Photo Album-England

Trawden, Lancashire

...which happens to be where I was born, in June 1944. At a house called: Avondale just below the top of the hill from the Parish church. Bill Stevenson, I'm told used to live next door.

	This is Avondale where my mum brought me up on her own in those days just after the war and before she met my step father, Stanley Czajczyk. (pronounced Chai chick)		This view towards Trawden and the Parish Church from Winewall
This is the main Parish Church of the village, situated at a junction where the road going to the right either loops back toward Colne or you can ascend up to join other minor roads that link the farmsteads with both Lancashire and Yorkshire.		These houses are seen from the viewpoint of the previous picture. Just around the corner, there used to be a Co-op where my mum worked and met her future husband, Tom.
	Another important building in the village, of course, is the school. A Miss Alton used to be one of the teachers there, but when?		The War memorial records the names of Trawdeners who died in active service for their nation. My father's name: Tom Baker can be seen on this picture provided by Sarah Greenwood.
Hollin Hall viewed through some recently planted trees. Is this to become Trawden Forest?		The monochrome pictures below were taken in the 1960's when I was discovering my fascination with photography.
	These farm pictures were taken near Trawden just off the road to Wycoller.		This remote farmhouse is called Little Laithe Farm. It has now been made into two dwellings and, I'm told, is very des-res!
Moor Trees, if you'll pardon the pun. Boulsworth Hill is in the background. The trees are between Little Laithe Farm and Near Wanless Farm.		A cat on a lonely farmstead!
I have to admit that in my time in the Trawden area, I never visited Lumb Spout, a local beauty spot. These pictures have been taken by Gillian Greenwood.
In July 17th, 2002 it looked like this:			July 14th, 2002, when there was a lot of rain and Wycoller was flooded.
	February 1990		This was also on the 14th July 2002.

