Clogger in Rochdale

[Geoff-E]

I, too, remember the clatter of the millworkers' clogs on the pavement as they passed our house in the early mornings.

There was a street in Whitehaven that was paved with wooden setts so that the nobs weren't disturbed by the miners on their way to work.

[Viktoria]

Not quite the same thing but on Piccadilly M/C there were in former times some good hotels and there were so many horse drawn carts laden with beams of cloth from the big mills in Ancoats which passed on their way to S&J.Watts lovely warehouse on Portland St.
The noise from the iron rimmed  cart  wheels was disturbing , they would be delivering early morning and through the day so oak setts -rather like outdoor parquet- was laid along the stretch
facing Piccadilly gardens. Perhaps as that was the site of the old Manchester Infirmary that  had something to do with it too.
I can remember them as late as the 1950`s, tram lines ran through them .
                                                                 Viktoria.

[andrewalston]

I've actually worn clogs (clugs!  rubber soled boots never lasted five minutes,) when working in an iron-foundry, are they still made one wonders?

Skoosh.

Yes they are. There are a few craftsmen making them. One I know is Walkley's at Mytholmroyd, who make them for everything from safety wear to dancing.

[Andrew Tarr]

What I can`t understand is why the address is:- Rochdale, Lancaster. Manchester.
Rochdale was a town in its own right and quite a few miles from Manchester.
As is Lancaster but many more miles away, so perhaps it was an error and ought to have been Lancashire, even so it is all in the wrong order.

I think you must read it as (county of) Lancaster, not a reference to that town.

[Skoosh]

I got used to them Andrew, they had a leather apron which prevented a splash of molten iron getting in & a quick release pin to get them off if any did. This operation was usually accompanied by a Highland jig & bad language! 

Skoosh. 

[KGD1956]

Hi,

Yesterday I was listening to David Olusoga presenting the BBC programme Black and British and he reveals a plaque commemorating the millworkers of Rochdale supporting the anti-slave trade.  I was born in Rochdale and grew up there until I left home in 1975 and my father Harold Davies worked at Fletcher Bolton until he died in 1977. 

Because of the connection between my father and Fletcher Bolton I became curious about whether Fletcher Bolton was around at the time of the building of "The Famine Road" which was a public works initiative to provide work for the millworkers who were undergoing huge hardship due to the lack of cotton coming into the mills because of the American Civil war.

I "googled" Fletcher Bolton and it came up with your discussion about Fletcher Bolton the clogger. I had thought it was a company partnership between two guys "Fletcher" and "Bolton" but I was very surprised to learn of a connection to Warrington.  My mother and father had moved to Rochdale from Warrington after the Second World War, my father having previously worked at a Timber Merchants in Warrington called "R A Naylor" before the war.

I am just intrigued and want to learn more about this connection between Fletcher, Bolton, Timber, Naylor, Warrington and Rochdale....