Morecambeology 52: The Naples of the North by Peter Wade

Railway posters were a colourful way of advertising destinations across the country. For seaside towns like Morecambe which wouldn’t have existed but for the railways they were especially important, drawing people in for day trips or longer visits.

There was a vogue for linking places to better known counterparts, a well-known example being Edinburgh as The Athens of the North. Morecambe and its bay were linked in this poster with the Bay of Naples though its mountain backdrop didn’t run to an active volcano like Vesuvius.

Another of these parallels was drawn in 1937 when the Hydro at the Broadway Hotel was opened by the Mayor, Charles Howes who styled Morecambe as The Droitwich of Lancashire (Droitwich being a Midlands spa town). You do wonder whether these parallels ever worked in reverse – was Naples, for instance, ever publicized as The Morecambe of the South?

The main aerial view in the poster shows Morecambe seafront as a single curve with the West End Pier, Stone Jetty and Central Pier jutting out into the sea. Recognisable landmarks along the promenade include the Alhambra, Winter Gardens and Tower. These appear again in some of the views below: the West End promenade with the Stone Jetty beyond, Alhambra, Royalty Theatre and Opera house, Winter Gardens and Tower. The Tower is shown as planned rather than as built, so the date given for the poster as c1905 is about right (the Tower dates from 1909).

The poster also promoted Morecambe as a cycling centre and tourist centre for the Lake District, both shown in the upper middle view.

 

Morecambeology Episode 44: Morecambe in the Middle by Peter Wade

Viewers of The One Show on Wednesday saw a bit of Morecambe sunshine at the launch of The Big Walk when four groups of walkers set off to all four corners of the United Kingdom. Their journey will cover a total of 1,522 miles ahead of The Big Lunch on 3rd June. Along the way the walkers will call in on community projects in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

The Big Lunch itself began in 2009 as a get-together for neighbours. Last year over 90,000 Big Lunch events were held, involving some 9 million people.

Morecambe was chosen as the starting point of The Big Walk because of its location near to the middle of the country. Deciding where the middle actually is isn’t as simple as you might think, depending as it does on how you define middle and, indeed, country.

Meriden near Coventry has a 500 year old claim to be at the centre of England. Yet, despite its cross and plaque, the title should properly go to Lindly Hall Farm near Fenny Drayton in Leicestershire.

Leicestershire can also claim the centre of population of Great Britain as the millions of London and the South East are balanced by the thinner populations of the North and West. Appleby Parva marks the population centre.

Another way of defining the centre of the country is in terms of being furthest from the sea. On this basis a point near land-locked Coton-in-the-Elms in Derbyshire takes the honours.

Haltwhistle in the border country between England and Scotland can make a claim by being half way along the longest mainland line of longitude.

A bit nearer to home are Whitendale Hanging Stones near Dunsop Bridge in the middle of the Forest of Bowland which marks the centre of gravity of Great Britain, a geographical balancing point.

The centre of mainland Great Britain falls on Calderstones Partnership NHS Trust near Whalley.

When we open the definition of country to be the United Kingdom including Northern Ireland and its outlying islands, the middle comes very much closer. Just a couple of kilometres (a mile and a half) off the end of the Stone Jetty is the geographical centre of the UK.

We can’t easily stand at the point but for someone in a boat, the grid reference is SD 4157666760.

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LUNE TUBE Film release of the week is Smoke Gets in Your Eyes – a fresh take on Carnforth’s past. Last week’s film, Morecambe’s Lost Royalty, is still available to view. To see these and more, visit http://www.lunetube.co.uk

Morecambeology Part 6: Stormy Weather with Peter Wade ;-)

The clue is in the name: Poulton – a settlement by a pond or pool. With no sea defences as such, Poulton and its neighbours had to make the most of the landscape, setting themselves on hills or behind higher ground, seeking shelter from storm and flood.

Caught between the sea and storms on one side and the flood plain of the Lune estuary on the other, there must have been many past inundations which have gone unrecorded.

From the 1850s onwards as Morecambe began to be established, there are regular reports of damage to new sea walls, wind damage and flooding (some as far inland as what is now the Shrimp Roundabout.

Many people still remember the storm of 1977 with gales of up to 92 mph and widespread flooding as the central promenade was breached. The most notable casualty was the West End Pier. This had suffered various mishaps over the years but finally fell victim to the storm, apparently because it had been fixed too rigidly to the promenade – with a bit more flexibility it might have survived. The morning after, the beach was alive with scavengers, many searching for pennies lost overboard from the slot machines.

Another notable storm took place on Mothering Sunday in 1907. A spring tide, south westerly gale and the Lune in flood after a month’s rainfall all combined to cause a breach in the West End promenade and widespread flooding inland. Around the Stone Jetty stone blocks were thrown about by the waves and the workshops of Wards Shipbreakers were damaged. The Ben-my-Chree, a paddle steamer with the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company awaiting scrapping, broke its moorings and had to be scuppered to stop it being carried away.

Inland there was flooding around Charles Street and Out Moss Lane resulting in the loss of livestock, as well as floods on White Lund, around Woodhill, Overton and Snatchems. Food and supplies had to be brought to stranded householders by boat.

Along Sandylands, front gardens were wrecked, and cellars and lower floors flooded. Furniture was to be seen floating down streets (a similar sight was reported in Parliament Street in 1977).

Sandylands Promenade was again wrecked by a storm at the very end of 1925. Its repair and, more importantly, its repair bill, led to the amalgamation of Morecambe and Heysham in 1928.