-time equivalents earning 40p per hour.
Girls and boys undertaking Saturday work aged at least 16 would receive £3 a day.
In the Reporter this week Moneysave was advising shoppers to "forget the town centre crush" and pick up bargains at their Merton Bank store.
These included a large sliced white "Wonderloaf" at 10½p; a ¼lb of Typhoo tea for 7p; Smith’s family-size crisps costing 10p and a giant pack of Omo washing powder at 22½p.
Under a rather unusual photo in the paper the Reporter also wrote:
"It isn't every day you see a tiger on a zebra crossing in the middle of busy Corporation Street, St. Helens. Holding that tiger were Museum Curator Denise Hillhouse and technician Geoffrey Burrows, who stopped the traffic on Wednesday.
"They decided to move the children's favourite museum piece back from the theatre workshops in Corporation Street, where it had gone for a stripe-lift, to a nice new bamboo cage in the museum foyer after dozens of requests from anxious young visitors."
And finally, the Reporter also described how a group of St Helens councillors had been "taken for a ride" this week as part of their official duties.
They had been to Bolton to discuss purchasing a replacement vehicle to serve as the mayoral car.
That was because the current Daimler was spending more time in the garage being repaired than on the road.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include Pilkington's deferral of their controversial float glass scheme, the school headmaster convicted of indecency, Radio City prepares to launch and the criticism of St Helens Ambulance Service by its own boss.
We begin on the 7th when for a week the Pilkington Musical Society presented 'Finian's Rainbow' at the Theatre Royal, which they described as a "musical comedy for all the family".
There were four bands of ticket prices from 50p to 70p, with children and OAPs paying 35p or 40p.
The Liverpool Echo on the 7th described how a Liverpool-bound train needed to be halted at Rainford earlier in the day when thieves put signals and points on a stretch of track out of action.
They stole a quantity of cable between Rainford and Fazakerley, which meant single line working could not be operated in the area.
The 6.05 am service from Wigan to Liverpool had to be terminated at Rainford, with its passengers transferred to the next scheduled train thirty-five minutes later.
That had to be guided through by a "pilot", a railwayman called in when automatic workings on a stretch of track had broken down.
On the 10th a general election was held. Sunshine led to a strong early turnout at the 80 polling stations in St Helens, which were manned by 180 Town Hall staff with a further 90 council employees charged with carrying out the count.
This was the second general election of the year with Leslie Spriggs in February having romped home for the Labour Party with a majority of over 20,000.
The former railwayman, who had been the town's MP for 18 years, was, as expected, re-elected and increased his majority to 22,066 on a 67% turnout.
But it certainly did in 1974 when the Parish Council decided to have Christ Church's near 200-year-old timepiece repaired.
That was after it had been behaving rather erratically – including striking 17 times!
The hand-wound clock had been built in 1795 but its weights were in such a dangerous condition it was said they could easily fall out of the works.
So this week the Parish Council agreed to spend a maximum of £200 having the clock repaired and if any extra cash was needed they hoped that the Church Council would cough up.
As we know there are very few public toilets within St Helens these days. However, in the early 1970s, the town had seventeen. The cost of vandalism was one reason why they were closed.
In February 1970 it was revealed that the Corporation's efforts to vandal-proof the public toilets in Haresfinch were proving unsuccessful.
Their windows had been smashed so often that special "brick-glass" panes had been installed.
However, the Corporation's Building Manager, Joseph Appleton, reported that some of the new anti-vandal windows had already been broken.
In 1972 it was revealed that vandalism to Haresfinch's public loos over the previous two years had cost £2,000 in repairs and alterations. That's about £30,000 in today's money.
As a result a concrete roof was going to be installed and the pipework would be concealed.
At this week's meeting of the Environmental Health Committee, the councillors heard that the "vandal proof" toilets at Haresfinch had last year been completely wrecked.
