Re: Where Mordex was
Posted: Mon Jul 27, 2020 1:30 pm
Great film Clive. There are still a lot of grayling in that stretch of the Don. There were several factories down from there that were wiped out in the Sheffield floods of 2007 and in some cases the land is only now being brought back into use.
The beginning of my spell of living in Sheffield was in late 1981 when I joined the Sheffield University Sociology department to carry out a survey of workers who had been made redundant from one of the great original steel firms Hadfield's (by then a part of Lonrho) a few years earlier. They were very far from being 'little mesters' but had been one of the largest steel forgings manufacturers in Sheffield (and hence the world) specialising in special steels and armaments. From 1869 the founder Robert Hadfield produced mainly castings for wheels and axles of an unrivalled strength and at one point it was estimated that more than 1,500,000 Hadfield's wheels were in use around the world. His son, also called Robert, was a qualified metallurgist and invented manganese steel and other important alloys. For many years they were the largest producers of artillery shells. In 1979 they had greatly reduced the workforce at their East Hecla works on Vulcan Road, which at one time covered 36 acres, they also closed completely another historic factory - the Brown Bayley works - where Harry Brearley (the inventor of stainless steel) had been works manager and director. Both these factories had been the focus for aggressive mass picketing (including miners 'led' by Arthur Scargill) in the national steel strike of 1980, even though they were still privately run and the actual dispute was between the ISTC (under Bill Sirs) and the nationalised steel industry then run by Ian MacGregor who later became even better known as Scargill's adversary at the NCB. The then Chief Exec of Hadfield's, Derek Norton, organised a retaliatory picket of his own, bussing 150 of his workers to London who then picketed the union's headquarters in Gray's Inn Road.
One of the first things I did in that job in late 1981 was to pick up from the works at Vulcan Road the (hand written) listing of the names and addresses of those made redundant in 1979. It was a vast echoing Victorian monument to industrial power with a large commemorative tablet by the front door to those of its workers who had died in the two world wars (despite presumably being in 'reserved occupations'). And just about completely empty by then. An eery feeling, that I was walking with ghosts, took hold of me as I made my way through to the sole remaining working office at the heart of the complex. This was the end of an era that began 150 years ago and we'd never get anything like it back ever again.
There's still steel in the East End of Sheffield, but greatly reduced now. The East Hecla Works became the site for the Meadowhall Shopping Centre, Hadfield's is remembered by a bridge and a weir https://www.google.com/maps/place/Vulca ... -1.4065942. The Brown Bayley works became the site for the Don Valley Stadium, built for the World Student Games in 1989 (the TV highlights were shown on Yorkshire TV at 4 am following repeats of Prisoner Cell Block H) and a perpetual white elephant thereafter, demolished in 2013 the site now houses the Olympic Legacy Park, comprising an academy, a UTC, the English Institute of Sport and various other sporting facilties. Brown Bayley itself is remembered by a footbridge over the nearby canal.
The beginning of my spell of living in Sheffield was in late 1981 when I joined the Sheffield University Sociology department to carry out a survey of workers who had been made redundant from one of the great original steel firms Hadfield's (by then a part of Lonrho) a few years earlier. They were very far from being 'little mesters' but had been one of the largest steel forgings manufacturers in Sheffield (and hence the world) specialising in special steels and armaments. From 1869 the founder Robert Hadfield produced mainly castings for wheels and axles of an unrivalled strength and at one point it was estimated that more than 1,500,000 Hadfield's wheels were in use around the world. His son, also called Robert, was a qualified metallurgist and invented manganese steel and other important alloys. For many years they were the largest producers of artillery shells. In 1979 they had greatly reduced the workforce at their East Hecla works on Vulcan Road, which at one time covered 36 acres, they also closed completely another historic factory - the Brown Bayley works - where Harry Brearley (the inventor of stainless steel) had been works manager and director. Both these factories had been the focus for aggressive mass picketing (including miners 'led' by Arthur Scargill) in the national steel strike of 1980, even though they were still privately run and the actual dispute was between the ISTC (under Bill Sirs) and the nationalised steel industry then run by Ian MacGregor who later became even better known as Scargill's adversary at the NCB. The then Chief Exec of Hadfield's, Derek Norton, organised a retaliatory picket of his own, bussing 150 of his workers to London who then picketed the union's headquarters in Gray's Inn Road.
One of the first things I did in that job in late 1981 was to pick up from the works at Vulcan Road the (hand written) listing of the names and addresses of those made redundant in 1979. It was a vast echoing Victorian monument to industrial power with a large commemorative tablet by the front door to those of its workers who had died in the two world wars (despite presumably being in 'reserved occupations'). And just about completely empty by then. An eery feeling, that I was walking with ghosts, took hold of me as I made my way through to the sole remaining working office at the heart of the complex. This was the end of an era that began 150 years ago and we'd never get anything like it back ever again.
There's still steel in the East End of Sheffield, but greatly reduced now. The East Hecla Works became the site for the Meadowhall Shopping Centre, Hadfield's is remembered by a bridge and a weir https://www.google.com/maps/place/Vulca ... -1.4065942. The Brown Bayley works became the site for the Don Valley Stadium, built for the World Student Games in 1989 (the TV highlights were shown on Yorkshire TV at 4 am following repeats of Prisoner Cell Block H) and a perpetual white elephant thereafter, demolished in 2013 the site now houses the Olympic Legacy Park, comprising an academy, a UTC, the English Institute of Sport and various other sporting facilties. Brown Bayley itself is remembered by a footbridge over the nearby canal.