Finding Loughborough connections in London!

Last weekend I was very lucky indeed, as I spent a few days wondering around London, something I hadn't done for a very long time. I was thrilled to happen upon some direct Loughborough connections, like products made in Loughborough, and some less direct ones, of course!!

Super to see that Loughborough is trendy! There were numerous buildings in London that were being renovated and refurbished, and it seems a covering with a building facade photographed onto it is the new way to hide what's going on, and to look appealing rather than having the traditional hoarding. You can see this in Loughborough town centre, surrounding the HSBC in Market Place. Since the blog post about changes in the town centre was written, the base of the surrounding of our HSBC is now painted with leaves!

Like all cities, towns, villages, and probably hamlets, London has a selection of telephone kiosks dotted around the city. Many are still operating as telephones, some are a little unloved, one which had a perforated, rather than a solid gold crown on the top (below, bottom right), and, of course, those in the city of London are painted black rather than red! You can read about Loughborough's Grade II listed K6 kiosk in an earlier blogpost. 

Likewise, it comes as no surprise to find that London has letter boxes! We passed very many of these, and there were an amazing number of double ones. I've written loads of posts about Loughborough's letter boxes, which you can find at Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5; Burton Street box; and Unusual and unreal boxes!

I must admit I was hugely surprised by the number of clocks I saw in London, mostly on the sides or fronts of buildings! One of these reminded me so much of our town hall clock!

On a related topic, in the London Transport Museum, I spotted rather lovely pocket watch - sorry, the photo really doesn't do it justice - which reminded me about one of Loughborough's watch and clock makers - Frederick Stubbs. 

As you'd expect, there were all types of vehicles in the transport museum - like sedan chairs, stagecoaches, trams, trolleybuses, buses, underground trains, steam trains, charabancs - but surprisingly, I couldn't find a single Brush body! 

In another museum, there was a poster from the time of the First World War, which helped the person on the street to identify specific aircraft. One of these was the Zeppelin, and I was reminded about the attack on Loughborough on the night of January 31st 1916, about which I've written numerous blogposts, and shared a virtual walk. 

I've only written briefly on this blog about the Freemasons Hall in Loughborough, which is on Orchard Street, in a building that used to be a congregational chapel. It is quite, quite different from the one in London (which although you can't see it in the photograph, does actually have a clock above the entrance).

As in Loughborough, drain covers bearing the name of their makers were also in evidence in London! This is just one example of the hundreds we saw, and examples of ones in Loughborough are on this blogpost.

Goodness me, it's already time to share this post with you, and all I've managed to do so far is share some of the more generic things with you! Pop back to the blog next week, for some direct Loughborough connections - books, bricks, perfumes, and pharmaceuticals!

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). Finding Loughborough connections in London. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/03/finding-loughborough-connections-in.html [Accessed 24 March 2024]

Take down policy:

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By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

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If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

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Lynne

The Day The Clock Stopped

If you walk into Loughborough town centre today, and you look up to the town hall clock, you will be confused: is it really 10 minutes past 5 o’clock? Well, no, and here’s the reason why …

On Wednesday 15th March 2023, at around 3-3.30pm, the HSBC branch in Loughborough Market Place, caught fire, and a substantial portion of the building collapsed. The fire spread to the Town Hall which is next door to the bank, and damage was done to certain areas. I’m assuming that this was when the Town Hall clock stopped - a couple of hours after the fire started. But, of course, this wasn’t the first time the beautiful timepiece had stopped …

Although the Town Hall had been built as the Corn Exchange in 1855, it was later extended, and became the Town Hall. The clock was commissioned in 1879 following a bequest from Basil Edward Farnham of Quorn, for which he left £200, the clock being for the use of the inhabitants, farmers and others, in recognition of the kindness shown to him for the many years he represented them as member of parliament for the northern division of the county of Leicester.

