- 03/06/2025
Bygone Burnley: The Weavers' Triangle, with historian Roger Frost MBE 9-5-25
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00:00Today we're in the Weaver's Triangle in Burnley. It is a very historic area and it
00:07consists of a number of buildings while the most important of which is behind me
00:13now. As you can see it's called the Inn on the Wharf but originally it was
00:19Burnley's Canal Warehouse which opened in 1801. As you can see it's a
00:25magnificent building it's been stone cleaned and it's a good pub but it's in
00:31this beautiful 18th century environment this now a car park but this was part of
00:40the operation site of the warehouse so we're going to look at the warehouse at
00:47the other side and we'll explain some of the features. Here behind me we have the
00:55stables and of course in the early days of canals the barges the commercial
01:01barges that move goods all over the country were hauled by horses we'll look
01:08at that in a few moments but behind me as I say is the second stables there was an
01:16earlier stables and these were built in the 1870s and we used until horses were
01:24replaced by steam barges and after that diesel barges. Now we're in the toll
01:32house visitor center now and we're in probably our most well-known room there is
01:40in it as you can see an exhibition of Burnley Fair and what has been recreated by Bill
01:48Pierce before he died was a recreation of Burnley Fair as it was in 1906. It took place on
01:58Pocker Lane where the police station is down and we've got one, two, three, four of the things that were at the fair, there used to be a fifth which is there which we're going to get repaired and we'll put that back later on.
02:15But Bill spent an age building this from hand by hand and he gave it to us just before he died and we've kept it here. Children love it and it is completely accurate in that the background with the chimneys, roof chimneys and houses behind,
02:41it are as Parker Lane was in 1906. It did a lot of work on it and we're very proud of this and the people like it immensely.
02:54In the room there is this little exhibition about one of Burnley's most famous men. If you go into Burnley Centre and in town centres throughout Lancashire you will come across a business called Altham's Tours.
03:12Now that company was started by Abram Altham who was a Burnley man in the 1870s and he started a business as a tea merchant. He was probably the first person to put tea in packets. When you bought tea in the past you bought it loose and they put it in a packet.
03:34But he was one of the first if not the first to do that. He was a very successful businessman. He was only in his 40s when he died and by that time he had become the country's biggest grocer.
03:51In other words you could say the Tesco of his day. He had shops and stalls in high streets and markets all over Lancashire, Lincolnshire, parts of the Yorkshire Dales, well throughout Yorkshire actually and he was a successful businessman.
04:12But he's famous now still as the originator of Altham's Tours.
04:19We'll show you a poster which is part of this exhibition which tells us that the last trip of the season, this is the 23rd of August 1880, Abram Altham will run a return day excursion to Morecambe in August 1880.
04:39Now it costs three shillings from Burnley or Rose Grove or Paddyham or Simonston and Great Harwood to go to Morecambe, three shillings there and back.
04:54And when you got there you got various cheaper options. For example, you could go into the Winter Gardens which is still standing in Morecambe and the aquarium was there for threepence but the usual charge was sixpence.
05:13So he was a businessman who understood that people lacked a bargain and he was very successful as I said.
05:22And you might like to know that he built the Oaks Hotel in Readley as his house but very unfortunately he died only in his forties in 1885 I think it was and of course he didn't live to enjoy the success.
05:41He would have been Burnley's mayor 18 months after he died.
05:48Right, we're in one of the exhibition rooms at the Visitor Centre now and we have in the last year redecorated in this building and above here the roof was in a poor condition so that's being restored.
06:03But we've got a little exhibition about the weavers triangle in here now. It's all about Victoria Mill which was a spinning mill built in 1855. It later on got the weaving department as well.
06:18It was built it was built it was built by the Massey family the brewers who were also involved in textiles and other industries but as the cotton industry declined other firms moved in.
06:33When I went in the first time when I went in the first time many years ago companies that deal in the disposal of rubbish household waste waste from the commercial sector had stuffed the building floor to ceiling in all four floors with rubbish.
06:54There were tyres, paper, all sorts of stuff. However, the UTC, the University Technical College, decided on that that would be the building that it would occupy.
07:10Now the UTC didn't work but very fortunately the University of Central Lancashire which has just renamed itself the University of Lancashire took the building and they have improved it and of course other buildings in the town have done the same and now it's providing facilities for Burnley's future.
07:37You might not realise this but Burnley twice in its history has turned universities down. Unbelievable today but now in the 21st century we have our own university or we are part of the University of Lancashire.
07:56Hopefully there will be thousands of students here and they'll be adding to the town's local economy.
08:04The University Centre is in what was the Wharf Masters house and we are now in one of the bedrooms at the Wharf Masters residence and the Friends of the Weaver's Triangle have converted it into a school room.
08:20All these are authentic desks. We haven't got as many as there might have been in lots of Victorian classrooms but everything else is completely authentic. The colours we've used, the way it's been decorated.
08:39There are a few features that we've not been able to actually have like for example light switches here are plastic but they would have been made of brass in those days.
