FIFTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (14th - 20th NOVEMBER 1972)
This week's stories include the 280 million-year-old fossils unearthed in College Street, the miracle boy at Carr Mill school, Yehudi Menuhin performs in St Helens, the big animal show in Parr, Whiston Council's plans for free school milk, the opening of temporary car parks for Christmas, the social club that was formed for widows and the PR man wanted by Pilks to work in St Helens – but live outside the town.
We begin on the 14th when at a joint union meeting ancillary hospital staff in the St Helens district voted to take part in a series of one-day stoppages over pay. However, they later decided to withdraw the resolution pending further talks.
The full inquest into two men killed in an underground explosion at Cronton Colliery in August was held this week. But after a 2-hour hearing and the questioning of ten witnesses the cause was still not known for certain. However, it was thought that a spark might have detonated a build up of gas. The victims were 23-year-old Kevin Walsh of Coalville Road in Carr Mill and 51-year-old Ted Beesley from Huyton. Kevin had not been due to work on the day of his death but had switched shifts so he could spend a longer Bank Holiday weekend with his wife and her parents. The Coroner, Ronald Lloyd, commended Cecil Fenney and Benny Molyneux for their valiant attempts at rescuing the men who died.
The week began badly for 87 production and distribution workers employed at Geest Industries in Walkers Lane after they were all sent home. Not that the workers at Europe's biggest banana ripening plant in Sutton Manor had done anything wrong. But ten truck drivers that transported bananas from South Wales to St Helens had gone on strike after being told that most of them were being made redundant. That was after Geest had decided it would be more economical to transport bananas to St Helens by British Rail. The lorry drivers were still out by the end of the week and it was feared that there might be a shortage of fruit in the north-west as a result.
Brian Clark started school this week and his mother called it a miracle. That was because only a few weeks earlier the four-year-old boy born with a heart disorder had been fighting for his life after a major operation. But Brian from Rowan Close in Laffak had now been given the all clear from doctors to begin attending Carr Mill Infants. His mother Lois Clark said: "We are thrilled to bits. It's lovely to see him going to school. He is quite excited about it. For us it's a miracle. Now he can join in any of the games at school as long as he doesn't over do it."
The Reporter on the 17th described how a workman carrying out a major re-sewering project in College Street had unearthed fossils thought to be 280 million years old. Pipelayer's mate Hugh Howard had made the discovery while digging and told the paper: "There was a whole seam of rock. I threw most of it away before I took a closer look and saw all the markings. I thought they might be of some interest to some expert, so I saved the rest."
The interested expert was Geoffrey Senior, the St Helens Chief Librarian, who immediately shot down to the excavation site and had the specimens scraped from a depth of 15 feet below pavement level. Mr Senior said the St Helens district is well blessed with fossils because of its rich coal deposits that had allowed impressions of the plant and animal life from millions of years ago to be preserved. The plan was for the fossils to be put on public exhibition at the Gamble Institute.
World-famous violinist Yehudi Menuhin and his pianist sister Hephzibah (shown above) were pictured in the Reporter after receiving a rapturous reception at the Theatre Royal. Tickets for the event had sold out months earlier and stage manager Slim Ingram had also been mightily impressed, telling the Reporter:
"I've never witnessed anything like it. It was a fantastic concert and they truly deserved the marvellous reception. They are a unique couple and their performance was something to see. They told me they had been very happy to play at the theatre and bring the music to St. Helens. Many of the audience came to me afterwards and said it had been wonderful to have had the opportunity of seeing them."
Mary Jones was featured in the Reporter after starting up a club for widows. The 26-year-old from Loughrigg Avenue in Clinkham Wood with three children had had a lonely time since her husband was killed in a motorbike accident in 1970. So now Mary was appealing to other widows to join with her and start having some fun again. She had placed a newspaper advert asking widows to contact her but so far had only received four replies.
"Since I lost my husband I've had very little social life," said Mary. "It's hard for anyone to be left on their own – but it's worse for a woman. I can't go to a pub or club on my own – women just don't do that in this area. Once or twice I've been to the cinema, but it's not much fun by yourself. A club for widows would be a great thing. At least there would be friends around with the same problems, and everyone could have a good night out once in a while."
