My grandparents were Charlie and Lily Routledge of Fiddle Wood Cottage. On one of my grandad’s birthdays he went to The Anchor with his sons, including my dad, and got ‘well-oiled’.Intoxicated with alcohol to the extent of losing control
My grandma had made a special tea and laid it out on a trestle table. Eventually he came staggering home and fell on the table which collapsed along with the food. So much for the party!
Ian Routledge Interview
Reading time: 5 min(s)
I was born at Beggartons in 1957 and lived at 54 Lower Mill Bank Road from around 1959 until 1966.
The Robison family lived in the house next door and we rented our property from them. Both families had a front door. Our house had one room upstairs and one room on the ground floor.
Their grandma was called ‘Gertie’ and was a character. She claimed to be blind but many doubted it. My grandma called her ‘Gorgeous Gussie’.
I had a younger sister, Sandra. We moved to Causeway Head, Soyland in about 1966 and were there 10 years.
My mum was Dawn Standen and she came from the North East to live in Morris’ hostel and work at Stansfield Mill, Triangle. Later she worked as a housekeeper for the Halls, at Damside. She would knit me jumpers and cardigans. Later in life she was partner to Stewart Andrews. She died in a car accident in 2004.
My dad was Horace. He worked at Ripponden and District Motors as a driver and later for the Water Board at West Vale. He died in 1986.
We had an auntie and cousins, the Cuthberts, who lived in Thimble Nook Cottage on Nathan Lane.
There were four sons and the youngest two were often in trouble with the police. One night, when I was seven, my grandad took me to the Speedway in Halifax. On the way home the two youngest Cuthberts got on the bus and started a fight with other lads. Police arrested both; grabbing the boys by their hair as they escorted them off the bus.
My grandad intervened, taking hold of one of the police officers by the tie and he ended up being arrested himself. So I had to make my own way home. Grandma wanted to know where grandad was. She was not pleased – again!
Mill Bank was still an insular village in the 1960s. People moved to different properties around the village but there were few incomers.
It was called ‘Debtors Retreat’ because the rents were so low and most of the properties were rented.
In 1970 there were hippies in end cottage next to the car park on Lower Mill Bank Road, opposite The George.
People didn’t have a lot of money; I remember John Wilson getting married to Margaret one Saturday and I was sent out to buy baked beans on toast to celebrate.
The [Fiddle] woods are looking very neglected now. In my time they were well maintained, and Blackburn and Sutcliffe looked after the waterways.
We played football and there were social events and Christmas parties at the Conservative Club in Ripponden.
There were very few cars in the village so we didn’t travel far. We got our first car just before we moved out of Mill Bank in 1966. It was a Morris 1000.
Occasionally we went to Halifax shopping with grandma or to the Speedway. I remember only one family holiday at Bridlington.
Steven Brooks was a lecturer at Manchester University and lived at Trout Beck. He was one of first people to commute from Mill Bank in the mid 1960s. He had a big beard.
I went to St. Mary’s School. Mr Proctor was the Head and Miss Womersley my teacher. Class sizes had fallen a lot by then and there were only about 20-30 pupils in three combined classes.
On Sunday nights before school I would be washed in a tin bath in the living room.
My dad gave me pocket money and I spent it on sweets. There were two shops on the top road, one opposite the Chapel and one at Bank View. There was also a butcher’s shop on stilts at the side of Grand View run by Tommy Ainsworth. I remember Berry’s Corner and the fish and chip shop being pulled down along with the cottages behind it.