08:51But on the desks we've got the kind of tablets that I used when I was at school except when I was at Ivy Street these are chalk that you put on you just rub them out saved in the cost of paper.
09:10But the ones that I used were like this. You put them onto your desk flat and you had a little salt cell full of sand. You had a pencil and you wrote the letters or numbers and then you shook it like that and they disappeared.
09:28Now I don't think kids could handle that today. In fact it could cause all sorts of problems when I was at school.
09:36And another thing I remember, each desk had an inkwell. And behind the window over there, there is a set of inkwells.
09:47And a child in the class would be the ink monitor. And every day, really every day you'd put the ink in. At the end of the day you'd pour the ink out and then the children used them in their desks.
10:01So, we're quite proud of this. On the wall over here, there's some of the gowns that the children wore, boys and girls, which we'll show you later on.
10:11We're on the canal bank now. We're near the Weaver's Triangle. But what we're going to point out are a few features that you can see when you come to the area, which we hope you will.
10:25And behind me is a feature of people often asking what it is. The proper name is a horse run. In the old days, when horses pulled barges, there was only one towpath.
10:39You've got horses going in both directions. Sometimes a horse would fall into the canal. These horses were way a tonne or thereabout.
10:51So it was very difficult to get them out of the water. But incidentally, horses weren't afraid of the water.
10:58And also, at this point, the canal is only about three foot deep, or was then. It's about two foot six deep now.
11:08But the horses would be walked along the canal, brought here and on the old side of it, you can see a slanting bit. That is the ramp.
11:18They were then hauled up, and the horse was then retied to the barge and continued on its journey.
11:26As we said, we're going to show you a few features along the canal. And this one is interesting here.
11:31Because although it's had industrial and commercial use, it was a computer company until recently, it's now been converted into small flats.
11:44But it was Tate, of Tate and Lyles sugar warehouse, going back many years.
11:51Now this is the Manchester Road Bridge. Part of it is original, but it's been extended over the years.
11:59But it does show a few features, which you might not otherwise spot. To my left here, there is the remains of an important feature.
12:13Planks were stored. Thick wooden planks were stored here. I remember them, because they were still in place when I was a boy.
12:21And what the point of them was, was that you took the planks out, sunk them into the canal, and this was in the war years.
12:31There was a big worry that if the canal was hit by German bombers, it would flood the whole time centre.
12:38Because there's no control of the water in Burnley, like there is in Barrow Ford or Blackburn, for example.
12:47But between the two, you can't stop the flow of water, except by temporary planks in the canal.
12:56And that is what took place here. You can see under the bridges, the slots that they were put into.
13:04Now behind me is the original toll house. There were a number of toll houses on the canal, not only in this part of the canal,
13:14but along the length of the canal. And when a barge was going through, you had to pay a toll at these places.
13:24And this was one of them. And we've got a picture of barges in this part of the canal here, taken from the upper windows,
13:35which will be included in the program. Up there, there was an office. And whenever a barge from the Blackburn End, which is ahead of me,
13:46came into this area, the bargee had to leap out of his barge and ring a bell. The bell's gone.
13:54But the bell was a couple of yards, maybe 40 yards from where we are now. He'd ring the bell, wake up the toll housekeeper.
14:06He'd come down and he'd pay the toll.
14:09But as you say, we're looking at a few features. And when people visit and we show them around the canal,
14:15and we're very lucky to have all this remaining, this little feature here, people always say, what is that?
14:23But you've got to imagine you, in the days when horses were pulling these big barges, and they were big barges.
14:32They weren't the little barges that we see today. They carried 45 tonnes of coal, these barges.
14:39And what happened was, if the horse needed stabling, and let's imagine the barges coming from this direction,
14:46the tow rope would be put round that little wheel, it would turn, and the horse would be led off in this direction,
14:55to the stables, which we saw earlier on, those red brick stables.
14:59So, here, on the wall, you can see the marks created by the tow ropes, the quite deep incisions in the stonework,
15:12where the ropes on the pulling barges rubbed against the stone, and that is the consequence.
15:22Now, our last shots are going to be of the Canal Side Warehouse.
15:28It is a typical building put up in the late 18th century, and you find them all over the country.
15:35But here in Burnley, it is not only complete, but it has got two additions.
15:41You can see in the background the parts that have got canopies, roofs on.
15:46They were added up at the time the railways came, and, of course, right from the beginning, the railway companies protected the goods that they moved,
15:56by putting roofs over the lines where the goods were stored.
16:02And here, the Canal Company is done just the same.
16:05The original warehouse is the Nearside Warehouse, and that opened in 1800 to 1801, and all of that is intact.
16:17Inside is now a pub, and a venue for all sorts of social events.
16:22So, in the Weaver's Triangle area today, we are still providing a service, not only for people of Burnley,
16:30but for canal lovers, people who have barges, people who go on holiday in a canal boat.
16:38They often come here and marvel at what has survived.
16:43It's completely intact.
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