If your knocking on a bit (like me!) you'll probably remember with some affection the days of men in railway signal boxes manually throwing big levers to control signals and points. An article in the Reporter described how all the trains that passed through St Helens were now being controlled remotely by a pushbutton signal box in Warrington.
A new two-storey building had opened at Bank Quay station in which the "signalmen of the ‘70s" controlled 200 miles of track. They did so via a huge, 64-foot long console and illuminated diagram that displayed the state of the signals, points and the position of trains. "Complex equipment transmits to Warrington the state of all points, signals and track circuits, ensuring that trains move only when it is safe", explained the Reporter.
The paper also announced how Whiston Council planned to defeat the Government's ban on free school milk. The Education Minister Margaret Thatcher had in 1971 controversially scrapped the provision of milk for the over 7s. Whiston Council's jurisdiction then included Eccleston, Rainhill, Bold, Whiston, Hale and Cronton and the 8,000 children in the 35 schools within those districts would each receive a third of a pint of milk each morning.
The scheme had been planned for some time but had faced resistance from Lancashire County Council and only two volunteers had initially come forward to help distribute the milk. But now 38 people had offered their services, although the council only had enough cash to pay for 11 weeks of milk.
Saints played the touring Australian rugby league team on the 15th with the added attraction for the spectators of an RAF police dog display. Saints lost 9 - 24.
There was a large advert in the Daily Telegraph on the 17th for an "experienced and successful PR man" to join Pilkingtons. The glass giant's communications during the 1970 strike had not been great and so they appeared to be learning lessons. Although the post was based at the firm's Prescot Road HQ in St Helens, applicants were essentially told that they wouldn't have to live in the town. The ad said:
"From St. Helens he will be in easy reach of attractive and fairly priced residential areas in Cheshire and rural Lancashire." Is that good PR, encouraging such folk to live outside the borough? The contact at Pilks Group Personnel Services for applicants to write to was a Miss A. F. Donald – but clearly women were not thought capable of PR work.
In July I reported how the raising of chlorine levels in drinking water supplied to St Helens homes had triggered a barrage of complaints about its taste. "You can't make a good cup of tea with it," complained Alderman Thomas Hignett to a meeting of the Water Committee.
The chlorine was added to the water supply to reduce levels of infection and pollution – although some people were confusing it with fluoride. The increase from 0.05 parts per million to 0.2 parts had baffled the boffins – as normally chlorine could not be tasted in water until it reached 0.5 ppm, that's 2½ times its then level. Due to the complaints the chlorine was returned to its old level – although the St Helens Water Committee had now decided to tackle the problem from a different angle.
On the 17th the Liverpool Echo reported that they were considering installing expensive equipment at their reservoirs. The new plant was needed to extract most of the chlorine out of the water before it left the reservoirs. The plan was to reduce the amount of chlorine to an acceptable level before the water entered the distribution mains.
From the 19th, 'Deliverance' starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds was screened at the ABC Savoy for a week and the Capitol was showing the X-rated film 'Au Pair Girls'.
From the 20th the first in a series of temporary car parks to cater for the expected heavy Christmas traffic within St Helens town centre was opened. It was situated in the New Market Place / East Street area with space for 200 vehicles. Parking was for a maximum of three hours with charges set at 3p for one hour and 5p for two.
Within the next fortnight another car park sited between Ormskirk Street, New Cross Street, King Street and Henry Street would open, providing accommodation for a further 100 vehicles. St Helens Corporation was also negotiating for the use of several other spare areas in the town centre, which would all remain open until about the end of January 1973.
And finally, this was still the era of live animal shows and from the 20th, Circus Hoffman appeared for several days at Parr Stocks Recreation Field. This was what was promised in their Reporter advert:
"Over 100 animals and exotic birds, lions and lion cubs, tigers, leopards, pumas, monkeys, buffalo, highland bull, llama, giant baboons, parrots, horse, ponies, mules, civet cat etc. High wire artiste, lions and tigers, llama, performing camels, dromedary, horses, jugglers, Russian bears, antipodista [juggler] trapeze, cowboys, Arab tumblers from Morocco and elephants etc. Worth coming miles to see."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next week's stories will include the successful letting of the town's new shopping centre, the Gravy Train hits the buffers, the dog called Blue that was set to patrol Taylor Park and the St Helens food shops with poor hygiene practices.
