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Category Archives: industrial heritage
The ‘lava flows’ of Harrington
As I write this, the twelfth eruption in four years of lava and magma is occurring on the Reykjanes peninsula in the South-West corner of Iceland. Webcams, aerial videos from drones, and photographs capture the flows and colours and forms … Continue reading
Posted in coal, coastal heritage, geology, haematite, industrial heritage, slag-banks
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The African Steam Ship Company, and the story of a piece of china
The shore at Parton, just North of Whitehaven, is a good place to find tiny sherds of pottery and china. Many of the fragments are of ‘blue and white’, of which some are willow-pattern – lucky finds are glimpses of … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, Found Objects, industrial heritage, ports, ships
Tagged china, Macgregor Laird, pottery sherds, transfer-ware, West Africa trade
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Haematite in Eskdale
On the first weekend in October the annual ‘Keswick’ Show and Sale of Herdwick sheep is held in Mitchell’s Livestock Mart in Cockermouth. Our tup ‘Bonzo’ had been accepted for official registration in the breed’s Stock Book: his appearance – … Continue reading
Posted in geology, haematite, industrial heritage, LIMESTONE, limestone and haematite, quarries
Tagged Herdwicks, iron ore, mines, raddle, Ravenglass
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Limestone: the Tata Shapfell kilns
The motorway sweeps down past the smooth rounded ‘sleeping elephants’ of the Howgill fells, down into the valley by Tebay, and then up again onto the moorland heights of Shap. Suddenly, incongruously, you see a tall vertical array of cylinders … Continue reading
Posted in industrial heritage, LIMESTONE, limestone limekilns, quarries, quicklime
Tagged Maerz, Shap, steel, Tata
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Limestone: quicklime, tubs and ghostly kilns
Lime kilns are a feature of limestone country. Many are small, and slotted into hillsides and escarpments like eyes in a skull, their brows an arch of brick or stone. Others are taller more imposing stone-built structures, sometimes with fancy … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, industrial heritage, LIMESTONE, limestone limekilns
Tagged railways, Warthole
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Port Carlisle: canals and ships and trains
(September 2020: you can now also view two videos about Port Carlisle, made for the launch of my book The Fresh and the Salt. The Story of the Solway: links are on the website.) When the tide is out, Port … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, industrial heritage, ports, ships
Tagged canals, emigration, memories, railway, steamers, wharf
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Ask the fellows who cut the peats
“I just went and asked for a job – I fancied gaan cuttin’ peat. The foreman said, ‘I’ll take you up on the moss’ – and what a walk it was! A big wide open space, peat stacks everywhere. And … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, conservation, industrial heritage, peat, bogs and moors, wetlands
Tagged climate change, peat, peat-cutting, Solway Wetlands
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The Solway viaduct
(Note: for a longer and fuller account of the design, construction and demolition of the Solway Junction Railway and viaduct, a research project by myself and James Smith and supported with funding from the Solway Wetlands Partnership and the Heritage … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, industrial heritage, peat, bogs and moors, Solway Viaduct & Railway
Tagged James Brunlees, railway, sandstone
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The Walls of Parton
‘Are you looking for the old port?’ The man seemed to have appeared from nowhere, yet he was tall and strongly built, white hair sticking up straight, not easy to overlook. ‘Port?’ I was bemused – I’d been poking at … Continue reading
Posted in coal, coastal heritage, fossils, industrial heritage, ports, sandstone, slag-banks, stones
Tagged coal, fossil plants, sandstone, ships, Solway
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Freshwater mussels in the West Cumbrian coalfield
The late Norman Hammond once told me that he used to go out in his boat to count the basking sharks when they came into the Solway. One time, he was motoring off Fleswick Bay near Whitehaven during a coal-miners’ … Continue reading
Posted in coal, fossils, industrial heritage, sea-bed & undersea, shells
Tagged Anthracomya, Carbonicola, freshwater mussels, musselbeds
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Solway Shore-walker 