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Some careful placement of the old gatepost was required to get it in the frame with the stone water trough and an ex Grand Central HST as it crosses Harringworth viaduct. Hard to believe there are only three sets of these given the appearance on seemingly the majority of the HST services.
This Whitethroat was in full song perched on the fence post,, must have been happy to feel the sun on its back
The two giant gateposts are all that remain of the Empire Hotel, once situated in the spa town of Buxton in Derbyshire, England.
A brief history,
Built between 1887 and 1889 to directly rival the nearby Palace Hotel, the Empire Hotel was demolished in 1969. Rarely used as a hotel whilst it stood, The Empire was commandeered for military purposes during the First World War as the Canadian Discharge Depot, which had been previously located in Shoreham and then Bath. It had around 1,000 troops receiving medical attention at any one time.
Craftsmanship in gritstone is evident on these gateposts and their acorn-like toppings. Seen at All Saints Church in Youlgreave.
Age and rust no doubt played its part in this field gate’s collapse but the resident horse using it as a scratching post probably helped as well.
Frost on the grasses around old gateposts at Scout Dyke. Before the building of the reservoir, Scout Dyke was a stream surrounded by fields. In many places, remains of the old field walls can still be found.
Walking along the upper lawns of the Italian Gardens you will come across a shady little "secret" garden. It is flanked by two tall bluestone columns topped with finials which act as gateposts for a set of elegant Victorian wrought-iron gates. Elegantly carved with sweeping curls, they would not look out of place in a garden in England.
The Forest Glade Gardens are well established European inspired landscaped gardens of six hectares that are to be found on the Mount Macedon Road in the hill station town of Mount Macedon.
The Forest Glade Gardens are just shy of one hundred years old. The gardens were originally two adjoining properties that comprised orchards and lush grazing paddocks. In 1941 local family the Newtons purchased and extended the property and set about creating one of Mount Macedon's most stunning gardens.
In 1971 the Forest Glade Gardens were acquired by Melbourne property developer Mr. Cyril Stokes who together with his partner Trevor Neil Bell, developed the gardens even further. Cyril was a great collector of European antiques, and his love of European antiquity is reflected in the gardens, particularly in the many classical marble and bronze statues dotted about the grounds.
Unfortunately the Forest Glade Gardens were partly destroyed by the tragic Ash Wednesday bushfires of 1983. However, after many years of hard labour put in by Cyril and Trevor, The Forest Glade Gardens were reborn from the ashes. The gardens are built on a sloping block and consist of a range of terraces all of which offer wonderful vistas. A garden designed to give pleasure all year round, the Forest Glad Gardens contain several heritage listed trees and are made up of smaller themed gardens including; the Italian Garden, the Japanese Garden, the Daffodil Meadow, the Peony Walk, Hydrangea Hill, the Topiary Gardens, the Bluebell Meadow, the Fern Gully and the Laburnum Arch.
In 2011 the property was gifted to a registered charity - The Stokes Collection Limited - with the intention of keeping the Forest Glade Gardens maintained and open to the public.
The Mount Macedon township is located east of the Mount Macedon summit, which is approximately 60 km north-west of Melbourne.
The name of Mount Macedon is apparently derived from Philip II, who ruled Macedon between 359 and 336BC. The mountain was named by Thomas Mitchell, the New South Wales Surveyor General.
Settled in the 1850s by gold miners and timber cutters, the railway arrived at the Mount Macedon township in 1861, providing a vital connection to Melbourne, and sealing the town's future as a 'hill station' resort for wealthy Melburnians escaping the summer heat in the 1870s. With the land deforested, large blocks were sold and beautiful and extensive gardens were planted around the newly built homes. The rich soil and good rainfall also made the area suitable for large orchards and plant nurseries who could send fruit and flowers back to Melbourne. Newspaper owner, David Syme, built a house, "Rosenheim" in 1869. It was acquired in 1886 for Victorian Governors to use as a country retreat, making Mount Macedon an attractive destination for the well heeled of Melbourne society. A primary school was built in Mount Macedon in 1874, and as the decades progressed, hotels, guest houses, shops, a Presbyterian Church and Church of England were built. In 1983, Mount Macedon was devastated by the Ash Wednesday Bush Fires. A large portion of the town was raised, and a number of lives were lost. However, like a phoenix from the ashes, Mount Macedon has risen and rebuilt. Today it is still a popular holiday destination, particularly during spring time when the well established gardens flourish with flowers and in autumn when the exotic trees explode in a riot of reds and yellows.
Seen during a short visit to the Andalusian city of Sevilla: looking through the gateposts of the Teatro Lope de Vega.
