Picture the Past
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Produced by Wigan Heritage Service Issue No. 64 August-November 2013 £2 Picture the Past Visit the Museum of WiganLife HERITAGE SERVICE Contents Letter from the 2-3 Heritage Service Editorial Team 4-5 The Duo-decimal Society Welcome to PAST Forward Issue 64. This issue brings readers the usual mix of family and local history articles, as ever written 6-7 Edward Hall by local researchers with an interest in the Borough’s history. 8-9 We are always keen to include articles by new writers and with this in mind are pleased to be Archives News able to promote the Wigan Borough Environment and Heritage Network 2013 Local History Essay Writing Competition – see page nine for more information. History is everywhere, no 10-11 A German Pork matter where you live or work around the Borough and articles in PAST Forward take many Butcher in Wigan different forms. We all have a history, whether a first day at work, a famous relative or the old house you pass everyday on your way to the shops, so if you’re passionate about local history 12 Leigh and Wigan and preserving it…Get Writing! Local Studies Our history is certainly not just for adults, so PAST Forward is running a competition for children and asking them to produce a work of art based on our local history – you can find 14-15 Coccium and more details on pages 18-19; or have a look at the front cover if you’re in need of inspiration! its origins Readers may well have noticed that we have increased the cover price of PAST Forward to £2 per issue. We have made this change in order to maintain the high quality design and print 16-17 Health, Sanitation of the publication at a time when our costs in producing the magazine are increasing. We very much hope that as readers you will continue to support PAST Forward and enjoy reading it as and the Government much as ever. Loan 1891 Excitingly, we are now able to offer a new digital subscription to the magazine, perfect for 18 Wiganers scattered overseas. The cost of this new subcription is £6 per year with none of the Kids Competition postage costs of the paper version and will be emailed straight to your inbox three times a year. 20-21 Signs of a Vanished Past • Articles must be received by the Information for copy date if inclusion in the next issue is desired 22-23 My First Day at Work Contributors Submission Guidelines 24-25 Captain We always welcome articles and Edwin Kerfoot letters for publication from both • Electronic submissions are new and existing contributors. preferred, although handwritten ones will be accepted 26-27 Pennington Flash If you would like to submit an article for PAST FORWARD , please • We prefer articles to have 28-29 The Glow Upon the note that: a maximum length of Heavens • Publication is at discretion of 1,000 words Editorial Team • Include photographs or images 30 Your Letters • The Editorial Team may edit where possible – these can be your submission returned if requested 31-33 Society News • Published and rejected • Include your name and address – 34-35 Events Calendar submissions will be disposed we will not pass on your details of, unless you request for them to anyone unless you have given to be returned us permission to do so FRONT COVER • Submissions may be held on file We aim to acknowledge receipt Illustration courtesy of Emma for publication in a future edition of all submissions. Brown for the “Picture the CONTACT DETAILS: [email protected] or The Editor at FORWARD , Past” children’s competition. PAST Museum of Wigan Life, Library Street, Wigan WN1 1NU. 2 HERITAGE SERVICE New Faces at the Museum of Wigan Life Pictured left to right: Lynda Jackson, Rita Musa and Joan Livesey. As we mentioned in the last issue, several familiar faces Rita Musa is joining us from the Library Service have now left the Museum and Archive, but we are reference team as our Local Studies Officer for Wigan, delighted to welcome three new members to the team. returning to work on the very collection where she began her career in Wigan. Having worked on the new Lynda Jackson is our new Community History Manager ‘Made In Wigan’ exhibition, Joan Livesey is moving over and is responsible for the management of the Museum of from the Archives to the Museum to work full time as Wigan Life. Lynda joins us from her post as Curatorial Exhibitions Officer. Manager at the Royal Armouries in Leeds, having previously worked at the Museum of Liverpool and the If you see them about at any of our venues, please feel People’s History Museum. free to say hello! PAST FORWARD Copy Deadline for Issue 65 Contributors please note the deadline for the ption Form receipt of material for publication is Subscri Monday, 28th October 2013. Past Forward Subscription Name Magazine subscription is £9 for three issues (incl. UK delivery). Address Payment by cheque (payable to