Lynne About Loughborough: Market Harborough

Showing posts with label Market Harborough. Show all posts

Monday, 22 April 2024

S is for Swan

Talking to someone the other day, they wondered why there were a lot of swans in Melton Mowbray. I must admit, I wasn’t sure if they were talking about real, live swans, or some other kind of swan, but whichever it was, it got me to thinking about swans in Loughborough!

A couple of really obvious ones, are the real ones that can be seen on the canal, or down at Charnwood Water, or the little pond adjacent to the Tuckers clay pit off Forest Road, called Swan Lake.

Then there’s the swans that give their name to something. So, Swanns Funeral Services on Bridge Street was established in 1892. Then, we’ve got Swan Street, which joins High Street and runs towards Derby Road, via The Rushes. On one of the maps I’ve seen, The Rushes was identified as being called West Street. I can only assume that these street names came from the knowledge that the area was frequently flooded?

Of course, along The Rushes, we also have a pub called the Swan-in-The-Rushes, but it hasn’t always been called this. Previously the pub was known as the Charnwood Forest Railway Inn, then became the Charnwood Inn when the old building was demolished and the new one built in 1931-2. It wasn’t until 1986 that the name changed again, to the Swan-in-The-Rushes.

But this wasn’t the first pub in Loughborough to have the word Swan in its name. In 1831, there appears to have been a new building with a yard built on Wellington Street, which was being used as a public house called the White Swan, and had been recently occupied by George Slater. This advert appeared in the Leicester Journal and Midlands County Advertiser of 10th June 1831. This new building must have replaced an older building which was also used as a pub, but called the Black Swan. Apparently, the White Swan closed in 1959.

On my recent travels, I have seen both White Swan and a Black Swan in Melton Mowbray, and the Three Swans at Market Harborough, all of which had lovely 3D signs!

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This is one of a series of posts in the ‘April A-Z Blogging Challenge’

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

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Dyer, Lynne (2024). S is for Swan. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/04/s-is-for-swan.html [Accessed 22 April 2024]

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Sunday, 21 April 2024

Ladybird at the Museum

Today I’ve been out on the allotment helping to keep in good shape, and make sure it produces lots of lovely fruit and veg! While I was there, doing a bit of weeding, I spotted a ladybird – and that got me thinking about Ladybird Books!!

I remember going to an exhibition in Leicester Museum and Art Gallery a few years ago, and our own Charnwood Museum has a Ladybird Corner, and has hosted some dedicated exhibitions, as has the local public library. So, it seems like Leicestershire are showcasing Ladybird Books across several of its museums.

I believe Melton Carnegie Museum are also going to feature Ladybird Books in a forthcoming exhibition. This will run from 4th May to 14th September 2024, and will focus on the series Well-Loved Tales. This is s0sre to be an interesting exhibition, and Melton Museum is worth a visit to see its other exhibitions which tell the story of Melton and its surrounding area.

I think the Ladybird Books exhibition at Market Harborough Museum has been and gone, but there is to soon be an exhibition in the community showcase featuring books from the At Work series, and the People Who Help Us series, and the responses of people who live in Market Harborough and around about.

Both Charnwood Museum and Melton Carnegie Museum also have a community showcase: Charnwood’s is called the Spotlight Case, and is currently hosting an exhibition called m’Other Voices. Melton’s is currently about the Observer Corps., but from May will be focussed on the battalions of paratroopers who were stationed in and around Melton Mowbray ahead of Operation Market Garden, which took place in September 1944. Some units of the 82nd Airbourne Parachute Regiment were also billeted near Melton, and in Rutland, as well as being in Quorn.

Anyway I hope you get to have a look around the museums in other parts of the county as they are well worth the trip, especially as the themes are often cahnging!

From the Ladybird exhibition at Market Harborough

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

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Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). Ladybird At the Museum. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/04/ladybird-at-museum.html [Accessed 21 April 2024]

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Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

Sunday, 9 September 2018

The cemetery chapels

Last weekend I spent an enjoyable afternoon at the local Sutton Bonington Show. Over the years I've been many times, initially because the Hathern Concert Brass band played a turn there, but I still try and go even though the youngest no longer plays with them.

This year, I'd recently been to the Leics. County Show at Market Harborough, and I couldn't help but compare the two events. These were so similar, that I even chatted to some of the same stallholders at both the events, but I somehow felt that the Sutton Bonington Show, considering its size and location (when compared to the Leicestershire Show Ground, and the Leics. show being a county-wide event) the Sutton Bonington show was equally as good, and in some cases better. Last year at SB we saw the Nottingham Knights perform in the ring: they weren't here this year, but they were at the County Show. There were not quite so many animals on show at SB, and the variety of cows were not quite as diverse, so they concentrated on Dexter cows. What I particularly like about the SB show is the handicraft / horticulture / baking tent, where competition entries are put on display alongside the judges comments: this is what makes SB a local event I suppose, unlike the County Show. See photos of the event at the end of this post.