On a Saturday morning in April 1957 a 30-year-old woman by the name of Sheila Cloney from the village of Fethard-on-Sea in County Wexford left home with her daughters, six-year-old Eileen and three-year-old Mary, bound for Northern Ireland.
Such was her anxiety to get away before one of the neighbours spotted her that she hit a gatepost as she tried to manoeuvre the heavy family car out of the entrance to the farm where she lived.
When her husband Seán returned from working in the fields, he called on Sheila’s parents and siblings to see if they knew where she was, before he alerted the Garda Síochana.
What led an ordinary woman from a quiet farming community in rural Wexford to flee home with two small children?
Sheila, the daughter of a well-liked farmer and cattle dealer and his wife, was a member of Fethard’s small Church of Ireland community.
In 1948 she was working in London as a domestic servant when a neighbour from Fethard – on his way back home from attending to the affairs of a deceased relative in Suffolk – called on her.
Seán Cloney, a Catholic farmer, had grown up less than a mile from Sheila. Seán and Sheila started going out together but because he was a Catholic and she was a Protestant their relationship caused difficulties in Fethard.
The local curate, Fr William Stafford, made known his displeasure at Seán for going out with a Protestant by banning him from the dramatic society in the Catholic parish hall.
Despite opposition at home, on 8 October 1949, Seán and Sheila were married in a registry office in London.
But two months later, a priest tracked them down to Bury St Edmunds and persuaded Sheila to get married in a Catholic church.
As stipulated by the Catholic Church’s Ne Temere decree, Sheila agreed to raise any children from the marriage as Catholics and signed a document to that effect.
It was this act which was cause such trouble later on. In 1950 Seán and Sheila returned home to Fethard. Eileen was born in 1951; Mary two years later.
The events leading up to Sheila’s decision to flee home began at the beginning of 1957 with the approach of Eileen’s sixth birthday. The Cloneys had not yet decided where Eileen would go to school. The couple had a broad understanding that the children would be raised in both religious traditions. Despite this, Sheila believed that her wish that they be partly raised as Protestants was being undermined.
For example, the nuns in the Catholic nursing home where Eileen and Mary were born had had them baptised immediately.
This removed the possibility of them also being baptised in the Church of Ireland, because, whereas the Church of Ireland did recognise baptisms carried out by a Catholic priest, the Catholic Church did not recognise Church of Ireland baptisms as valid.
During the spring of 1957, Catholic priests were regular visitors to the Cloney household, putting pressure on the couple to send Eileen to the local Catholic national school.
Finally, the parish priest, Fr Laurence Allen, pushed Sheila too far.
One day he landed in her kitchen and told her that Eileen was going to the Catholic national school and that there was nothing that she could do about it. Sheila had other ideas and on April 27, 1957 she fled across the border with the children.
Sheila’s decision to seek help in Northern Ireland was probably influenced in some small part by coverage of the Maura Lyons case, which many recall as the first time they heard Ian Paisley’s name.
It was associates of Paisley, who were also involved in the Lyons case, who were responsible for hiding Sheila and the children in Belfast and later smuggling them across the Irish Sea to Scotland.
Sean later followed his wife to Belfast to try, unsuccessfully, to recover his children through the courts.
At the same time, the clergy in Fethard, especially the apoplectic curate Father Stafford, hatched their own plan to force Sheila and the Cloney children to return home.
On May 12, Fr Stafford let fly at Sunday mass. He denounced Sheila of robbing her children of their faith and groundlessly accused the Protestants of Fethard of having financially aided her departure.
He announced that it was now up to the Catholics of Fethard to exert pressure on the missing woman and her co-religionists to make sure the children were returned, and that this was to be achieved by a boycott of Protestant-owned businesses and farms.
The next day the majority of the Catholics in Fethard stopped going into the two Protestant shops. On Wednesday, the Church of Ireland school was forced to close when the Catholic teacher walked out.
An elderly music teacher living alone in Fethard lost her dozen Catholic pupils. Catholic labourers told Protestant farmers that they would no longer be able to work for them and Catholics no longer bought their milk. Shots were also fired outside the homes of Protestants in the area.
Most Catholics obeyed the priest — many out of fear — but some, mostly old IRA men who had fallen out with the Church during the Civil War, opposed the boycott.
One in particular would heckle the vigilantes — organised by Fr Stafford to make sure the boycott was enforced — as they came out of their weekly meetings to discuss tactics in the parish hall.
The boycott became a national scandal in Ireland and was reported abroad — there was even a mention in Time magazine. Donations flooded in to a relief fund set up to provide financial assistance to Fethard’s distressed Protestant community, especially from Northern Ireland.
