Leaf Street Swimming Baths, the first of a set of stories

I pretty much took the old Victorian and Edwardian Swimming Baths for granted. 

After all when you are ten the ornate splendour of the wrought iron, the bright glazed tiles and the stained glass is just background to  the business of playing in the water.

I wish I had taken more interest in my surroundings and so now fifty years on I am having to rediscover that magnificence of the Municipal Public Bath.

Sadly all too many have gone, victims of changing recreational habits, cost cutting exercises and the fact that some at least had come to the end of their useful life.

All of which is the lead into a new series on Manchester and Salford’s Swimming Baths and Washhouses.

Now I have always had a fascination for them and the part they have played in the provision of public services by local governemnets.

And this was further advanced by the talk recently at Chorlton History Group on the Swimming Baths of Greater Manchester.*

So this is the start of the series with a second look at Leaf Street Baths in Hulme.

In 1860 the Manchester & Salford Baths and Laundries Company opened their third public baths in Hulme.

The company had been formed in 1855, and built baths in Salford, Mayfield at Ardwick and Victoria Park.  Its assets were bought by Manchester Corporation in 1877.  The company had added a Turkish bath in 1860 which was the first in a public baths in Manchester.  The Leaf Street Baths were demolished in the clearances of the 1970s and today the site is open ground.

When I first posted the story I pondered on who remembered them and the response has been impressive.

There are those who wrote to me describing their first swimming lessons and those who still have their certificate proudly proclaiming their achievement at swimming a length, and memories from Tom who supervised children from nearby Royce School when they attended in the early 1970s.

Nor were the baths just a place for recreation, most also had a washhouse and facilities for families and individuals to take a bath, and in the case of Leaf Street it's own Turkish Baths.

Next, Whitworth Baths on Ashton Old Road and later the role of the Municipal Public Baths in keeping the people of the twin cities clean

*http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/the-swimming-baths-have-to-be-one-of.html

Pictures; Leaf Street Public Baths, 1920, m57327 and entrance m57328, Bath cubicle for private washing washing, 1920, m57333 courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council