Any Other Business

[tatsblisters 11,036]

2 minutes ago, Nicepix said:

Where I am from all the big industries; coal, steel, paper, all had very active social sections. Collieries like Maltby and Grimethorpe had their own football pitches with terraces, proper dug outs and changing rooms. Same in Sheffield with the steel works. Every weekend special trains were laid on to take the fishing club members off for matches on the Trent, Witham and Welland. Pigeon racing was also a top sport along with greyhound and whippet racing. A lot of the lads would do rabbitting and run long dogs. They had the money and the company of like minded mates.

Once these massive employers closed many of the working men never worked again in their own communities. That lead to a reduction of interest in the traditional sports and whilst some of the football teams still remain in name only, the youth sides were lost or reduced in numbers in many places. Keeping working dogs wasn't an option for some given the reduction in income and the fishing side would also be curtailed given that the subsidies from sports and social clubs ended when the industry closed. 

Shift work gave a lot of miners like me more time to indulge in various hobbies like dogs pigeon racing and such like a few of the pigeon flyers and keen allotment men at the pit I worked at used to work the regular night shift so they had time in daylight hours for their hobbies. 

[Nicepix 5,650]

2 minutes ago, tatsblisters said:

Shift work gave a lot of miners like me more time to indulge in various hobbies like dogs pigeon racing and such like a few of the pigeon flyers and keen allotment men at the pit I worked at used to work the regular night shift so they had time in daylight hours for their hobbies. 

Like my old mate used to say; he'd go back to the pit if only to catch up on his sleep.

[eastcoast 4,596]

7 hours ago, Nicepix said:

Most of the beaters on the shoot I was part of were redundant miners. Despite the hardships of the job they would have returned to the lits in a heartbeat. One of them used to say that he'd go back to the pit tomorrow, if only to catch up on his sleep. 

My Dad was a ripper dahn't pit and virtually everyone we knew hsd some colliery connection. Most of them over 50 were knackered through dust or injuries. My Dad succumbed to a kidney condition brought on by a rock fall. So why would the miners go back to working in such hostile conditions? Because the pits held the communities together. Those lads schooled, worked, drank, fished, ran dogs, kept chickens and tended their gardens together. It doesn't happen now. Where 3,000 men found employment and provided employment for hundreds of shop keepers there are now a collection of factories staffed by Poles or employing 5 or 6 people, none of whom live in the area. The fishing boats going out of Whitby and Scarborough on a weekend were full of miners. Coaches full of miners went down to the Lincolnshire drains or the Trent, or up to the Yorkshire rivers wherd they fished. More coaches took the football and rugby teams and their supporters to matches against other collieries. That has all gone. Where there was work and pride there is now no social cohesion. Nothing has been put in place to replace that.

I used the music in the clip below to accompany a little video I made about the dereliction of the steel industry. It came from the film Brassed Off. I lived in the village they called Grimley, really Grimethorpe, or Grimey as everyone calls it. It is very appropriate. Like the funeral music to an industry's death.

 

Great post Nicepix. Used to have a massive crush on Tara Fitzgerald, even named a terrier bitch after her. Told the girlfriend at the time the inspiration came from the Irish song Harp That Once Through Tara's Halls, nah, just really fancied Tara Fitzgerald.

[low plains drifter 11,279]

6 hours ago, socks said:

It was a private mine called the gleishon which was above pontardawe mate. 

Hi Ho 

 

 

[tatsblisters 11,036]

16 minutes ago, Nicepix said:

Like my old mate used to say; he'd go back to the pit if only to catch up on his sleep.

Can't deny some job's you could get your head down usually electricians or fitters on standby for breakdowns helped if you had a mate to take it in turns to keep konk an old saying at the pit I worked at to keep an eye out for any officials coming down the gate were the flame light from their oil lamp could be seen from a distance. Lol

[Nicepix 5,650]

1 minute ago, tatsblisters said:

Can't deny some job's you could get your head down usually electricians or fitters on standby for breakdowns helped if you had a mate to take it in turns to keep konk an old saying at the pit I worked at to keep an eye out for any officials coming down the gate were the flame light from their oil lamp could be seen from a distance. Lol

He used to say that he'd get his head down in the pack hole or "pack oil" as he called it. It was the same on nights in the police stations. A lot of the older bobbies would sleep in the canteen or even empty cells back in the late 1980's. Regularly I would be the only one out of foot patrol ironically walking around the village featured in Brassed Off while all the older bobbies were fast on in the nick. 

By the time I finished in 2011 you had barely enough time for a shit in a 10 hour shift let alone a kip or a meal.

 

[tatsblisters 11,036]

15 minutes ago, Nicepix said:

He used to say that he'd get his head down in the pack hole or "pack oil" as he called it. It was the same on nights in the police stations. A lot of the older bobbies would sleep in the canteen or even empty cells back in the late 1980's. Regularly I would be the only one out of foot patrol ironically walking around the village featured in Brassed Off while all the older bobbies were fast on in the nick. 