The huge response from northern Protestants prompted the Church of Ireland Bishop of Ossory, Ferns and Leighlin, John Percy Phair, to write to the Belfast Telegraph thanking ‘our friends in the North’ for their financial assistance. About £1,000 was deposited in the relief fund in total.
The Catholic hierarchy was initially tight-lipped about the boycott.
But at the end of June, about a month and a half into the boycott, during a solemn high mass in Wexford town, the Bishop of Galway, Michael Browne, thundered from the altar: “There seems to be a concerted campaign to entice or kidnap Catholic children and derive them of their Faith.
“Non-Catholics, with one or two honourable exceptions, do not protest against the crime of conspiring to steal the children of a Catholic father, but they try to make political capital when a Catholic people make a peaceful and moderate protest.”
Despite the hierarchy’s support for the boycott, many ordinary Catholics were disgusted at what was occurring in Fethard-on-Sea — most significantly, the Taoiseach, Eamon de Valera.
On July 4, less than a week after the intervention of the bishops, de Valera condemned the boycott in the Dail “as ill-conceived, ill-considered and futile” and repudiated “any suggestion that this boycott is typical of the attitude or conduct of our people”.
De Valera was instinctively appalled by the actions of the Fethard boycotters but also furious at the damage it was doing to the reputation of the state.
His worst fears were confirmed on the Twelfth when speakers on Orange platforms across Northern Ireland denounced the treatment being meted out to the Fethard Protestants.
The Prime Minister Lord Brookeborough said the boycott was a reminder of what would happen if Northern Ireland was subsumed into an all-Ireland Republic. Eventually, a deal to bring the dispute to an end was brokered in the house of the Republic’s Minister for Finance, Jim Ryan.
That September, the parish priest went into the Protestant-owned newsagent in Fethard to buy a packet of cigarettes to signal that the boycott was over.
Sheila and the children returned home on New Year’s Eve. But though the boycott was now officially over, old wounds remained and the Protestant shopkeepers found that many of their old customers never returned.
Life was certainly never the same for the Cloney family.
Eileen and Mary never went to school. Instead they received lessons from their parents at home and helped on the farm. In some small way, the boycott marked the waning of the influence of the Catholic Church in the Republic. The bishops themselves recognised that they had failed to win over public opinion.
As for the Church of Ireland, many critics were quick to point to a lack of leadership. Certainly, Bishop Phair was quick to blame ‘mixed marriages’ and Sheila Cloney for leaving her husband and refusing to honour her promise to raise the children as Catholics, rather than concentrating on the injustice of the boycott.
In 1998, the Catholic Bishop of Ferns, Brendan Comiskey, apologised for the Catholic Church’s role in the boycott.
It was some small consolation for the Cloney family who have had to deal with a significant amount of tragedy down the years.
In 1998, Mary died of a rare liver disease. Sean died in 1999, four years after being left paralysed from the neck down after a road traffic accident. Eileen and her sister Hazel, who was born a few years after the boycott, still live locally. On June 28, 2009, Sheila Cloney’s funeral service was held in the tiny St Mogue’s church at the entrance to Fethard.
It was a low-key affair: there was no eulogy, no death notices in the newspapers. Sheila wished to draw a veil over those extraordinary events of 1957 but she will be remembered by many for standing up to the clerical bullies and raising her children as she saw fit.
Tim Fanning is a journalist and author of The Fethard-on-Sea Boycott, Collins Press, £12.99, available from all good bookshops and also at collinspress.ie
I was originally planning a trip down to Curbar Edge in the Peaks yesterday evening, until the clouds rolled in and all looked grey. By 6.30 the clouds were beginning to break up a bit, so I dashed up to Royd Moor (a bit closer than the Peaks) to catch the evening light, which developed in to the most wonderful of sunsets.
One of my pet hates is barbed wire, which I think is the blight of our countryside. However, on this occassion I have to admit that it made quite a useful subject!
Saltwell Park is a Victorian park in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, England. Opened in 1876, the park was designed by Edward Kemp and incorporates the mansion and associated grounds of the Saltwellgate estate owner, William Wailes, who sold his estate to Gateshead Council for £35,000. Upon opening, it became known as "The People's Park". The park was expanded in 1920 when the council purchased the adjacent gardens to the Saltwell Grove estate and added these to the park. This extended the park's total size to 55 acres (22 ha). Towards the end of the 20th century, the park had fallen into disrepair, but between 1999 and 2005, it was subject to a £9.6 million restoration project, funded collaboratively by the Heritage Lottery Fund and Gateshead Council and is now host to around 2 million visitors per year.