WLCT), postal order or credit/debit card (telephone 01942 828128). Postcode For worldwide subscription prices and information, please contact us. Telephone No. Digital subscription (delivered by email, Email worldwide) is £6 per year. Payment options as above. Please state which issue you wish Signed Date your membership to begin at: K Please tick here if you would like to receive information regarding Wigan Heritage Service (Museum, Archives) activities and events.We do not pass your details to other organisations. Return to: The Museum of Wigan Life, Past Forward Subscription, Library Street, Wigan WN1 1NU 3 The Duo-decimal Leigh’s First Creative Society: Writing Group? BY YVONNE ECKERSLEY Putting the Duo-decimals notably Shakespeare, Marlowe dramatic (or not so) performances. in context and Jonson, whilst relaxing in Through the comment that the convivial atmosphere Co-duo Wynne, ‘went to sleep’ Leigh, around the turn of the facilitated by copious amounts during one reading, we get a hint twentieth century, had a thriving of food and drink. of the pressures some of the men amateur dramatics and literary were under. culture. For a considerable The Minutes There was much light-hearted section of the population, various banter and duos were not afraid to societies provided outlets for Each host was required to write mock themselves. Hence, Co-duo their intellectual and artistic minutes of ‘his’ meeting, and at (Alderman) Smith stated he was talents. the following meeting, read them due to, ‘spout at the town pump’. aloud. This led to good natured Dr Jones was mocked frequently In 1901, Dr Wynne gathered competition as to who could write because of the ‘impossibility of twelve friends and associates and the most entertaining or humorous deciphering his hopelessly illegible forged them into the Duo- account. The Minutes, whilst hand-writing’ and conversely decimal Society. The Duo- idiosyncratic, had a distinct happily played the stooge. He decimals were a tight group pattern. They began conventionally joined the badinage surrounding drawn from Leigh’s wealthy, high enough, noting date, venue, play the necessity, and difficulty, of duo status and influential individuals. read and cast list, after which hosts in providing him with Within the group there were a much of the formality disappeared. suitable breeches so he could number of councillors, aldermen In the second part of the minutes attend their meetings! and mayors; eminent medical we find, among the humour, men, some with leadership roles valuable insights into individual There are ambiguous entries. at Leigh Infirmary; Leigh’s members, the group, its dynamics, The entry where Co-duo Unsworth Director of Education; Leigh attitudes and practices. ‘regaled the assembly’, with an Grammar School’s Head; local Interestingly, they reveal that a account of his duties as a Poor industrialists, solicitors and unifying ethos of the group Law Guardian is left to speak for bankers. These men, socially as seemed to be a shared contempt itself. He reported how that night well as professionally, enjoyed for certain social expectations, when he had attended ‘for his overlapping spheres of interest expectations they were, annual visit to qualify him for the and some, the ‘Penningtonians’, paradoxically, obliged to conform post… he had been entrapped by were close neighbours. to in their public lives. a deputation of the unemployed but with his usual idle urbanity he The Duo-decimals met monthly Within their capabilities the co- had succeeded in escaping’. Duo during the winter in each other’s duos rose to the challenge of Ward used the minutes to criticise homes. Meetings were designed entertaining. Some hijacked the group’s other-worldness. He to indulge their thespian and common fictional themes. Within wrote, ‘We live aloft, in realms of literary interests whilst being an their ‘stories’, members were the pure delight, calm, serene, opportunity to enjoy good protagonists, ‘characters’ contemplating, philosophising, company. They performed performing deeds of ‘derring do’. discussing literary themes, wisdom readings from sixteenth and Other members based their writing seeking, studying’. They were ‘so seventeenth century playwrights, on ‘reviews’ of their peers’ detached…from the common 4 happenings of our village life’, that French. One has to imagine the Woodlands Meeting, Menu Card they failed to acknowledge the Minute taker, relating these ‘bloodshed at Hall House’, during speeches back at the next a coal strike. meeting. It is clear the Minutes were written However, not everything was with care by educated men. Many treated frivolously. Compassion literary devices used can be was expressed when Co-duo identified as component parts of a Ward’s infant son died, then later, genre, collectively known as ‘The when another son was ‘Killed in Comedy of Manners’, a style Action’ in France.