So .......... the ongoing debate about Chorlton-cum-Hardy

Now the name Chorlton-cum-Hardy has been the butt of music hall jokes going back into the 19th century and still pops up today.

Out towards the Mersey across the Meadows, 1979

For those, south of Watford, it is a lazy way of pointing fun at the North and is accompanied by comments about flat caps, black puddings, and is delivered in an accent which flips between Yorkshire, Lancashire and a poor North East.

Then there are those who, like little school boys, with Britain’s Big Rude Joke Book,  play on the word cum, as if we haven’t heard it all before.

Yesterday the debate on the origins surfaced again and in the course of that discussion reference was made to one local historian, “who reports that he can find no mention of Chorlton-cum-Hardy before 1700. The name was adopted by Victorian property developers who arrived in the wake of the coming of the railway in 1880, to distinguish this Chorlton from Chorlton-upon-Medlock”.

From A Topographical Dictionary of the United Kingdom, 1825

Actually the name Chorlton-cum-Hardy predates the Victorian building boom of the 1880s, and is referenced as Chortlon-cum-Hardy by the Rev John Booker in his book in 1857.*

And also in various newspaper stories in the 1830s onwards, although it only appears as Chorlton in the Topographical Dictionaries published in 1825 and 1840.

The first building boom began in the 1860s along Edge Lane, followed by the really big boom which began after the recession in 1880 and pretty much redefined the area around the Three Banks, wiping out the small hamlet of Martledge.

And that of course raises the interesting fact that we were not just Chorlton and Hardy but also Martledge.

Martledge was the small hamlet stretching up from what is now the Four Banks and vanished under the rows of new development.

A rural Chorlton. circa 1890s

So completely did it vanish that within three decades than ancient name had been pretty much forgotten and people talked of the area as New Chorlton or the New Village to distinguish it from Chorlton Green and Beech Road which were Old Chorlton.

Hardy was that outpost beyond Chorlton Brook which had consisted of a few cottages and the farm, but the cottages were abandoned in the 1850s leaving only the farm.

As for Chorlton which was the area around the green it was the largest of our hamlets.

Chorlton-cum Hardy as a name appears to linger on into the late 1960s and early 70s but is slowly confined to history.

And for those who want more, the old township of Chorlton, ran north from the Mersey to roughly where the railway line was laid, west from St Werburghs, to the present border with Stretford, and extended down Edge Lane to Longford Park.

Chorlton Green, 1979

Counter to popular perception repeated by endless historians, the development of the area predates the railway, and really begins with the arrival of mains water in the 1860s, followed by gas and sanitation in the 1870s.

With the end of the recession, the two big landowners began selling agricultural land off to property speculators and builders in piecemeal fashion but did it with agreements by which the developers undertook to pay an annual rent rather than a cash sum, which freed up capital to use to build the properties.

This new phase began in the early 1880s and was helped by the arrival of the railway in 1880 and the Corporation network of trams at the start of the 20th century.

Leaving me only to reflect that some comedians have served us better, and I shall close with Flanders and Swann’s gentle reflection on the closure of branch railway lines in the 1960s which mentions Chorlton-cum-Hardy.

And of course to mention my one book, The Story of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, 2012*

“No churns, no porter, no cat on a seat
At Chorlton-cum-Hardy or Chester-le-Street”**

Location; Chorlton-cum Hardy and Martledge

Pictures; Chorlton-cum-Hardy 1979 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, extract from A Topographical Dictionary of the United Kingdom, 1825, Benjanin Pitts Capper,page 208, and Rural Chorlton courtesy of Allan Brown

*A History of the Ancient Chapels of Didsbury and Chorlton, John Booker, 1853

**The Slow Train, Flanders and Swann, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6OHD2uCpfU

***The Story of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2011/11/the-story-of-chorlton-cum-hardy.html

Changing Chorlton .......... no 2 Conrad’s on Wilbraham Road and a for sale sign

Now in an age of online shopping which vies with huge supermarket chains, there is something very pleasant about shopping at Conrad’s.

There is just so much in the place that it is pretty much like an Aladdin’s Cave of treasures.  You might go in for some stationary but be drawn to a range of paints, brushes and pencils and on the way fall across a packet of paper day glow stars.

And many of us over the years will have asked the staff for help with “another exciting school project” which involved creating an Egyptian pyramid, a Tudor Rose or Sidney the Snake.

It is one of those places I just enjoy visiting and of course always reminds me of Quarmby’s which managed to combine reams of paper, bottles of ink and anniversary cards for Nana with the upstairs magic which was the “toy floor.”

Even the grumpiest of my friends put their miserable side in their pockets when they accompanied me and the kids upstairs.

It started with the big toys which were always displayed on the walls as you made your way up, and opened out to  the huge collection of everything from puzzles, to cap guns, figures of farm animals and the ever popular board games.

Just like Conrad’s it was the quantity and variety of what was on offer and the sheer pleasure of going in for a bag of elastic bands and coming out with a small box of Lego.

So I was miffed yesterday to see a For Sale sign above Conrad’s shop front which prompted the assumption that this box of delights might become another bar, fast food outlet or restaurant.

Not that the onward march of the “night economy” should be rubbished.  At a time when so many traditional shops had closed leaving lines of empty businesses at least the bars, fast food outlets and restaurant filled the void

And of course alongside them are now a new range of independent traders, so perhaps if Conrad’s is sold it will remain a shop for all things crafty.

I hope so.

All of which just leaves me with Peter’s painting and that simple observation that he will miss the passing of Conrad’s as much as me and my four lads.

Location; Chorlton

Painting; Conrad’s © 2017 Peter Topping, Paintings from Pictures,
Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

Changing Chorlton ............... down at McFadyen’s Memorial Congregational Church

Now one of the popular posts recently has been a series on McFadyen’s Memorial Congregational Church by Tong Goulding.

It is a familiar landmark which has just undergone a big renovation and I have featured plenty of pictures of how it used to look and at least one when the work was underway but none of the finished building.

So here courtesy of Steve Raw is one of the new entrance with its stunning big window.

It was taken just a few days ago.

And I think it will reappear to adorn more stories from Tony and perhaps the odd reflective piece about our churches over the last century and a cit.

But for now given that lots of people like contrasts, here are two from a time before now.

The first is a favourite of mine, taken I think sometime at the beginning of the last century and reappearing on countless picture postcards

And just to finish one of Andy's Robertson's from the middle of the reconstruction..

Pictures; the Church on a sunny September day, 2015 from the collection of Steve Raw, the Church circa 1900, from the Lloyd collection, and the church during its renovation, 2015 courtesy of Andy Robertson