The park is split broadly into three sections. Saltwell Grove, the southern section, is an area of grassed open space with a bandstand to the western corner. The central area contains the centrepiece of the park – Wailes's former home, the Grade II listed Saltwell Towers and its surrounding belvedere walls. These have been fully restored and are now a visitor centre. There are also three war memorials, a yew-tree maze, a dene and an area containing several species of caged animals known as Pet's Corner. The largest section of the park is the Northern Fields section which contains a four-acre boating lake with a wooded island at its centre, as well as three bowling greens and two pavilions.
Saltwell Park has been presented with numerous awards in recent years, including being named "Britain's Best Park" in 2005 and Civic Trust Park of the Year in 2006. It has won a Green Flag award every year since 2006 and in 2013 it was re-listed as one of fifty-five Green Heritage sites in the UK. The park has been a social hub for over a century; an annual public bonfire night display was first held in 1883, a circus in 1886 and the park hosted the Holidays at Home programme during World War II. Today the bonfire display has grown into one of the largest in Tyne and Wear and is attended by thousands of people every year. In October 2012, Saltwell Park was the site of the first British Legion Field of Remembrance in North East England. It also plays a role in local sport and recreation; it has hosted a fundraising day in support of Sport Relief, a Race for Life for a number of years and in November 2012 a "green gym" was installed at the park – one of only two in Gateshead.
Conception and opening
At the turn of the 19th century, Gateshead was beginning to expand but, save a smattering of industrial elements mainly at Sheriff Hill and at the south shore of the River Tyne, the town and its surrounds were mostly agricultural and most of the town was covered by large, private estates. The largest of these was the Saltwell estate, which consisted of around 500 acres (200 ha) of land in a broad quadrangle between the Team Valley and the villages of Bensham and Low Fell. In 1805 this estate was broken up into a number of smaller properties including Saltwell Cottage. By 1856 Saltwell Cottage had become the Saltwellside estate and was in the hands of William Wailes, a native of Newcastle upon Tyne who had become one of the leading exponents of stained glass in England. In 1856 Wailes commissioned the design of a grand Victorian mansion for his family to live at Saltwellside. Work began in 1859 and continued until 1871 when Wailes' Saltwell Towers was finally completed. Saltwell Towers was a large, eclectic mansion in red brick with Gothic turrets and mock battlements.
While Wailes was building Saltwell Towers, Gateshead was expanding and industrialising. The resultant air pollution, poor social conditions and general shortage of clean drinking water in the town led to concern about public health and gave rise to calls for the creation of public parks. One such call was made in 1857 when the editorial of the local newspaper, the Gateshead Observer, demanded that a park be built at Windmill Hills. In 1861, the owners of ten acres of land at Windmill Hills approached the town council and offered the land free of charge so long as it was used as a place of recreation for the people of Gateshead. The land was formally conveyed on 18 November 1861 and the opening of the first public park in Gateshead was celebrated by the closing of workplaces and a day of holiday in the town.
Gateshead Council subsequently considered other sites for a second park, but it was discouraged by the high prices being asked by the estate owners at Redheugh and Shipcote. The Shipcote estate was owned by Sir Walter James, who was approached by a council park committee in 1874 and asked how much would be required to purchase at least part of his estate. Whilst negotiations were ongoing, James' offer to sell part of his estate at £650 per acre was met by fierce criticism from members of the public and the council began to seek an alternative to the Shipcote proposal. The town clerk wrote to William Wailes to ask if he would be willing to sell his 37 acres (15 ha) Saltwellside estate. On 11 November 1874, Wailes replied that the council could have his entire estate for £32,000, and in March 1875 James told the park committee that he did not wish to compete with Wailes but that he would offer a subscription if the council went ahead at Saltwellgate. Later that month the park committee formally opened talks with Wailes and, after various proposals were considered and rejected, in September 1875 the council decided to buy the entire Saltwellgate estate for an increased total price of £35,000 after securing a loan for the full amount from the Local Government Board. The agreement was formalised two months later and included a provision to lease Saltwell Towers back to Wailes for the remainder of his life.
Having obtained the Saltwellgate estate, the council contacted local ornithologist and landscaper John Hancock and asked him to submit designs for the new park. When Hancock refused, citing the pressure of his existing work, the park committee retained Edward Kemp at four guineas a day until his plans were submitted and approved in February 1876. Kemp's plans were implemented over a period of years by borough surveyor James Bowyer at a cost of around £11,000. Original plans to officially open the park on Whit Monday 1876 were not realised, and the park was never officially opened, but nonetheless, public usage began in late 1876.
Design and layout
Saltwell Park is located within a residential area around 1.5 kilometres (0.93 mi) south of Gateshead town centre on land which slopes towards the Team Valley in the west. It is a broad rectangle with boundaries at East and West Park Roads, Saltwell View and Saltwell Road South. The original site purchased from Wailes was joined by the gardens of a late 19th century villa at East Park Road known as Saltwell Grove (or "The Grove") after these were purchased by Gateshead Council in 1920. The park today constitutes around 55 acres (22 ha) of land in total.