The clock was to be illuminated, but there was much discussion about the ownership of the clock, and who would pay to light it up! The clock was owned by the Town Hall Company, but it was the Loughborough Local Board who had been requested to pay for the gas to light up the clock.

The clock was made by George and Francis Cope who started a clockmaking business near Canning Circus in Nottingham in 1845. They – and the later generations of the family - made many types of clocks, some of which can still be seen today, like the tower clocks, a courtoom clock for the Galleries of justice, a large grandfather clock which is possibly still in Yate’s Wine Lodge in Nottingham, a wall-mounted clock in an auctioneers in Radford, the clock on the Nottingham University’s Trent Building, one on West Bridgford Grammar School building, as well as the one on the impressive council buildings in the centre of Nottingham, which was constructed in 1928. Incidentally, the bells for the latter were cast at none other than Taylors, Loughborough’s own bellfoundry. Nowadays, the firm of clockmakers is trading as a jewellers.

So, in the week leading up to 28th February 1880, Loughborough’s Town Hall clock was installed and set to work. The clock is described thus, in the ‘Hinckley News’ of 28th February 1880:

“The main wheel is 14 inches in diameter, and all the others correspond. It is fitted with Sir E. Beckett’s new double three-legged gravity escapement, and has a compensated pendulum and maintaining power to keep it going while it is being wound up. The pendulum weighs over a hundredweight, and the distinctive features of the escapement is that the pendulum does part of the work itself, and is not embraced as other escapements are by a crutch or a fork, but hangs independently, and the power to propel it is obtained by the falling to the centre of the gravity arms. Each arm after it has been discharged by the pendulum, falls with the pendulum to the centre, and after it has lifted the other arm, the train then lifts it ready to be discharged by the pendulum, which is a second and a quarter one.

The whole of the wheels are made of the best brass. The striking part has a main wheel, 14 inches in diameter, and the barrels for the cord to be wound on are made of iron. The hammer weighs 28lbs, and is lifted six inches high from cams. Wire ropes and iron pulleys are used and all the clock works are mounted in strong cast iron frames, which are cast solid, and are so arranged that any wheel may be taken out and dismantled without disturbing the rest. The dials are over 5ft 6in in diameter, and are fitted at an angle, one side facing to the Market Place, and the other to Ward’s End.

The outer circle is filled in with white opal glass, and the centre is of half-inch plate glass ground on one side. The hands are made of copper and gilt. Provision has also been made for illuminating the clock with gas, and a mechanical arrangement for lighting the same has been added.”

The article goes on to describe the bell:

“The bell, which is hung in a small turret above the clock has been cast by our eminent local firm of bell founders, Messrs. John Taylor and Co., and possess a very clear and mellow tone, the note struck by it being C. It is 2ft 8in in diameter and weighs 6cwt. 3aqrs. 3lbs. Besides the name of the founder, and the year in which it was cast, the bell bears the following inscription: ‘This bell and clock the gift of the late E. B. Farnham, of Quorndon House, M.P. for North Leicestershire, 1837 to 1859.’ The bell has been struck several times during the past few days, and its sound can be heard at a considerable distance.”

Interestingly, in later years, Miss Ada Annie Stubbs, daughter of Frederick Stubbs, jeweller and watch and clockmaker of Loughborough, regularly winds the Town Hall clock, and checks its accuracy every morning at 7am when she listens to the news broadcast. In the summer of 1956, the clock was overhauled by a Nottingham Company (I do not know if it was the same company as had made the clock originally), but on 26th January 1957, Miss Stubbs was worried that the clock had fallen silent, so she rushed to the Town Hall from her home on Leicester Road, to set if going again. Apparently, the clock had stopped just before 11pm the night before, but Miss Stubbs was only able to get it working again for about 30 minutes. The Nottingham company was called out again to sort it out. Miss Stubbs died in 1968, and more recently the clock’s mechanism was replaced so it no longer needs to be wound up to work.