hi there , I also lived at Avondale 1969 -1971. name Colin Clapham lived up Winewall until 1953 then up Trawden. I remember the chippy well & you. I still live in Colne & my mother still in trawden age 92. Great to see your site, brings back memories.	Colin Clapham	Colne
Hello Mike, My mother was evacuated to Trawden during the war. She was taken in by Uncle Edwin and Aunty Nellie. I am not sure of the surname but I have emailed my father to find out. Next weekend (25/6/2011) is her 80^th birthday which we are celebrating near Harrogate. We hope to visit Trawden on our way home to Manchester on the Sunday morning. Just to say thank you for the website PS. My mother’s name was Catherine Chadwick if anyone should remember her. Her sister Norah was also evacuated but not taken in by the same family.	Catherine Pritchard
Hello Mike I came across your site to day, The reason I am emailing you is that my mothers family come from Trawden. There names are the fosters, the needham's. I was told that I always called him uncle Albert lived at lodge home with his wife Nora nee greenwood, I know that there is a few relatives still in the area, as my mother Margaret nee temple now lomas has told me. Do you know of a school registry that I could let my mother know of to see if she may be able to see if any of her friends are still living.I have really enjoyed looking through the photos of the area, As my mum did take us to the area where she was born. Now uncle albert use to make little radios for people to use in the area and i belive they had the small garage just down from lodge home just over the creek , river i dont know what you would call it.and my mothe margaret use to go around and collect sixpence from diffrent people so they could listen. I wont say to much untill i hear from you...	Sue Price
Gillian Greenwood writes trying to contact Alan Jay (below) If he could contact me, I will put you both back in contact. I was just having a quick look at your Trawden pages with my other half and I read the messages from Alan Jay. I remember him from Trawden School. He was the same age as my brother and his sister Susan was in the same class as me. I wonder if you are still in touch with him and can pass on a few things to him. Firstly "Billy Pond" was and still is, (though the pond is filled in) at the top of Slack Laithe Farm. The Greenwoods never had that land while there was a pond and I never heard of a bull being stuck in it. Does Alan know any more about this? In 1990 there was no-one living in the cave at Lumb Spout or at any time recently. The Teacher at Trawden School who had a disabled baby was not Miss Alton but another teacher who taught the infants. Miss Alton didn't marry until much later in life. She lived in Trawden Hall until her death a few years ago. Her father bought it in the 1930's or 40's I think and divided it into two. Lumb spout was up to the 1950's a well known beauty spot and people came from the surrounding towns to picnic there. Now apart from a few ramblers it has been upstaged by places like Alton Towers. There was always a house at Lumb spout. It was a very old one. I'm not sure when it fell into disrepair or was demolished but a bungalow was built there which burnt down in 1969.	Gillian Greenwood	Trawden
Dear Mike, I wanted to thank you for your site. I visit it often and take a walk down memory lane. I was born in Trawden in 1960 and lived there until 1974 when my dad took a job in the States and we emigrated to New Hampshire (I still live there). We lived on Hall Road for most of the time we lived there (#12 and then #24) and my Grandma and Grandad (Dick and Eva Inman) lived at #2. My dad (Robin) used to work at Pioneer in Barrowford but also had a stint as the landlord of the Rock (keeping his job at Pioneer)for about a year and a half in 1968 to 69. We lived there for that time and we were the first ones that tried to fix up the Rock from rough old place that it was. I remember the ceiling in the kitchen collapsing just after my grandma walked out of it and she was mad as hell because it ruined the stew and hard she had just finished making. I have very fond memories of Trawden and I am back often as my mum (Mona) and dad moved back once they retired and now my dad (mum passed away in 06)lives at the top of Heifer Lane in Colne. Dad has signed the house over to me and my brother (Richard) and we have made a pact that we will never sell it so our kids over here will have somewhere to visit. I remember your mum and dads fish and chip shop very well as I used to play out with Mark Whiteoak and Victor Miller who both lived up Winewall (Mark has now moved all the way to Cottontree). We used to play in the beck and once rode a dinghy down it in a flood that we had to duck to get under the bridges (daft sods). I remember playing hare and hounds up Winewall and up to the rec in Trawden and going camping in Wycoller to scare the hell out of ourselves waiting for the ghost to show up. I remember all the little shops that are now all gone and having a sixpence to spend that my Grandad would slip to me and our kid and standing there looking at all the glorious toffees in the glass jars and deciding whether to get a spanish or some rock (or both). We used to play football in winter on the Bursgreen carpark using doors for goals that were around the corner from each other. I was at Trawden school when Mrs Macin, Jesse Shaw, Ma Alton and Mr Par were there. My Grandad had a pen over the fence from the school with a load of hens and 2 donkeys and homing pigeons. I remember my mum chasing one of the donkeys with a steel bucket after it had flicked its heels and just missed my head when I was about 4 years old. She never did catch it. Returning to Trawden makes me happy to see how lovely it has become and how they have taken great care upgrade the properties although I am saddened by the dilution of the human culture (corner shops gone, central groceries, videocentric culture.. The pubs don't seem quite as relevant anymore) but I will say..Once a Trawdener always a Trawdener. It is till home to me and although I have lived here more than 30 years my heart is still back there. Thanks again for your site.	Robert Inman	New England, USA