The park is split into three sections – southern, central and northern areas – and the entire park is bordered by perimeter shrubs, plants and trees. The southern Saltwell Grove area is demarcated from the central section by an old stone wall running in a west–east direction which formed the park's original southern boundary and is, according to a Gateshead Council document, an "important feature in the history and development of the park". This section consists largely of open space, meandering pathways skirting the perimeter, a bandstand and some flowerbeds. Entrances to this section of the park are to the west at Saltwell Road and to the extreme south-east corner.
The central section comprises Saltwell Towers and its grounds and is some 17 acres (6.9 ha) in total area. Saltwell Towers is located in the middle of the central section of the park and it is surrounded to the south by its accompanying walls, walkways and ha-ha. An enclosed rose garden lies to the east of the building and to the west there is a maze and a dene through which a stream runs into a lily-pond at an entrance to the park at Saltwell Road South. The approach from the southern section is a large grassed area replete with paths which wind towards a footbridge to the Towers, which is used for general leisure activities and picnicking and is home to a stone-built war memorial. The entrance to the footbridge is the site of a bronze war memorial which sits in the centre of a roundabout surrounded by bedding flowers. The footbridge was built in 2003 and is also a war memorial.
The northern section of the park constitutes 19 acres (7.7 ha) of land and can be accessed either by external entrances at the north-eastern corner of the park and West Park Road or internally from the central section through the dene or from Pets Corner. The north-eastern entrance consists of a pair of imposing gateposts and the view from this access point sweeps across the entire northern section of the park. The eastern perimeter of this section is a terraced walkway known as the Broadwalk with adjacent, banked bedded planting. A central path from the Broadwalk splits a large grassed area almost neatly in half and leads to a lake and two child's play areas. A path circles the perimeter of the lake and seating is placed at the fringe of the lake at various points. To the south of the lake are three bowling greens and to the north are tennis courts. These cannot be seen from the lake due to a screen of plants. The plants within the screen are typical of those bedded throughout the park, which include French marigolds, roses, tulips, phlomis, sedum and silver dust.
Principal attractions
There are eleven listed buildings in Saltwell Park. Saltwell Towers, former home of William Wailes and later to lawyer Joseph Shipley (founder of the nearby Shipley Art Gallery), was the seat of the former Saltwellgate estate and has been described by a BBC report as a "fairytale mansion". The building is a dark red and yellow brick construction with asymmetrical towers, tall chimney stacks and corner turrets. It has been used for a number of purposes, including as a hospital during the First World War and as a museum from 1933 to 1969, but was then abandoned and fell into considerable disrepair. However, after a £3 million, five-year refurbishment programme was completed in 2004, the building was officially reopened as a visitors centre in the presence of Wailes' great-great-grandson. Saltwell Towers today includes a cafe, some pieces of local art, an exhibition on the history of the park and also a stained glass centrepiece commissioned from a local artist. A Gateshead Blue Plaque in commemoration of Wailes was installed in 2005. The mansion was protected in 1973 as a Grade II listed building, along with the two storey, sandstone belvedere walls which surround the west and south of the mansion. These are replete with stairs and corner battlements and the entire walls are conjoined by a walkway which is open to the public.
A stable block is at the north-west of Saltwell Towers, built in 1871 in the same style as the mansion in red brick and with a slate roof. This is a Grade II listed building and is now an educational area for schools and local community groups. Also to the north-west of Saltwell Towers is the Charlton Memorial Drinking Fountain, a stone and granite fountain inscribed in memory of George Charlton, the mayor of Gateshead between 1874 and 1875. This is Grade II listed, as is the 'Salte Well' at the west entrance to the central section of the park. The latter is dated 1872 and is a sandstone construction with a basin in the central alcove. Midway along the Broadwalk in the north section of the park is a Grade II listed bronze statue of Alderman John Lucas, mounted on a sandstone plinth and granite base. Built in 1902, it was paid for by public subscription. The wrought iron gates and accompanying stone piers which greet visitors at the north-eastern entrance to the park are also Grade II listed.