Anyway, this is not the topic of this week's blogpost!! To the cemetery chapels ...

This weekend and next are the Heritage Open Day events, and I have been lucky enough to make a number of visits, and although there were literally hundreds of places to visit, for some reason or other, my visits have centred around cemetery chapels!

Perhaps this is because of our very own cemetery chapels, on Leicester Road, and maybe my visits were sparked by reading about these in "Loughborough in 50 Buildings" or in the recent "Loughborough Echo" piece about the buildings being up for rent again, the lift company having moved out. Here's a bit about our cemetery chapels from "Loughborough in 50 Buildings":

"Loughborough Cemetery was created following the passing of the Burial Acts, the chapel being designed by architects Bellamy and Hardy of Lincoln in the popular Gothic Revival style, and built by John Sudbury of Loughborough.

At a ceremony in July 1856, a procession, including members of the Burial Board, which comprised many well-known local men, including Edward Chatterton Middleton, Edward Warner, Beauvoir Brock, and Henry Toone, walked from the Town Hall to the cemetery, where Edward Middleton laid the foundation stone for the chapels."

And some photos:

As authoritative sources suggest, our chapels are some of the most splendid in the country. So, on the trail of others with which to compare, I went off and had a look around those in Melbourne, South Derbyshire, Melbourne being one of my favourite places. The chapels are somewhat smaller, of slightly different design, ours were opened in 1856, Melbourne's in 1859, and both are Grade II Listed. They do, however, differ in current usage, the Melbourne one being "in need" and the subject of a joint project between the Parish Council and Melbourne Historical Research Group to re-vitalise the buildings, and Loughborough's renovated and leased to a company (recently Cibes Lifts, but currently vacant). Some photos below of the Melbourne cemetery chapels:

The cemetery chapel at Rothley is quite different from the ones at Loughborough and Melbourne, being constructed in 1904, hence why it's of red brick construction. Also, being rather close to Swithland, it has a Swithland slate roof. With Rothley being a somewhat smaller town than either Loughborough or Melbourne, the chapel is correspondingly smaller. It does not appear on the register of Listed Buildings, but is of sufficient importance to be locally listed. On the day I visited, the building was hosting an exhibition about the Barrow upon Soar workhouse, which covered about 30 local parishes. This was an excellent exhibition and, as you know, I'm quite interested in workhouses, so I'll come back to this when I have more time. In the meantime, please enjoy photos from the Rothley cemetery chapels, followed by the Sutton Bonington Show.

The Sutton Bonington Show:

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Dyer, Lynne (2018). Leicestershire County Show. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2018/09/the-cemetery-chapels.html [Accessed 9 September 2018]

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Lynne

Sunday, 26 August 2018

Leicestershire County Show

This weekend we've popped along to the Leicestershire County Show. Well, we didn't exactly pop: we walked to Loughborough railway station, caught a train to Market Harborough, and walked to the new Leicestershire County Showground. We were going to walk along the canal at Harborough, but sadly part of the footpath was closed so we ended up walking along the roadside.

I've always been a bit of a fan of county shows, and very well remember as a child going along to the Abergavenny and Border Counties Show. To a small child, it seemed enormous: a huge arena with all sorts of displays going on (I particularly liked the scrambling bike displays), vast fields to walk through, various side arenas, loads of little stalls selling all sort of things, a huge marquee housing the entries for the handicraft competitions, an equally huge one for the entries in the flowers, fruit and veg competitions, and a smaller one for the baking entries. And not forgetting the humungous food and drinks tent!

So when the Leicestershire County Show came to Loughborough - well, Dishley, to be precise - I just had to go along. I remember one time we went we drove, and queued for what seemed like hours along Warwick Way! Anyway, this was quite some years ago now, and the show has since been to Melton Mowbray, before moving to its current place. Some of the things I loved about the show when it was at Dishley, was the variety of events, stalls, and demonstrations, the animals ...

Photos from the May 2005 event at Dishley:

Photos from the May 2003 event at Dishley:

In its new location at Market Harborough, there was certainly plenty of space for the arenas, for the stalls, for food outlets, the craft tent, a fairground, vintage vehicles and pens for the animals. Considering the weather that we've had for most of the summer, it was a little overcast and a tad chilly, but it was a good day out.