By the time I finished in 2011 you had barely enough time for a shit in a 10 hour shift let alone a kip or a meal.

 

Pack hole was hard collar all shovel work if you got the pack on early you had time to your self. 

[king 12,038]

5 hours ago, greg64 said:

well i do have COPD but  i don't know if it's down to that as i have been a smoker most of my life, just gone my first ten days without a fag though 

It can't of helped the copd mate.

But well done going 10 days so far without a fag

[tatsblisters 11,036]

2 hours ago, baker boy said:

Whats a pack hole, is it the void between the chocks and heading rings after the panzer has been pushed

Yes mate from what I can remember. 

[WILF 50,920]

On 08/10/2022 at 11:38, Nicepix said:

Most of the beaters on the shoot I was part of were redundant miners. Despite the hardships of the job they would have returned to the lits in a heartbeat. One of them used to say that he'd go back to the pit tomorrow, if only to catch up on his sleep. 

My Dad was a ripper dahn't pit and virtually everyone we knew hsd some colliery connection. Most of them over 50 were knackered through dust or injuries. My Dad succumbed to a kidney condition brought on by a rock fall. So why would the miners go back to working in such hostile conditions? Because the pits held the communities together. Those lads schooled, worked, drank, fished, ran dogs, kept chickens and tended their gardens together. It doesn't happen now. Where 3,000 men found employment and provided employment for hundreds of shop keepers there are now a collection of factories staffed by Poles or employing 5 or 6 people, none of whom live in the area. The fishing boats going out of Whitby and Scarborough on a weekend were full of miners. Coaches full of miners went down to the Lincolnshire drains or the Trent, or up to the Yorkshire rivers wherd they fished. More coaches took the football and rugby teams and their supporters to matches against other collieries. That has all gone. Where there was work and pride there is now no social cohesion. Nothing has been put in place to replace that.

I used the music in the clip below to accompany a little video I made about the dereliction of the steel industry. It came from the film Brassed Off. I lived in the village they called Grimley, really Grimethorpe, or Grimey as everyone calls it. It is very appropriate. Like the funeral music to an industry's death.

 

I said before a long time ago that now, as an older bloke, I realise we should have supported the miners because it meant so much more than just “the industry”……at the time I was young and just viewed it through the prism of The Sun and Scargills is a commie b*****d so f**k em type thing.

They were standing in the way of Thatchers brave new, get out and get it for yourself world to lads like me……how f***ing wrong were we ?!! 
What a bollocks up we sowed the seeds for and allowed to happen.

 

[Nicepix 5,650]

17 minutes ago, WILF said:

I said before a long time ago that now, as an older bloke, I realise we should have supported the miners because it meant so much more than just “the industry”……at the time I was young and just viewed it through the prism of The Sun and Scargills is a commie b*****d so f**k em type thing.

They were standing in the way of Thatchers brave new, get out and get it for yourself world to lads like me……how f***ing wrong were we ?!! 
What a bollocks up we sowed the seeds for and allowed to happen.

 

The miners I knew partially blamed Scargill for the closures. He lived on our shoot and him and his wife were constantly haranguing us about shooting. They got told to feck off by the men he had represented. One day Anne was giving them some gip about spending their time driving birds towards guns, hadn't they got better things to do, blah, blah...... One of them replied to the extent that if her husband hadn't made such a balls up of the negotiations they wouldn't have to walk the fields to earn £15 a day. They'd be in the pub spending their wages.

[Nicepix 5,650]

6 minutes ago, baker boy said:

Where was this

He lived just outside Worsbrough, a bungalow in the corner of a field. We had a partridge drive that ended with the guns lined up across the middle of the field about 200 yards away from his house. Some of the birds that had been shot well in front would turn and end up in his back garden. The wrought iron gate was always locked, but my spaniel could rotate sideways and squeeze her chest through the gap. She would nip into his garden, retrieve the runner then go back if there were any more. 

Edited October 9, 2022 by Nicepix

[tatsblisters 11,036]

silverwood+colliery - Bing video

WWW.BING.COM

 

[tatsblisters 11,036]

1 minute ago, Pez79 said:

I used to work with a few old miners who worked at Silverwood, I believe it was the first pit in Britain to mine a million tonne in a year.

Think it was mate i wanted to work there when i left school as most of my mates were going there but the old man put a stop to it i ended up going to Maltby pit when i was 19 after my parents gave in best thing i ever did looking back met the best mate a man could ask for a true countryman and poacher who sadly died a few years ago also it was an honour to work with lads who wouldn't stand for bullshite in the workplace unlike some of the divs and boring brown nosing arse lickers i have had to endure in the workplace since finshing at the pits.

[Nicepix 5,650]

12 minutes ago, Pez79 said:

I used to work with a few old miners who worked at Silverwood, I believe it was the first pit in Britain to mine a million tonne in a year.

I didn't realise they had rent boys down the pits.