Who will restore these plaques?
This is an article taken from a local newspaper. It shows Mr Bill Crossley, a technician in Preston Polytechnic's building department, pictured with one of the stone plaques from the old Town Hall, which were stored at the former "Junior Tech" in Corporation Street for 20 years.
Who will restore these plaques?
SEVERAL finely sculpted stone plaques which, when first revealed to the people of Preston 116 years ago evoked unprecedented excitement and admiration, now lie forlorn at a Preston college.
My story (May 3) of the opening of Preston's magnificent Victorian Gothic Town Hall in 1867, its virtual destruction by fire in 1947, and its final disappearance in 1962, brought a telephone call from Mr Bill Crossley, a technician in the building department of Preston Polytechnic.
In my story I'd mentioned the fine stonework on the richly ornamented exterior of the Town Hall, including & series of plaques illustrating the industries of the town throughout the ages.
"The plaques are all down here," he told me, "lying in our yard".
I met Mr Crossley at the Poly's building department housed in the old "Junior Tech" in Corporation Street and saw these old, heavy, three-foot diameter plaques, with figures so deeply cut as to be almost three-dimensional.
They had, it seemed, been there since about 1962 when the old Town Hall was finally demolished. The plan then. I believe, was to incorporate some if not all of the plaques into the fabric of the new Polytechnic.
Time and, I assume, the difficulty in finding safe storage space for such weighty objects (where space is always eagerly snapped up for on-going student projects) has caused considerable damage to the plaques but some are not beyond recall and could possibly be restored.
Lying alongside the "industrial" plaques were several depicting the coats of arms of local families and one with the Preston coat of arms. These appeared to be in good condition.
Mr Crossley agreed that these mementos of a day proclaimed at the time "ever memorable in the annals of Preston", should be pre served and, ideally, brought to public view again.
We have already in the town centre, in front of the Harris Library and not far from their original site, a row of lamps which once stood in front of the old Town Hall.
These were stored for many years at the Council depot in Argyle Road and it was by a fortunate chance one could say almost by "accident" that these lamps were eventually brought back to where they really belonged.
Some years ago Coun Dennis Kehoe, then chairman of the Leisure Committee, was looking round the depot when he spotted the elegantly decorated lamps.
Coun Kehoe became Mayor in 1979-80, the town's Octocentenary year. He recalled seeing the lamps and initiated moves to have them re stored and set up in the town centre.
The National Federation of Building Trades Employers (of which he is a member) offered to carry out the work. In the event. Council work men undertook the work but the NFBTE made a substantial financial contribution.
Perhaps the sculptors and stonemasons equivalent of the NFBTE might be prevailed upon to make a similar gesture with regard to the plaques?
From 1867 my thoughts turned briefly to a later period as Mr Crossley, on learning I was at the old Junior Tech in the years just be fore World War II. took me round the once familiar corridors.
Rooms have been altered, new floors laid, but the old staircase with its rail highly polished by many a youthful bottom (and woe betide if you were caught by the stern custodian Mr Trinder!) is still there, as is the old common room, the scene of regular lunchtime bouts of shove-half-penny.
I recalled my old school mates, Slater, Jackson, Mounsey, Bonner, Benn, Bilton, Doan, and teachers Mr George Clucas, Mr "Alfie' Woods, gym master Mr Kettle (very handy with the admonitory "slipper") and Mr "Jock" Hulse.
On leaving, down the steps overlooking Corporation Street, memories came flooding back of the times sadly frequent when I would arrive a few minutes late. There was no sneaking in unobserved for Mr Naylor, the principal, made a point of standing by his strategically-placed office window taking note of all of fenders and it wasn't long, in fear and trembling, before we were summoned to the presence!
Happy days, though, and it wasn't long before we began to regard them with even greater affection as, almost overnight it seemed, we changed our blazers for a much different kind of uniform.
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| Who Will Restore These Plaques? Original Newspaper Article |
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Who will restore these plaques, indeed?
I have been intrigued by these plaques, since I first learned of the demise of Preston's third Town Hall and saw photographs of them being removed during the demolition. These photographs were in the Preston Digital Archive on Flickr.
