The new east Manchester, pictures from the 1970s

I have been reflecting on those industrial landscapes which many of us grew up in.*

They were a product of the 19th century, continued to dominate many parts of our towns and cities into the 1970s and vanished like snow in the winter sun during the last two decades of the 20th century.

Their going was down in part to town and city planning but mostly to the fairly rapid deindustrialization which saw the end much of our heavy industry.

Most of the factories, mills and warehouses went in a cloud of dust and debris leaving wide open spaces we now call “brown sites” and some with imagination or not so good imagination in to flats for those seeking a new inner city experience.

What also went were the old rows of terraced housing replaced by new social houses and flats.  But as these went up the factories were coming down presenting the newly re-housed families with a bleak future.

Some of that change was caught in a series of pictures by my friend Eileen Blake.  They are a remarkable record of east Manchester in the 1970s.  Here are the new schools and housing estates, nestling beside the older terraced houses and still dominated by the remnants of the old industry, including the gas works and power station.

Pictures; from the collection of Eileen Blake

*http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Industrial%20landscapes