Tuesday 19 December 2017

The Case of the Mysterious Red Girder and Victoria Station

Now as mysteries go I don’t think The Case of the Red Girder would excite Sherlock Holmes but it has caught my imagination.

The Red Girder, 2017
It is there in Andy Robertson’s recent picture of the bookstall and Left Luggage Office.

The building, with its gold lettering on a blue background is clearly a relic of a different age and I never tire of looking at it.

But that red girder seems rather out of place.

Clearly it once had a purpose but I have no idea what that was or when it was placed there.

The advertsing hoarding, 1988
Added to which I don’t ever remember seeing the side of the building above the bookstall during the 1970s when I regularly used the station.

The answer it seems is that for a while at least it was a bracket holding up a large advertising hoarding.

The sign was there in 1988 when E. Krieger took his picture, and for all I know may have been there in the ‘70s.

There will be someone out there who knows, can quote chapter and verse and will probably have the picture.

We shall see.

Location; Victoria Railway Station

Pictures; Victoria Railway Station, 2017 from the collection of Andy Robertson and in 1988 by E. Krieger, m63407, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass


2 comments:

  1. I am not familiar with the location as I have not used trains for 53 years but it looks to be the stump of a large cast iron lattice girder that spanned a great distance, perhaps from its stump clear across that archway to a similar building or wall opposite, the same probably applied to the smaller stump on the right of the building. They probably supported the roof structure or a large canopy.

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  2. Wasn't this featured in Three Sneezes and Orange Trolls?

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