We begin on the 14th when at a joint union meeting ancillary hospital staff in the St Helens district voted to take part in a series of one-day stoppages over pay. However, they later decided to withdraw the resolution pending further talks.
The full inquest into two men killed in an underground explosion at Cronton Colliery in August was held this week. But after a 2-hour hearing and the questioning of ten witnesses the cause was still not known for certain. However, it was thought that a spark might have detonated a build up of gas. The victims were 23-year-old Kevin Walsh of Coalville Road in Carr Mill and 51-year-old Ted Beesley from Huyton. Kevin had not been due to work on the day of his death but had switched shifts so he could spend a longer Bank Holiday weekend with his wife and her parents. The Coroner, Ronald Lloyd, commended Cecil Fenney and Benny Molyneux for their valiant attempts at rescuing the men who died.
The week began badly for 87 production and distribution workers employed at Geest Industries in Walkers Lane after they were all sent home. Not that the workers at Europe's biggest banana ripening plant in Sutton Manor had done anything wrong. But ten truck drivers that transported bananas from South Wales to St Helens had gone on strike after being told that most of them were being made redundant. That was after Geest had decided it would be more economical to transport bananas to St Helens by British Rail. The lorry drivers were still out by the end of the week and it was feared that there might be a shortage of fruit in the north-west as a result.
Brian Clark started school this week and his mother called it a miracle. That was because only a few weeks earlier the four-year-old boy born with a heart disorder had been fighting for his life after a major operation. But Brian from Rowan Close in Laffak had now been given the all clear from doctors to begin attending Carr Mill Infants. His mother Lois Clark said: "We are thrilled to bits. It's lovely to see him going to school. He is quite excited about it. For us it's a miracle. Now he can join in any of the games at school as long as he doesn't over do it."
The Reporter on the 17th described how a workman carrying out a major re-sewering project in College Street had unearthed fossils thought to be 280 million years old. Pipelayer's mate Hugh Howard had made the discovery while digging and told the paper: "There was a whole seam of rock. I threw most of it away before I took a closer look and saw all the markings. I thought they might be of some interest to some expert, so I saved the rest."
The interested expert was Geoffrey Senior, the St Helens Chief Librarian, who immediately shot down to the excavation site and had the specimens scraped from a depth of 15 feet below pavement level. Mr Senior said the St Helens district is well blessed with fossils because of its rich coal deposits that had allowed impressions of the plant and animal life from millions of years ago to be preserved. The plan was for the fossils to be put on public exhibition at the Gamble Institute.
"I've never witnessed anything like it. It was a fantastic concert and they truly deserved the marvellous reception. They are a unique couple and their performance was something to see. They told me they had been very happy to play at the theatre and bring the music to St. Helens. Many of the audience came to me afterwards and said it had been wonderful to have had the opportunity of seeing them."
Mary Jones was featured in the Reporter after starting up a club for widows. The 26-year-old from Loughrigg Avenue in Clinkham Wood with three children had had a lonely time since her husband was killed in a motorbike accident in 1970. So now Mary was appealing to other widows to join with her and start having some fun again. She had placed a newspaper advert asking widows to contact her but so far had only received four replies.
"Since I lost my husband I've had very little social life," said Mary. "It's hard for anyone to be left on their own – but it's worse for a woman. I can't go to a pub or club on my own – women just don't do that in this area. Once or twice I've been to the cinema, but it's not much fun by yourself. A club for widows would be a great thing. At least there would be friends around with the same problems, and everyone could have a good night out once in a while."
If your knocking on a bit (like me!) you'll probably remember with some affection the days of men in railway signal boxes manually throwing big levers to control signals and points. An article in the Reporter described how all the trains that passed through St Helens were now being controlled remotely by a pushbutton signal box in Warrington.