There are three war memorials in the park. There is a Boer War memorial in the central section of the park around 100 metres south of Saltwell Towers. This consists of a bronze angel perched on a granite plinth and dated 1905. A modern Durham Light Infantry memorial was unveiled on 12 July 1981 by the mayor of Newcastle. This takes the form of a sandstone wall with adjoining flanking walls which create a small ornamental garden. There are three plaques and a description commemorating men of the battalion who died in battle between 1900 and 1945. The third war memorial is the bridge adjoining the lawned, central gardens to the belvedere walls of Saltwell Towers. This timber footbridge, 22 feet (6.7 m) long and 12 feet (3.7 m) wide, is named the Primosole Bridge and is a copy of the original Edwardian bridge which once crossed the ha-ha. The name is carved onto a low stone wall which runs alongside and an inscription commemorates the men of the Durham Light Infantry who died whilst crossing the original Primosole Bridge during Operation Fustian in the Second World War.
The principal feature of the northern section of the park is a boating lake. This has been in situ since a tender to install a 4 acres (1.6 ha) lake with an island in the centre was accepted in August 1880. An approach to Joseph Swan to illuminate the lake received no response, but a further approach to John Hancock to design the lake edge was more successful; the lake edge today still follows Hancock's original design. Model boating has been a fixture of the lake since 1886 and the Saltwell Park Model Boat Club is the latest organisation to use the lake for this purpose. The island in the centre of the lake was in 1909 home to a bandstand, and visiting performers were required to travel by boat to the island, but the bandstand was moved to the Saltwell Grove section of the park in 1921. During the summer months, visitors can hire rowing boats and pedalos for use on the lake. The lake has long been inhabited by mallards and tufted ducks and it is also home to several other species of wildfowl, including swans, Canada and barnacle geese, coots and moorhens. Common pochard and grebe also inhabit the lake in winter after migrating from Russia and central Europe. Kingfishers are also reported to have returned to the lake after a lengthy absence.
There have been animals kept in Saltwell Park since June 1877 – initially, these included monkeys, deer and a raccoon. Caged animals are still kept in the north-east of the park in an area called "Pets Corner", where there are a peacock and peahen, pheasants, rabbits and guinea pigs kept in a pair of aviaries built in 1880 and paid for by John Elliot, then chief constable of Gateshead The aviaries are stone and wrought iron, octagonal constructions which were listed at Grade II by English Heritage in 1973. A bandstand was erected in 1876 and was subsequently replaced in May 1895 by an octagonal, red-brick, cast-iron and wood structure which was first sited in the northern fields. This was then moved to the island in the lake and moved again to Saltwell Grove. It was taken down and rebuilt at Beamish Museum in 1978, where it remains in use and has been designated a Grade II listed building. The present bandstand is in the Saltwell Grove area and is used every Sunday during the summer months by brass bands.
In the western shadow of Saltwell Towers there is a maze, built in 1877 by Wailes for his family's use. The maze was replanted with yew trees as part of the 2005 regeneration project to the original plans laid by Wailes. Also renovated was Saltwell Dene, a picturesque wooded area with a stream, bridges, cascades and a lily pond which inspired local artist Thomas Miles Richardson to paint a watercolour of it in the 19th century. Saltwell Dene was the final part of the 21st century restoration project to be completed, reopening to the public in March 2005. At either end of the Broadwalk there are two wooden shelters whilst the centre of the Broadwalk is marked by the Almond Pavilion. The pavilion was opened in 1881 and was a refreshment pavilion for decades before it fell into disrepair; by the 1980s it was derelict and it was then completely destroyed by fire. It has been fully reconstructed, including a replica of the original clock tower, and is once more a refreshment kiosk with new toilet facilities. It offers panoramic views into the northern fields and across the boating lake. An oriental garden was opened in 2011 to mark the twenty-year anniversary of the twinning arrangement between Gateshead and Komatsu. This includes a gravel pond, waterfalls and stone lanterns. The park is also host to three well-used bowling greens, replete with their own pavilion (the Avenue Green Pavilion) and a rose garden.
Various other attractions have been installed and subsequently removed from the park, including a paddling pool, a museum and, from 1982 to 1993, a retired and modified Vickers Viscount 701 airplane. The aircraft had its wings cut short and was marked "Saltwell Airways".
Awards and usage
Upon opening, Saltwell Park was also called 'The People's Park' and the name is still used locally today. Today, the park is a green lung in the centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead which attracts over two million visitors a year. In 2005 it was named "Britain's Best Park". In 2006 the park was chosen as Civic Trust Park of the Year and received a Gold Laurel Award from the Institute of Maintenance and Building Management. The park has won a Green Flag Award every year since 2006 and was in 2013 re-listed as one of fifty-five Green Heritage sites in the UK.
