New Project

[Sparrow]

The rise and fall of wool trade in the north of England, a series photographs showing the remnants of the wool industry now that time is softening their outlines, people gentrifying their interiors or nature taking back it's dominance.

As a child the skyline of all the local towns were dominated by the woollen mills, the sun was often obscured by the smoke of industry. Today it's all but gone, the older water-powered mills up in the dales have become twee dwellings, and Thomas Chaloner's alum works north of Whitby is now archaeology; he nicked the alum receipt from Pope Clement VIII in Italy (c1600) a "local lad makes good" sort of story, hard to believe England's prosperity for the for next 250 years relied on that felony.

I've been told the Wool-sack in the House of Lords is now stuffed with manmade fibres.

Buckets of urine on London street corners, sailors taking the piss, the Pope's alum works, gothic Whitby, industrial beauty spots, odd lines of pubs, works so mighty Ozymandias would have despaired and the end of a glorious revolution.

'Little Emily's Bridge' a packhorse bridge, named after Emily Norton a young member of a family who took refuge in the area during the civil war, a lot of fighting took place in Yorkshire due to the wool trade, state of the art technology and huge revenues made it a strategic asset, the fall of Skipton, and the loss of revenue would have been a great blow to the king.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3326/3407754542_8ba859366b_b.jpg


Linton church, St Michael and All Angels, was already old by the time the bridge was built in the 14c, the consensus is that it was built sometime in the 12 century then extended later as the population expanded.

Yet if one looks at the core building it looks like no Norman church I've ever seen; to my eye it has the look of those early Greek or Roman basilica one finds in the Med, something a retired legionnaire might recognise

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3597/3406943221_a2a38120b6_b.jpg

 

[rpsawin]

Capture it while you can. It sounds like a great project. Best luck and post more pictures.

Bob