A new two-storey building had opened at Bank Quay station in which the "signalmen of the ‘70s" controlled 200 miles of track. They did so via a huge, 64-foot long console and illuminated diagram that displayed the state of the signals, points and the position of trains. "Complex equipment transmits to Warrington the state of all points, signals and track circuits, ensuring that trains move only when it is safe", explained the Reporter.
The paper also announced how Whiston Council planned to defeat the Government's ban on free school milk. The Education Minister Margaret Thatcher had in 1971 controversially scrapped the provision of milk for the over 7s. Whiston Council's jurisdiction then included Eccleston, Rainhill, Bold, Whiston, Hale and Cronton and the 8,000 children in the 35 schools within those districts would each receive a third of a pint of milk each morning.
The scheme had been planned for some time but had faced resistance from Lancashire County Council and only two volunteers had initially come forward to help distribute the milk. But now 38 people had offered their services, although the council only had enough cash to pay for 11 weeks of milk.
Saints played the touring Australian rugby league team on the 15th with the added attraction for the spectators of an RAF police dog display. Saints lost 9 - 24.
There was a large advert in the Daily Telegraph on the 17th for an "experienced and successful PR man" to join Pilkingtons. The glass giant's communications during the 1970 strike had not been great and so they appeared to be learning lessons. Although the post was based at the firm's Prescot Road HQ in St Helens, applicants were essentially told that they wouldn't have to live in the town. The ad said:
"From St. Helens he will be in easy reach of attractive and fairly priced residential areas in Cheshire and rural Lancashire." Is that good PR, encouraging such folk to live outside the borough? The contact at Pilks Group Personnel Services for applicants to write to was a Miss A. F. Donald – but clearly women were not thought capable of PR work.
In July I reported how the raising of chlorine levels in drinking water supplied to St Helens homes had triggered a barrage of complaints about its taste. "You can't make a good cup of tea with it," complained Alderman Thomas Hignett to a meeting of the Water Committee.
The chlorine was added to the water supply to reduce levels of infection and pollution – although some people were confusing it with fluoride. The increase from 0.05 parts per million to 0.2 parts had baffled the boffins – as normally chlorine could not be tasted in water until it reached 0.5 ppm, that's 2½ times its then level. Due to the complaints the chlorine was returned to its old level – although the St Helens Water Committee had now decided to tackle the problem from a different angle.
On the 17th the Liverpool Echo reported that they were considering installing expensive equipment at their reservoirs. The new plant was needed to extract most of the chlorine out of the water before it left the reservoirs. The plan was to reduce the amount of chlorine to an acceptable level before the water entered the distribution mains.
From the 19th, 'Deliverance' starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds was screened at the ABC Savoy for a week and the Capitol was showing the X-rated film 'Au Pair Girls'.
From the 20th the first in a series of temporary car parks to cater for the expected heavy Christmas traffic within St Helens town centre was opened. It was situated in the New Market Place / East Street area with space for 200 vehicles. Parking was for a maximum of three hours with charges set at 3p for one hour and 5p for two.
Within the next fortnight another car park sited between Ormskirk Street, New Cross Street, King Street and Henry Street would open, providing accommodation for a further 100 vehicles. St Helens Corporation was also negotiating for the use of several other spare areas in the town centre, which would all remain open until about the end of January 1973.
And finally, this was still the era of live animal shows and from the 20th, Circus Hoffman appeared for several days at Parr Stocks Recreation Field. This was what was promised in their Reporter advert:
"Over 100 animals and exotic birds, lions and lion cubs, tigers, leopards, pumas, monkeys, buffalo, highland bull, llama, giant baboons, parrots, horse, ponies, mules, civet cat etc. High wire artiste, lions and tigers, llama, performing camels, dromedary, horses, jugglers, Russian bears, antipodista [juggler] trapeze, cowboys, Arab tumblers from Morocco and elephants etc. Worth coming miles to see."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next week's stories will include the successful letting of the town's new shopping centre, the Gravy Train hits the buffers, the dog called Blue that was set to patrol Taylor Park and the St Helens food shops with poor hygiene practices.