The park has long been a hub of local social activities and events. A public firework display was first held in 1883, the first circus was hosted in 1886 and the Holidays at Home programme was conducted there during World War II – from September 1942 to the end of the war, families and American G.I.s could enjoy donkey rides, dancing, brass bands and gymnastic events. A bonfire night fireworks display has been held at the park for many years, one of three public displays in Gateshead (the other two are at Barmoor in Ryton and Oliver Henderson Park in Leam Lane). This event has grown into one of the largest displays in Tyne and Wear and is attended by thousands of people. In October 2012, Saltwell Park was the site of the first British Legion Field of Remembrance in North East England. Around ten thousand crosses were planted in Saltwell Grove. An Enchanted Parks event was hosted for the seventh consecutive year in December 2012. This is a collection of winter-themed visual arts, sculpture and interactive features which attracts around 14,000 visitors every year. An annual sculpture day has been held at the park for twenty-seven years and members of the public are invited to build themed sculptures under the supervision of local professionals. The 2012 renewal, themed "Wonders of the World", was held in Saltwell Grove and attracted hundreds of families.
Saltwell Park has hosted a Race for Life – a national fundraising event for women only, organised by Cancer Research UK – for a number of years. The 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) course has been attempted by over 8,000 competitors in the last three years, with the latest renewal held in May 2012. On 21 March 2010 the park hosted a fundraising day in support of Sport Relief, a bi-annual charity event organised by the BBC. Three fun runs around the boating lake attracted over 4,000 participants in total, including Jayne Middlemiss, Andrew Hayden Smith and Futureheads guitarist David Craig. Local athletics club Saltwell Harriers have hosted an annual 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) race in and around Saltwell Park since 1911. Named the Ronnie Walker Saltwell Road Race since 2010 in honour of the long-standing club president, it is the oldest road race in England. 1984 Olympic silver medallist Mike McLeod won the race for 16 consecutive years between 1974 and 1990. In November 2012 a "green gym" was opened at the park. Fitness equipment was installed near the tennis courts in the Northern Fields section of the park and is available for use by the public free of charge. This is one of only two such outdoor public gyms in Gateshead, the other being opened simultaneously at Windy Nook Nature Reserve. A Parkrun takes place every Saturday morning at 9 am starting and finishing at the South Pavilion. As well as physical health, the park is now home to the Recovery College Collective, a peer led mental health charity offering informal drop ins and creative workshops.
Gateshead is a town in the Gateshead Metropolitan Borough of Tyne and Wear, England. It is on the River Tyne's southern bank. The town's attractions include the twenty metre tall Angel of the North sculpture on the town's southern outskirts, The Glasshouse International Centre for Music and the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. The town shares the Millennium Bridge, Tyne Bridge and multiple other bridges with Newcastle upon Tyne.
Historically part of County Durham, under the Local Government Act 1888 the town was made a county borough, meaning it was administered independently of the county council.
In the 2011 Census, the town had a population of 120,046 while the wider borough had 200,214.
History
Gateshead is first mentioned in Latin translation in Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People as ad caput caprae ("at the goat's head"). This interpretation is consistent with the later English attestations of the name, among them Gatesheued (c. 1190), literally "goat's head" but in the context of a place-name meaning 'headland or hill frequented by (wild) goats'. Although other derivations have been mooted, it is this that is given by the standard authorities.
A Brittonic predecessor, named with the element *gabro-, 'goat' (c.f. Welsh gafr), may underlie the name. Gateshead might have been the Roman-British fort of Gabrosentum.
Early
There has been a settlement on the Gateshead side of the River Tyne, around the old river crossing where the Swing Bridge now stands, since Roman times.
The first recorded mention of Gateshead is in the writings of the Venerable Bede who referred to an Abbot of Gateshead called Utta in 623. In 1068 William the Conqueror defeated the forces of Edgar the Ætheling and Malcolm king of Scotland (Shakespeare's Malcolm) on Gateshead Fell (now Low Fell and Sheriff Hill).
During medieval times Gateshead was under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Durham. At this time the area was largely forest with some agricultural land. The forest was the subject of Gateshead's first charter, granted in the 12th century by Hugh du Puiset, Bishop of Durham. An alternative spelling may be "Gatishevede", as seen in a legal record, dated 1430.
Industrial revolution
Throughout the Industrial Revolution the population of Gateshead expanded rapidly; between 1801 and 1901 the increase was over 100,000. This expansion resulted in the spread southwards of the town.
In 1854, a catastrophic explosion on the quayside destroyed most of Gateshead's medieval heritage, and caused widespread damage on the Newcastle side of the river.
Sir Joseph Swan lived at Underhill, Low Fell, Gateshead from 1869 to 1883, where his experiments led to the invention of the electric light bulb. The house was the first in the world to be wired for domestic electric light.
In the 1889 one of the largest employers (Hawks, Crawshay and Company) closed down and unemployment has since been a burden. Up to the Second World War there were repeated newspaper reports of the unemployed sending deputations to the council to provide work. The depression years of the 1920s and 1930s created even more joblessness and the Team Valley Trading Estate was built in the mid-1930s to alleviate the situation.