Hi just had to contact you when i saw your house Avondale because i used to live there too from 1988 untill i think 1990 when i moved back to bradford my birthplace, I was reading some of your emails one from shiela was rayson well i was friends with donald john and keith i was happy to have known them keep up the good work rose	Rose Aitchison
Hi, I was amazed at the speed you posted my message. I looked further at the site. Miss Alton was a relative of the people that owned Trawden Hall. Everyone was devastated when her baby was deformed by thalidomide that was 1958. Little Laithe farm was the site of the "Billy pond" it was an open cast excavation of "slack". The coal seem came to the surface and you could dig it and dry it out. We had that on our farm at lower beardshaw and I earned lots of pocket money. The "Billy pond" was called so because Jack Greenwood's bull got caught up in there something Sarah maybe did not know. As kids the Billy pond was a dumping ground and we used to collect pram wheels and such as well as tadpoles. Idris was the person who did Chapel on Lane house where I lived following Lizzie Holgate. I remember Mrs Pickles next door lifting her window and shouting to my Mum "Ought Fresh". Sadly I have no recollection of your home unless it was one of the pair built on top road to colne where Clive Smith's dad used to be a grave digger. (Smicca). Hope this is of interest.	Alan Jay
Hi there, My name's Alan Jay, I was born in Trawden 1954. My Dad worked his way up from an apprentice at Banisters to a place on the management and we left when artificial fibres killed the cotton industry. Trawden freedom in those days was fantastic, we used to build trolleys to go down the tram tracks and climbed boulsworth regularly. That winter was something else. The question I want to ask is about lumb spout. It was always a secret place for our gang, "the beck patrol". Briefly someone built a house up there and it burnt down. If lumb spout is in the tourist domain what about the cave? We were scared as kids that there might have been bears in it. When I went back in 1990 possibly one of the kendals was living in it. I brought my family back to Trawden in 1998 boy had it changed. I couldn't let my kids go in the cave because of the smell. Our beck was overgrown and Wycoller is a park, we used to play "japs & commandos" in houses now worth £250,000+. Please post me on your site so anyone who remembers me and Trawden School (I think Mrs Makin & Jessie Shaw were past their "sell by date" but Ted Parr as new headmaster revived and most passed our 11+ so a lot of us became successful)! Would love to hear.	Alan Jay
I have just found your site and i like it i lived in trawden in 44to 47 at Green Bank then at the Clarion until 50 and went to trawden school when Jessie Shaw was teaching ,i remember the Dark Lane in 47 i walked from the top of the wall on one side across to the other. I also remember the clogger Leonard but his shop was in a house on Lane House just on from the bus terminus.	Jack Cartmell	New Zealand
Hi Mike, Just latched on to the site. My cousin's Grand daughter and my self are related to the Bracewells. My Grand dad was Herbert 1876 and wife Jane Smith 1836. Herbert's dad was James and wife Jane Laycock. I used to visit with my Mum Ada Laycock nee Bracwell in the 50's. Would be interesting to hear from any friends or relations. laycotx@vicnet.net.au Keep the excellent work up.	David Laycock	Australia
Just wanted to let you know that your web sit is FANTASTIC. For the past 11years I have lived in Atlanta GA and my Husband has never seen Trawden where I grow up. I called my mum who still lives there and she said that your mum and dad had the chip shop at cotton tree. My Grandma used to take me in there for a treat when I was a littlie girl, I remember them and the fact it was the best fish & chips around. Thanks for making time to put a great web site together.	Jacqueline Arthur	U.S.A
Hi mike, here is one 79yr old Trawdener, resident in N.Z. (Tauranga) my name was Sheila Smith, married previously to Donald Rayson. I have 2 sons still in Trawden and 1 in Colne, my youngest son Stephen is here in N.Z but lives in Auckland. My present husband & I have lived in N.Z since 1972, my name is now Sheila Davies, my husband is from Crosshills, we love watching the computer & love your programme also all the panoramic views etc, around on Skiptonweb etc, N.Z is a beautiful country we have been so lucky to have made a life here, though my husband is now getting over a very bad stroke which has left him unable to do most of the things he enjoyed, but We sit at the computer& reminisce, over places we still recognize. Many thanks for your website great work, (I used to be a weaver at Hollin Hall mill) I shudder when I think about laying on the floor sweeping under the looms with them still running) & can still think how different it must be today.	Mrs Sheila Davies ( Sheila)	Tauranga, New Zealand
Hi mike just like to say what a nice surprise to come across your site I lived in Trawden for many years as a child and remember playing in that very school yard and going to that church when i was in the cubs as the cub hall was/is right across from it the memories came flooding back thanks	Adrian Butterworth
Your correspondent Katrina Hodgson refers to her ancestors living at Slack and The Little Haig. Does she have any connection to the TILLOTSON family who resided variously at The Haig (Hague; Slack (Ponden) Thorne Edge, Corn Close, Barnside. A long shot, but would you please forward my enquiry to her? My mother was a Tillotson.	Charles Greenhough (Expatriot Yorkshireman)	Suffolk UK
First off, the pictures on your site really are a marvellous portrayal. Thanks you so much for sharing them. I noticed your photo of Little Laithe farm near Trawden. Fair Laithe farm in the same area is where many of my ancestors farmed from the late 1700s to the late 1800s (also Slack, Well head near Winewall, and Little Hague and Stone Trough near Kelbrook).	Katrina Hodgson	Canada

A new Trawden website has been created at Trawden on Line