This week's stories include the 280 million-year-old fossils unearthed in College Street, the miracle boy at Carr Mill school, Yehudi Menuhin performs in St Helens, the big animal show in Parr, Whiston Council's plans for free school milk, the opening of temporary car parks for Christmas, the social club that was formed for widows and the PR man wanted by Pilks to work in St Helens – but live outside the town.
We begin on the 14th when at a joint union meeting ancillary hospital staff in the St Helens district voted to take part in a series of one-day stoppages over pay.
However, they later decided to withdraw the resolution pending further talks.
The full inquest into two men killed in an underground explosion at Cronton Colliery in August was held this week.
But after a 2-hour hearing and the questioning of ten witnesses the cause was still not known for certain. However, it was thought that a spark might have detonated a build up of gas.
The victims were 23-year-old Kevin Walsh of Coalville Road in Carr Mill and 51-year-old Ted Beesley from Huyton.
Kevin had not been due to work on the day of his death but had switched shifts so he could spend a longer Bank Holiday weekend with his wife and her parents.
The Coroner, Ronald Lloyd, commended Cecil Fenney and Benny Molyneux for their valiant attempts at rescuing the men who died.
The week began badly for 87 production and distribution workers employed at Geest Industries in Walkers Lane after they were all sent home.
Not that the workers at Europe's biggest banana ripening plant in Sutton Manor had done anything wrong.
But ten truck drivers that transported bananas from South Wales to St Helens had gone on strike after being told that most of them were being made redundant.
That was after Geest had decided it would be more economical to transport bananas to St Helens by British Rail.
The lorry drivers were still out by the end of the week and it was feared that there might be a shortage of fruit in the north-west as a result.
Brian Clark started school this week and his mother called it a miracle.
That was because only a few weeks earlier the four-year-old boy born with a heart disorder had been fighting for his life after a major operation.
But Brian from Rowan Close in Laffak had now been given the all clear from doctors to begin attending Carr Mill Infants. His mother Lois Clark said:
"We are thrilled to bits. It's lovely to see him going to school. He is quite excited about it. For us it's a miracle. Now he can join in any of the games at school as long as he doesn't over do it."
The Reporter on the 17th described how a workman carrying out a major re-sewering project in College Street had unearthed fossils thought to be 280 million years old.
Pipelayer's mate Hugh Howard had made the discovery while digging and told the paper:
"There was a whole seam of rock. I threw most of it away before I took a closer look and saw all the markings. I thought they might be of some interest to some expert, so I saved the rest."
The interested expert was Geoffrey Senior, the St Helens Chief Librarian, who immediately shot down to the excavation site and had the specimens scraped from a depth of 15 feet below pavement level.
Mr Senior said the St Helens district is well blessed with fossils because of its rich coal deposits that had allowed impressions of the plant and animal life from millions of years ago to be preserved.
The plan was for the fossils to be put on public exhibition at the Gamble Institute.
World-famous violinist Yehudi Menuhin and his pianist sister Hephzibah (shown above) were pictured in the Reporter after receiving a rapturous reception at the Theatre Royal.
Tickets for the event had sold out months earlier and stage manager Slim Ingram had also been mightily impressed, telling the Reporter:
"I've never witnessed anything like it. It was a fantastic concert and they truly deserved the marvellous reception. They are a unique couple and their performance was something to see.
"They told me they had been very happy to play at the theatre and bring the music to St. Helens. Many of the audience came to me afterwards and said it had been wonderful to have had the opportunity of seeing them."
Mary Jones was featured in the Reporter after starting up a club for widows.
The 26-year-old from Loughrigg Avenue in Clinkham Wood with three children had had a lonely time since her husband was killed in a motorbike accident in 1970.
So now Mary was appealing to other widows to join with her and start having some fun again.
She had placed a newspaper advert asking widows to contact her but so far had only received four replies.
"Since I lost my husband I've had very little social life," said Mary. "It's hard for anyone to be left on their own – but it's worse for a woman. I can't go to a pub or club on my own – women just don't do that in this area.
"Once or twice I've been to the cinema, but it's not much fun by yourself. A club for widows would be a great thing. At least there would be friends around with the same problems, and everyone could have a good night out once in a while."
If your knocking on a bit (like me!) you'll probably remember with some affection the days of men in railway signal boxes manually throwing big levers to control signals and points.