In one attack doors had been ripped off, toilet bowls and washbasins smashed and the walls disfigured by aerosol sprays.
And at Derbyshire Hill their toilets had needed to be demolished because they had been wrecked so badly.
Recently the new public conveniences in the Birchley Street car park had also been vandalised. Vernon Lewis, the Deputy Director of Technical Services, told the committee:
"We've got to make them as indestructible as possible. We may have to provide facilities which are not ideal, but which stay there and don't get vandalised."
Later Leonard Cundy, the council's Cleansing Manager, said it was costing thousands of pounds a year to repair the damaged toilets. On the Birchley Street damage he said:
"We were surprised with it being so close to the police headquarters. We thought it would be the one place where it would be fairly free from vandalism."
Mr Cundy added that it appeared that females were the worst culprits, with one of the lady attendants at Birchley Street having been physically threatened by two or three girls.
In 1876 the St Helens Newspaper announced that a new invention was making headway in the production of newspapers.
They called the device a "writing machine", although we know it as a typewriter.
On the 11th of this week, nearly 100 years later, the St Helens Reporter described how they were embracing a new technique in newspaper production that they called "compugraphic". The paper wrote:
"It is a new method of producing newspapers via a computer, and photographing directly on to metal printing plates. It is quicker and cleaner, and it should produce a superior newspaper."
Compugraphic production would replace Linotype which they said was the "time-honoured method of producing newspapers from molten lead. It is dirty and not really healthy."
But they would not be introducing the new system straight away but phasing it in over a number of weeks. That, they said, would mean some pages would be compugraphic and others "hot metal":
"During this interim period, your paper may look odd. It will be something of a hybrid. We ask our readers, correspondents, advertisers and newsagents to bear with us. The final product will be clean and modern – well worth waiting for."
In 1972 Albert Hart, the owner of Hart's large department store in St Helens, had died at the age of 76.
Albert had begun his working life on a stall in St Helens Market and then in 1934 he had opened a small shop in Church Street.
Over the years the business was expanded and at the time of Mr Hart's death it was employing 100 staff.
The two-storey premises covered 30,000 square feet and then had 44 departments and later in 1972 the store was sold to Lewis's.
In this week's Reporter Lewis's were advertising a range of "super specials".
These included their own-brand cassette recorder for £12.50; a Sanyo 14 inch black and white portable TV for £49.95 and a rocking chair for £29.99.
In a recruitment advert in June 1974 for their new Merton Bank supermarket, Moneysave said full-time female checkout operators and shelf fillers could earn £18 per week at the age of 20, with their part-time equivalents earning 40p per hour.
Girls and boys undertaking Saturday work aged at least 16 would receive £3 a day.
In the Reporter this week Moneysave was advising shoppers to "forget the town centre crush" and pick up bargains at their Merton Bank store.
These included a large sliced white "Wonderloaf" at 10½p; a ¼lb of Typhoo tea for 7p; Smith’s family-size crisps costing 10p and a giant pack of Omo washing powder at 22½p.
Under a rather unusual photo in the paper the Reporter also wrote:
"It isn't every day you see a tiger on a zebra crossing in the middle of busy Corporation Street, St. Helens. Holding that tiger were Museum Curator Denise Hillhouse and technician Geoffrey Burrows, who stopped the traffic on Wednesday.
"They decided to move the children's favourite museum piece back from the theatre workshops in Corporation Street, where it had gone for a stripe-lift, to a nice new bamboo cage in the museum foyer after dozens of requests from anxious young visitors."
And finally, the Reporter also described how a group of St Helens councillors had been "taken for a ride" this week as part of their official duties.
They had been to Bolton to discuss purchasing a replacement vehicle to serve as the mayoral car.
That was because the current Daimler was spending more time in the garage being repaired than on the road.
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include Pilkington's deferral of their controversial float glass scheme, the school headmaster convicted of indecency, Radio City prepares to launch and the criticism of St Helens Ambulance Service by its own boss.