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| Preston Town Hall Stone Plaques Seen During Demolition in May 1962 |
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| Preston Town Hall Stone Plaques Seen During Demolition in May 1962 |
As per other posts, I have wandered down to Howick on the banks of the River Ribble, along the Ribble Way, to where the fragments of Sir George Gilbert Scott's wonderful former Town Hall were dumped unceremoniously to act as rubble within flood defences. I was less confident that I would ever see the reputedly salvaged parts. There didn't seem to be any information available. I noticed that the people who I would normally rely on for 'intelligence' were asking questions to each other in the comments on various Flickr posts. That didn't give me much hope of finding anything more. Like the stonework remains at Cold Bath Street, or the Preston Henge, etc. the answers seemed to have been lost in the past.
However, I was recently thrown a lead. A post about removing artefacts from Preston Town Hall prior to demolition, with a photograph from May 4th 1962, solicited a comment about the plaques. The post was of a photograph from the Preston Digital Archive in the Preserving Preston’s Heritage group. Thanks to Mndy Moo, I learned that at least some of them, if not all of them, had ended up being part of the amphitheatre behind Preston's College.
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| Preston Town Hall Stone Plaques by Mndy Moo |
Whilst I knew that the amphitheatre would be secured and I wouldn't be able to access it, as it's on private property, I had a look at maps, and reckoned that I could perhaps get close enough to look from the path that runs along Savick Brook. By pure coincidence, my visit was also on 4th May.
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| Former Preston Town Hall Stone Plaque at Preston's College Amphitheatre |
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| Former Preston Town Hall Stone Plaque at Preston's College Amphitheatre |
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| Former Preston Town Hall Stone Plaque at Preston's College Amphitheatre |
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| Former Preston Town Hall Stone Plaque at Preston's College Amphitheatre |
It was good that they were saved. They don't seem to have stood the test of time though. It's hard to be certain, but I would have thought they would have weathered better over this length of time if they were still on a building.
From the ones that I was able to photograph, I have been able to match only two of them to the ones pictured during the 1962 demolition. This scene appears to depict a part of the weaving process. I think that the woman is loading bobbins onto a loom. Since the time that the plaques were removed, all of the figure have lost their heads and much of the detail has been eroded away.
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| Preston Town Hall Stone Plaques During Demolition - Detail 1 |
Another one that I could match up appears to be another depicting a scene of a woman engaged in weaving. The rollers from the machinery are still there, but again much of the detail has been worn away. Again, the woman has been decapitated.
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| Preston Town Hall Stone Plaques During Demolition - Detail 1 |
I don't know how many are at the college and I also don't know how many were on the original building. They were positioned within the arches above the windows on the first floor. There aren't any close-up photographs that show them in place. It's possible that there were 5 on the north face of the building against the Flag Market and there were more on the Cheapside elevation.
These photographs show the Former Town Hall north elevation looking from the Flag Market. I have indicated where the plagues would have been on the second photo.
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| Sir George Gilbert Scott's Preston Town Hall |
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| Preston Town Hall showing some of the Plaque Positions |
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Further Reading and Sources of Information
Who will restore these plaques?
Mr Bill Crossley, a technician in Preston Polytechnic's building department, is pictured with one of the stone plaques from the old Town Hall, which have been stored at the former "Junior Tech" in Corporation Street for the past 20 years.
From Middle Ford Miss' Flickr photostream
https://www.flickr.com/photos/heathercrook/11108851356/
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Demolition of Preston Town Hall. May 4, 1962
Recovering artefacts. These round stone carvings representing industry and agriculture were located above the windows that faced Cheapside. From the Preston Digital Archive.
Image courtesy and copyright of The Lancashire Evening Post © www.lep.co.uk
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rpsmithbarney/10387420393/
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Removing artifacts from Preston Town Hall prior to demolition. May 4, 1962
These round stone carvings representing industry and agriculture were located above the windows that faced Cheapside. From the Preston Digital Archive.
Image courtesy and copyright of The Lancashire Evening Post © www.lep.co.uk
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rpsmithbarney/10861771376/
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Blog Preston - Preston Past: Sir George Gilbert Scott’s Preston Town Hall
Posted on 7th March, 2012 in - History, Nostalgia, Photos | Author - Paul D. Swarbrick
https://www.blogpreston.co.uk/2012/03/preston-past-sir-george-gilbert-scotts-preston-town-hall/
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