An article in the Reporter described how all the trains that passed through St Helens were now being controlled remotely by a pushbutton signal box in Warrington.
A new two-storey building had opened at Bank Quay station in which the "signalmen of the ‘70s" controlled 200 miles of track.
They did so via a huge, 64-foot long console and illuminated diagram that displayed the state of the signals, points and the position of trains.
"Complex equipment transmits to Warrington the state of all points, signals and track circuits, ensuring that trains move only when it is safe", explained the Reporter.
The paper also announced how Whiston Council planned to defeat the Government's ban on free school milk.
The Education Minister Margaret Thatcher had in 1971 controversially scrapped the provision of milk for the over 7s.
Whiston Council's jurisdiction then included Eccleston, Rainhill, Bold, Whiston, Hale and Cronton and the 8,000 children in the 35 schools within those districts would each receive a third of a pint of milk each morning.
The scheme had been planned for some time but had faced resistance from Lancashire County Council and only two volunteers had initially come forward to help distribute the milk.
But now 38 people had offered their services, although the council only had enough cash to pay for 11 weeks of milk.
Saints played the touring Australian rugby league team on the 15th with the added attraction for the spectators of an RAF police dog display. Saints lost 9 - 24.
There was a large advert in the Daily Telegraph on the 17th for an "experienced and successful PR man" to join Pilkingtons.
The glass giant's communications during the 1970 strike had not been great and so they appeared to be learning lessons.
Although the post was based at the firm's Prescot Road HQ in St Helens, applicants were essentially told that they wouldn't have to live in the town. The ad said:
"From St. Helens he will be in easy reach of attractive and fairly priced residential areas in Cheshire and rural Lancashire."
Is that good PR, encouraging such folk to live outside the borough?
The contact at Pilks Group Personnel Services for applicants to write to was a Miss A. F. Donald – but clearly women were not thought capable of PR work.
In July I reported how the raising of chlorine levels in drinking water supplied to St Helens homes had triggered a barrage of complaints about its taste.
"You can't make a good cup of tea with it," complained Alderman Thomas Hignett to a meeting of the Water Committee.
The chlorine was added to the water supply to reduce levels of infection and pollution – although some people were confusing it with fluoride.
The increase from 0.05 parts per million to 0.2 parts had baffled the boffins – as normally chlorine could not be tasted in water until it reached 0.5 ppm, that's 2½ times its then level.
Due to the complaints the chlorine was returned to its old level – although the St Helens Water Committee had now decided to tackle the problem from a different angle.
On the 17th the Liverpool Echo reported that they were considering installing expensive equipment at their reservoirs.
The new plant was needed to extract most of the chlorine out of the water before it left the reservoirs.
The plan was to reduce the amount of chlorine to an acceptable level before the water entered the distribution mains.
From the 19th, 'Deliverance' starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds was screened at the ABC Savoy for a week and the Capitol was showing the X-rated film 'Au Pair Girls'.
From the 20th the first in a series of temporary car parks to cater for the expected heavy Christmas traffic within St Helens town centre was opened.
It was situated in the New Market Place / East Street area with space for 200 vehicles.
Parking was for a maximum of three hours with charges set at 3p for one hour and 5p for two.
Within the next fortnight another car park sited between Ormskirk Street, New Cross Street, King Street and Henry Street would open, providing accommodation for a further 100 vehicles.
St Helens Corporation was also negotiating for the use of several other spare areas in the town centre, which would all remain open until about the end of January 1973.
And finally, this was still the era of live animal shows and from the 20th, Circus Hoffman appeared for several days at Parr Stocks Recreation Field. This was what was promised in their Reporter advert:
"Over 100 animals and exotic birds, lions and lion cubs, tigers, leopards, pumas, monkeys, buffalo, highland bull, llama, giant baboons, parrots, horse, ponies, mules, civet cat etc.
"High wire artiste, lions and tigers, llama, performing camels, dromedary, horses, jugglers, Russian bears, antipodista [juggler] trapeze, cowboys, Arab tumblers from Morocco and elephants etc. Worth coming miles to see."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next week's stories will include the successful letting of the town's new shopping centre, the Gravy Train hits the buffers, the dog called Blue that was set to patrol Taylor Park and the St Helens food shops with poor hygiene practices.
