Bygone Burnley: Queen's Park, with historian Roger Frost MBE

Burnley Express

Bygone Burnley: Queen's Park, with historian Roger Frost MBE, 7-7-25

Transcript

00:00We're in Queen's Park in Burnley today, and Queen's Park is Burnley's oldest park.

00:07But that in itself has a bit of a history.

00:10The borough was founded in 1861, and it's clear right from the very beginning

00:16that the councillors and aldermen were not interested in building parks,

00:22which went against what was going on in the country at the time.

00:25There was a mad rush to build parks from about 1843 onwards.

00:32In Birkenhead, the borough council there had established the country's first public park.

00:40And other authorities, mainly the cities and larger towns, they wanted their own parks,

00:47and there was a sort of rush like there was to build canals when they were in demand, or the railways.

00:55There was a similar one about parks, but Burnley said no.

00:58What Burnley did was construct, in each ward, a recreation ground,

01:04which was more than a recreation ground.

01:06It was designed for children, adults, elderly.

01:10They each had their own facilities in them.

01:12They were much smaller than parks.

01:15This one is 28 acres, and they had few facilities.

01:23But when this was constructed, the man who gave the land, Sir John Thursby,

01:30wanted it to be a proper public park.

01:33In fact, he denigrated what Burnley had done before,

01:38and made these little pleasure grounds all over the town.

01:44And so, but this is Burnley's first park,

01:48and we've come on a really sunny day,

01:51and the park is looking splendid at the moment.

01:55One of the innovations in Queen's Park

01:57was that there should be a sensory garden,

02:02and we're left with just one bed of plants

02:06that were very good for people who were blind.

02:11They could go up to them, feel them.

02:13I've just been looking at some mint,

02:15and then put the mint to their noses and smell them.

02:19And there was a whole arrangement of them

02:24on all three sides,

02:27behind what was the little park cafe,

02:31which has been painted on this side.

02:34I don't think I've seen it open for a while.

02:38So, people were encouraged to come here.

02:41It's nice and smooth,

02:43so some of them who were disabled also

02:46would be brought here.

02:47And they would feel and touch

02:51and smell the flowers and plants that were here.

02:55Now, Queen's Park was designed to have

02:57a number of sporting facilities.

03:01And we're standing at the Bowling Green now,

03:03which was originally included in the park.

03:08But there were tennis courts,

03:10and just opposite where we are now,

03:13there was a pitch and putt course.

03:15I remember being very bad at pitch and cut putt.

03:20But there were also two gymnasiums in the park.

03:25Now, they were called gymnasiums in Victorian times,

03:29but in actual fact, what they were,

03:32were sort of pleasure grounds.

03:37One was for boys, and the other was for girls.

03:40And they consisted of some of the normal things

03:43that you'd find in the park, like swings.

03:45But the boys had had equipment

03:48that you'd normally find in gymnasia.

03:51Things like horse,

03:53I can't remember what they call them.

03:56Don't you call them?

03:57But where you vault over them.

04:00Should I say that?

04:00I'll say that again.

04:01A lot of the things the boys had

04:04were vaults that you could be jumped over.

04:08So they'd run for some distance,

04:11and then using their hand,

04:12they'd leap over them.

04:14Rather like you see in the Olympic Games,

04:16that was undertaken on a site above the trees there.

04:20So I think this park, right from the very beginning,

04:23had activities.

04:26Bowling, tennis.

04:28Pitch and put was a little bit later.

04:30But right from the beginning,

04:33they had two gymnasiums,

04:34and it was very Victorian,

04:37because the designer of the park

04:39made it absolutely clear

04:41that one was for boys,

04:43and the other one was for girls.

04:45And the two of them shouldn't meet.

04:47At least they shouldn't meet in Queen's Park.

04:50Behind me is a line of trees

04:54that runs through the centre of the parking,

04:57sort of cuts the parking too.

04:59But they weren't planted just to look attractive.

05:02There was very much a reason for them,

05:05because three Burnley collieries

05:08were linked by a Ginny Track railway

05:11that carried coal from Rooley

05:14and the B-hole mine near Turfmoor

05:18through the park

05:19to Bank Hall colliery,

05:22where it was put in canal barges

05:24for dispatch and use in industry

05:28and in people's homes

05:30all over East Lancashire.

05:32And the Ginny Track railway

05:34was only a narrow-gauge railway.

05:36It was the kind of railway

05:39that didn't have locomotives attached

05:44to the trains.

05:46It had a big steam engine

05:49on the ridge in Birmingham,

05:52or just below the ridge.

05:53And this drove the Ginny Track to Rooley,

05:59the one to B-hole at Turfmoor,

06:03then this one, which we are on here now,

06:07to Bank Hall colliery.

06:08And it was a very big system.

06:13It was a dangerous system, too.

06:15And children were often dared

06:18that they would jump on and then jump off

06:20as the vehicle went past.

06:23But Burnley had lots of Ginny Track railways,

06:26and this was just the most prominent one.

06:29And recently, some work in the park

06:32revealed part of the Ginny Track.

06:35It's since been covered over.

06:37And it was a major feature.

06:41And for a few years after the opening of the park,

06:43you could see the Ginny Track.

06:45So just behind Dominic,

06:50who was taking the pictures,

06:52there was a section of the park

06:54which was covered over,

06:55tumbled over,

06:57so you couldn't see the Ginny Track.

06:59But it was still there.

07:01But on the original features,

07:02you can see behind me now,

07:04this is the grandstand,

07:06which is really a glorified bandstand.

07:10Bank Hall had its own brass band.

07:13And throughout the summer months,

07:15in the early years,

07:16the band played regularly,

07:20I mean, every weekend in the park,

07:23brass bands were very popular at the time.

07:28Just one little feature of the park,

07:30if you look at the actual roof of the bandstand,

07:34notice the crown.

07:36Well, I've always felt,

07:37and I'm not sure about this,

07:39but that is the imperial crown.

07:42And just before Queen's Park opened to the public,

07:46the Queen became the Empress of India.

07:50So that looks to me to be a model of the imperial crown.

07:56There are numbers of different crowns,

07:59but that one looks like it's modelled on the imperial crown,

08:05which was very significant at that time,

08:08that the Queen became the Empress of India.

08:11We're in front of the Bowling Green pavilion here,

08:18which incidentally has been restored beautifully

08:20over the last year or so.

08:23So Burnley Council is trying to keep on top of all the repairs.

08:28But one thing that has happened to the park over the years

08:32is that it's now divided in two.

08:35There are two unequal proportions

08:37because what was Belvedere Road

08:40was extended into Queen Victoria Road.

08:44And to do that,

08:46we had to chop a little bit of the park off,

08:48which is behind me.

08:51Now, that was greatly disputed in the past,

08:56but it was constructed.

08:58It was done in the 1920s.

09:00The debate took place in 1924

09:04and the only way to extend Belvedere Road

09:08and make Queen Victoria Road into one road

09:12was to chop a little bit off.

09:15And I always think that's a great pity

09:17that the integrity of the park was spoilt in some way.

09:23But as you've seen,

09:25it's still a splendid park

09:27and one Burnley can be very proud of.

09:30Arkham's Jeans

09:32Yaman

09:32Laxha

09:33The

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