Regeneration
In the late noughties, Gateshead Council started to regenerate the town, with the long-term aim of making Gateshead a city. The most extensive transformation occurred in the Quayside, with almost all the structures there being constructed or refurbished in this time.
In the early 2010s, regeneration refocused on the town centre. The £150 million Trinity Square development opened in May 2013, it incorporates student accommodation, a cinema, health centre and shops. It was nominated for the Carbuncle Cup in September 2014. The cup was however awarded to another development which involved Tesco, Woolwich Central.
The National Trail starts to climb out of the trough created by Graining Water - on one of those ancient stone flagged paths, which are common to the Calderdale area.
Part of my A-Z Project, a local derelict barn that has pretty much looked like this for as long as i remember.
Taken at the end of March when they flowers were beginning to peek over the top of a flower tub on the top of a garden gate.
Better viewed large and thank you for your favourites. :O)
A home-made stone gatepost into which a free-standing wooden gate could be slotted was cheaper than paying a blacksmith to make an iron one on hinges, or even chains as used here. Bit IRONIC to find this on Cleveland Street, an old footpath connecting the ironstone mines of East Cleveland with local villages
A pair of gateposts that guard the approach to Grin Low Tower above Buxton. A definite track passes between them but there is no sign of a wall so they stand like sentinels marking the way.
Graffiti on a gatepost on Stokes Croft Street not far from the big railway arches. This was a favourite of mine and a number of other people I know. Unfortunately, it got painted over recently so I guess the owner of the property wasn't so keen.
The entrance stone come gatepost to the hut circles on the slopes above the hamlet of Hammerslake near Lustleigh on East Dartmoor.
Gordon Lightfoot has a song that comes to mind:
"It's snowin' in the city, and the streets are brown and gritty."
(from 'Alberta Bound')
Although it wasn't snowing, the streets were indeed, 'brown and gritty'.
Two textures by Flypaper Textures
In 1836 the first pastoralists moved into the Geelong region with David Stead and John Cowie on the Moorabool River and Alexander Thompson on the Barwon River (Kardinia estate meaning sunrise in local Aboriginal language). By 1837 there were enough pastoralists and their workers in the region for Magistrate Foster Fyans to be stationed at the Barwon River and Constable Patrick McKeever to be the first police officer there. The town of Geelong was surveyed in October 1838 with the first land sales in 1839. The first general store, the Wool Pack Inn and a wool store opened around his time and by 1841 there were 82 houses and over 400 residents and the town had its own newspaper. The main streets were named after places and people mainly who were early settlers– Moorabool, Yarra, Bellarine, Corio, Gheringhap, Swanston and Malop, Ryrie, McKillop, Myers, Brougham, Fenwick and etc. The name of Geelong came from a local Aboriginal languages meaning either “white sea bird” or “cliff” or “going up”. Within a short time there was a saddler, Wesleyan place of worship (not quite a church), a post service etc. In 1848 Geelong was declared a port for exporting wool, grain, hides, tallow etc. A year later (1849) it was officially proclaimed a town with its own Town Council and a mayor as the self-governing colony of Victoria was created from NSW. The growing Industrial Revolution in England and the great demand for wool for England’s woollen mills boosted the town’s growth and optimism which was exploded by the discovery of gold in central Victoria and Ballarat. Geelong was able to supply needed goods for the goldfields etc. In 1851 Geelong had 8,291 inhabitants but by 1853 it had 22,000 thanks to gold from Ballarat being received and exported from here. The basalt and sandstone Customs House was built in 1856 in Brougham Street when exports began from here rather than at Williamstown near Melbourne and immigrants landed directly in Geelong. The first Town Hall was built in 1855 and a telegraph connection with Melbourne was established in 1854. The fine sandstone Telegraph Station with a timeball for shipping on its roof was built in 1858 and still stands next to the former Post Office. The first railway in Victoria linked Melbourne and Geelong in 1854. A private company began building the Melbourne to Geelong railway in 1854 but it was not completed until 1856. The first railway station was replaced with the current one between 1877 and 1881 hence the polychromatic brick work which was popular at that time. A new railway line was built from Geelong to the goldfields at Ballarat starting in 1858 with completion of the link in 1862. A short tunnel was cut through the hill beyond the railway station in 1875 to allow trains to travel to South Geelong and on to Colac. By the mid-1850s Geelong was the third biggest town in the Australian colonies and a well-established city and it continued to greatly significantly in the 1860s. Brougham Street near the bay was lined with impressive wool stores and warehouses at this time and they still grace that street.