We begin on the 14th when at a joint union meeting ancillary hospital staff in the St Helens district voted to take part in a series of one-day stoppages over pay.
However, they later decided to withdraw the resolution pending further talks.
The full inquest into two men killed in an underground explosion at Cronton Colliery in August was held this week.
But after a 2-hour hearing and the questioning of ten witnesses the cause was still not known for certain. However, it was thought that a spark might have detonated a build up of gas.
The victims were 23-year-old Kevin Walsh of Coalville Road in Carr Mill and 51-year-old Ted Beesley from Huyton.
Kevin had not been due to work on the day of his death but had switched shifts so he could spend a longer Bank Holiday weekend with his wife and her parents.
The Coroner, Ronald Lloyd, commended Cecil Fenney and Benny Molyneux for their valiant attempts at rescuing the men who died.
The week began badly for 87 production and distribution workers employed at Geest Industries in Walkers Lane after they were all sent home.
Not that the workers at Europe's biggest banana ripening plant in Sutton Manor had done anything wrong.
But ten truck drivers that transported bananas from South Wales to St Helens had gone on strike after being told that most of them were being made redundant.
That was after Geest had decided it would be more economical to transport bananas to St Helens by British Rail.
The lorry drivers were still out by the end of the week and it was feared that there might be a shortage of fruit in the north-west as a result.
Brian Clark started school this week and his mother called it a miracle.
That was because only a few weeks earlier the four-year-old boy born with a heart disorder had been fighting for his life after a major operation.
But Brian from Rowan Close in Laffak had now been given the all clear from doctors to begin attending Carr Mill Infants. His mother Lois Clark said:
"We are thrilled to bits. It's lovely to see him going to school. He is quite excited about it. For us it's a miracle. Now he can join in any of the games at school as long as he doesn't over do it."
The Reporter on the 17th described how a workman carrying out a major re-sewering project in College Street had unearthed fossils thought to be 280 million years old.
Pipelayer's mate Hugh Howard had made the discovery while digging and told the paper:
"There was a whole seam of rock. I threw most of it away before I took a closer look and saw all the markings. I thought they might be of some interest to some expert, so I saved the rest."
The interested expert was Geoffrey Senior, the St Helens Chief Librarian, who immediately shot down to the excavation site and had the specimens scraped from a depth of 15 feet below pavement level.
Mr Senior said the St Helens district is well blessed with fossils because of its rich coal deposits that had allowed impressions of the plant and animal life from millions of years ago to be preserved.
The plan was for the fossils to be put on public exhibition at the Gamble Institute.
Tickets for the event had sold out months earlier and stage manager Slim Ingram had also been mightily impressed, telling the Reporter:
"I've never witnessed anything like it. It was a fantastic concert and they truly deserved the marvellous reception. They are a unique couple and their performance was something to see.
"They told me they had been very happy to play at the theatre and bring the music to St. Helens. Many of the audience came to me afterwards and said it had been wonderful to have had the opportunity of seeing them."
Mary Jones was featured in the Reporter after starting up a club for widows.
The 26-year-old from Loughrigg Avenue in Clinkham Wood with three children had had a lonely time since her husband was killed in a motorbike accident in 1970.
So now Mary was appealing to other widows to join with her and start having some fun again.
She had placed a newspaper advert asking widows to contact her but so far had only received four replies.
"Since I lost my husband I've had very little social life," said Mary. "It's hard for anyone to be left on their own – but it's worse for a woman. I can't go to a pub or club on my own – women just don't do that in this area.
"Once or twice I've been to the cinema, but it's not much fun by yourself. A club for widows would be a great thing. At least there would be friends around with the same problems, and everyone could have a good night out once in a while."
If your knocking on a bit (like me!) you'll probably remember with some affection the days of men in railway signal boxes manually throwing big levers to control signals and points.
An article in the Reporter described how all the trains that passed through St Helens were now being controlled remotely by a pushbutton signal box in Warrington.
