This pencil graffiti has lasted surprisingly well considering it is supposedly 70 years old…… Being a regular visitor to both derelict and active industrial sites, I’ve walked across all kinds of surfaces, but never a rubberised one. The site roads on the southern section were coated with a rubber like asphalt designed to stop…
Category: Industrial Landscape
#420 – Rhydymwyn Valley Works, aka The Mustard Gas Factory, Part 1
The landscape of Britain continues to be littered with the remains of past conflicts. From the Napoleonic era forts of the channel, through to the likes of Chatham dockyard and old ordnance factories, pill boxes and ammunition dumps – you don’t have to look that hard to find something. I’d previously visited the remains of…
#419 – Leigh Spinners
Sometimes, you just see a photograph materialise in front of your eye – the light meets the composition and you are in just the right place at the right time. You stop and just bring your camera to your eye and thankfully you have just the right lens on your camera (I tend to use…
#416 – Blackburn Gas Holder
A few years ago I spent some time living in Blackburn, and my house was a mile or so away from this huge gas holder. To be honest I never really noticed it. I mean, I knew it was there, but it was just part of the local landscape. I’ve no particular interest in gas…
#413 – Pullman Car Works
This gigantic place was the centre of the Pullman Palace Car empire. Quite literally – the Pullman company built an entire town round the works, and called it Pullman. The town survives today, as does the Pullman brand but very little of the factory does. Google Streetview shows that just the central tower section (and…
#412 – Library of Congress Images – Ferris Ships, Western Marine & Salvage and the Ghost Fleet of Mallows Bay
One of the problems with the LoC archive is the erratic key wording and classification. Some pictures are done well, some poorly, some not at all. So it can be pot luck what a search comes back with, and when you are looking for something else a picture may turn up by chance that is…
#408 – Library of Congress Images – Cramp’s Shipyard
I’ve posted a few pictures of American naval ships and naval yards over the last year or so, so here’s a slightly different perspective on the subject. William Cramps shipbuilding yard in Philadelphia was a long established, privately owned shipbuilders that built ships for three major conflicts fought by American forces (the Civil War, World…
#405 – Beyer Peacock’s Gorton Foundry
The Gorton Foundry in 1947, courtesy of Britain From Above Following on from my post on Mather and Platt’s foundry, the (only?) other evidence of East Manchester’s engineering past are the boiler shops of Beyer Peacock’s Gorton Foundry. Like Mathers, the majority of the site has been demolished, but maybe the most significant part…
#404 – Mather and Platt’s Park Engineering Works
I’ve noted on this blog before that Manchester, the so-called first industrial city, now describes itself as a post-industrial city. It’s an accurate assessment as it’s hard to find anything of any consequence that is made in Manchester these days, beyond Cornflakes and Coronation Street. The area to the east of the city was, at…
#403 – Pen-yr-Orsedd Quarry Part 3
Winding engine (I think) in one of the sheds. Just a few more random ones from the visit. It was good to have some expert accompaniment on the visit, so thanks again to Iain Robinson for spending a good part of the day with me as he’s very knowledgeable on the local quarry industry and…
Mechanical Landscapes 