Since that time, the clock has undergone further refurbishment, for example in 1980, and again in 2012 it stopped working. This time, it was out of action for six years, finally ringing out again in 2018, which it had continued to do until that fateful day last March. Here’s hoping it will once again be repaired and ring out across the town centre.        

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). The Day the Clock Stopped. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/03/the-day-clock-stopped.html  [Accessed 17 March 2023]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

Everywhere reminds me of Loughborough

So glad to be back in sunny Loughborough after a couple of weeks away in Cornwall! As ever, things I've spotted in the many places I've visited during the holiday have been constant reminders of our lovely market town. Indeed, there have been so many interesting connections, I could use up a whole year's worth of blog posts sharing my findings with you ... but I won't!!

So, a quick look at the similarities between Launceston - which was where we broke our long journey - and Loughborough. Both were small market towns, both played a part in the Civil War. 

Costume in Launceston Museum

Launceston Museum

Costumed mannequin at one time in the Old Rectory Museum

The War Memorial in Launceston rises up in the centre of the town, unlike ours which is in the beautiful setting of Queen's Park, and is now accompanied by a memorial to Loughborough's war horse, Songster. 

The town hall clock in Loughborough is pretty special: the clock I spotted in Launceston was attached to a bank building, and was rather ornate:

Both towns had a workhouse. Loughborough's first was on the site now occupied by the Royal Mail sorting office. The Union workhouse was situated on what is now Regent Street. I've posted before about Loughborough's Workhouse, so here's some information about Launceston's:

Now, of course, almost everywhere I go I am tuned in to spot bells! Sadly, they're not always the Taylors variety, but I love to have a quiet poke around, just in case! There were two in Launceston Museum, the first of these was used to summon estate workers to meals, and the second one from a local iron foundry:

The cast of the Great Paul Bell in Queen's Park Loughborough

Another formerly Loughborough-based company is always evident, wherever I go, because I spend a lot of time in bookshops, and whether they're selling new or second-hand books, you can guarantee they've got some Ladybird Books!!! At Launceston Museum, they had a ladybird, but no Ladybird Books:

Boundary stones, milestones and fingerposts? Don't get me started on that one - something I've blogged about before!!!! Here's a boundary stone from the Bude Canal:

And ours from the boundary between Loughborough and Woodthorpe, although experts suggest that this one is not in its original location:

Pubs everywhere are of interest!!! Like Loughborough, Launceston has a White Hart pub: I don't know what the Launceston one was like inside, but it differed on the outside from Loughborough's as it actually had a 3D white hart sitting on the front of the building.

Then I thought I'd spotted another local connection, when I saw an old boot hanging from the front of a building. Did Launceston, like Loughborough, used to have an Old Boot pub?

Excitement continued to grow, until I came to the doorway of the shop, and looked at the tiled floor ... 

Ah well, Leicester's quite close!!!

Another area of employment in Loughborough was lacemaking. Local inventor John Heathcoat had a lacemaking factory on Mill Lane (now Market Street) which was attacked in 1816. The building that replaced it has recently been honoured with a Leicestershire Green Plaque. Lacemaking on display in Launceston Museum was of the Bedfordshire pillow lace type.

Another interest of mine is fire insurance plaques. I don't think there are many in Loughborough: I've only found one, on a house in Park Street. Launceston Museum had a few on display:

And finally, when I was training to be a tour guide we were encouraged to look up, in order to learn more about a town's history from its buildings. I've been used to doing this for many years, but I would also encourage you to look down, as there is a huge amount of history hidden in our streets, which we simply walk over and take for granted! Here's an example from Launceston:

And a couple from Loughborough:

Many of the things I've written about also appear in 'Secret Loughborough'.

You are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follow:

Dyer, Lynne (2019). Everywhere reminds me of Loughborough. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2019/07/everywhere-reminds-me-of-loughborough.html [Accessed 21 July 2019]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Lynne