A new two-storey building had opened at Bank Quay station in which the "signalmen of the ‘70s" controlled 200 miles of track.
They did so via a huge, 64-foot long console and illuminated diagram that displayed the state of the signals, points and the position of trains.
"Complex equipment transmits to Warrington the state of all points, signals and track circuits, ensuring that trains move only when it is safe", explained the Reporter.
The paper also announced how Whiston Council planned to defeat the Government's ban on free school milk.
The Education Minister Margaret Thatcher had in 1971 controversially scrapped the provision of milk for the over 7s.
Whiston Council's jurisdiction then included Eccleston, Rainhill, Bold, Whiston, Hale and Cronton and the 8,000 children in the 35 schools within those districts would each receive a third of a pint of milk each morning.
The scheme had been planned for some time but had faced resistance from Lancashire County Council and only two volunteers had initially come forward to help distribute the milk.
But now 38 people had offered their services, although the council only had enough cash to pay for 11 weeks of milk.
Saints played the touring Australian rugby league team on the 15th with the added attraction for the spectators of an RAF police dog display. Saints lost 9 - 24.
There was a large advert in the Daily Telegraph on the 17th for an "experienced and successful PR man" to join Pilkingtons.
The glass giant's communications during the 1970 strike had not been great and so they appeared to be learning lessons.
Although the post was based at the firm's Prescot Road HQ in St Helens, applicants were essentially told that they wouldn't have to live in the town. The ad said:
"From St. Helens he will be in easy reach of attractive and fairly priced residential areas in Cheshire and rural Lancashire."
Is that good PR, encouraging such folk to live outside the borough?
The contact at Pilks Group Personnel Services for applicants to write to was a Miss A. F. Donald – but clearly women were not thought capable of PR work.
In July I reported how the raising of chlorine levels in drinking water supplied to St Helens homes had triggered a barrage of complaints about its taste.
"You can't make a good cup of tea with it," complained Alderman Thomas Hignett to a meeting of the Water Committee.
The chlorine was added to the water supply to reduce levels of infection and pollution – although some people were confusing it with fluoride.
The increase from 0.05 parts per million to 0.2 parts had baffled the boffins – as normally chlorine could not be tasted in water until it reached 0.5 ppm, that's 2½ times its then level.
Due to the complaints the chlorine was returned to its old level – although the St Helens Water Committee had now decided to tackle the problem from a different angle.
On the 17th the Liverpool Echo reported that they were considering installing expensive equipment at their reservoirs.
The new plant was needed to extract most of the chlorine out of the water before it left the reservoirs.
The plan was to reduce the amount of chlorine to an acceptable level before the water entered the distribution mains.
From the 19th, 'Deliverance' starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds was screened at the ABC Savoy for a week and the Capitol was showing the X-rated film 'Au Pair Girls'.
From the 20th the first in a series of temporary car parks to cater for the expected heavy Christmas traffic within St Helens town centre was opened.
It was situated in the New Market Place / East Street area with space for 200 vehicles.
Parking was for a maximum of three hours with charges set at 3p for one hour and 5p for two.
Within the next fortnight another car park sited between Ormskirk Street, New Cross Street, King Street and Henry Street would open, providing accommodation for a further 100 vehicles.
St Helens Corporation was also negotiating for the use of several other spare areas in the town centre, which would all remain open until about the end of January 1973.
And finally, this was still the era of live animal shows and from the 20th, Circus Hoffman appeared for several days at Parr Stocks Recreation Field. This was what was promised in their Reporter advert:
"Over 100 animals and exotic birds, lions and lion cubs, tigers, leopards, pumas, monkeys, buffalo, highland bull, llama, giant baboons, parrots, horse, ponies, mules, civet cat etc.
"High wire artiste, lions and tigers, llama, performing camels, dromedary, horses, jugglers, Russian bears, antipodista [juggler] trapeze, cowboys, Arab tumblers from Morocco and elephants etc. Worth coming miles to see."
St Helens Reporter courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next week's stories will include the successful letting of the town's new shopping centre, the Gravy Train hits the buffers, the dog called Blue that was set to patrol Taylor Park and the St Helens food shops with poor hygiene practices.