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Parkwood Springs


Guest paulie

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Guest erudd123

Hi,

I am a Masters student at Sheffield Hallam studying Documentary Production and I am currently creating a short film piece based around the regeneration of Parkwood Springs Post war (1940's.)

To do this properly I would really LOVE to interview three people:

1. Somebody who either lived in or witnessed the demolition of the housing estate in 1978 or has any photographs/ filming of this happening

2. Somebody who witnessed or knows accounts of the state of Parkwood Springs in 1940 after the devastation of the wars air raids

3. Someone currently living in Parkwood Springs

4. Finally I would be very interested in talking to somebody who worked in the industrial hub of Parkwood Springs, preferably the gas works but any sort of industry would be great.

I know I am looking for a lot here and it is most likely that I won't be able to find all these people but if anyone knows someone who you think would be good for me to talk to or even yourselves please let me know.

Please ask me any questions :)

Thanks!

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Guest shelagh scholfield

Sorry I cant answer your questions.My family lived there until the houses were demolished . We don't have any photos and as far as I know no one is living there now. My family loved living at the Springs and were sorry to leave.I hope you do have a film made and that the public will be able to view it.I for one would love to see it.

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Hi,

I am a Masters student at Sheffield Hallam studying Documentary Production and I am currently creating a short film piece based around the regeneration of Parkwood Springs Post war (1940's.)

To do this properly I would really LOVE to interview three people:

1. Somebody who either lived in or witnessed the demolition of the housing estate in 1978 or has any photographs/ filming of this happening

2. Somebody who witnessed or knows accounts of the state of Parkwood Springs in 1940 after the devastation of the wars air raids

3. Someone currently living in Parkwood Springs

4. Finally I would be very interested in talking to somebody who worked in the industrial hub of Parkwood Springs, preferably the gas works but any sort of industry would be great.

I know I am looking for a lot here and it is most likely that I won't be able to find all these people but if anyone knows someone who you think would be good for me to talk to or even yourselves please let me know.

Please ask me any questions :)

Thanks!

If you go on Sheffield forum and look up a guy called Retep, he is the expert on Parkwood Springs having lived and worked in the area most of his 60 odd years.

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This was taken from the top of Parkwood Springs now the Ski Village.

What a view.

attachicon.gifimg108.jpg

Sheffield ski slope in the early days, and a view of the same skyline taken from Walkley early one morning in 1990. W/E.

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Guest catherineemmalewis

My ancestor Richard Holman lived at 66 Vale Road for a time around the 1870s/80s. He was a fellmonger (buying and selling animal skins) and judging by the newspaper reports from his death in 1887 it looks as though he owned a fair amount of property in the area including houses 16 and 18 Vale Road, houses on Harvest Lane, a house and land on the corner of Vale Road and Mount Road and some other pieces of land on Vale Road. He also owned a site called Ball Bridge Leather Works which I presume is where the business was based.

Very sad that the house on Vale Road is no longer there as this was about the most proserous period in my family's history and it would be lovely to get a better idea of how they lived!

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He lived on Rock Street 1849-1852.

My ancestor Richard Holman lived at 66 Vale Road for a time around the 1870s/80s. He was a fellmonger (buying and selling animal skins) and judging by the newspaper reports from his death in 1887 it looks as though he owned a fair amount of property in the area including houses 16 and 18 Vale Road, houses on Harvest Lane, a house and land on the corner of Vale Road and Mount Road and some other pieces of land on Vale Road. He also owned a site called Ball Bridge Leather Works which I presume is where the business was based.

Very sad that the house on Vale Road is no longer there as this was about the most proserous period in my family's history and it would be lovely to get a better idea of how they lived!

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Have been informed there is a meet of some Parkwood residents Monday 2nd March -2-O'clock at the top of Wood Street wellington/Hillsborough Hotel.

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Guest bobman

The house to the very right of the pic with the street name on it is 193 wallace road, I lived ther from when I was born in 1969 up until they pulled em down in 1974

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Guest bobman

this is a story i found that was written by my dad

 

193 Wallace Rd Was my address from 1969 to 1974. This was the last house, next to the jennel at the top on the left. We moved there as newly weds I worked in Darnall West Signal Box and the house became available through BR Eastern Region Traffic at the MASSIVE amount of £1.25 a week rent inc rates. We moved from off the Manor to Parkwood to further my career as a signalman trainee. I applied for the signal box (Neepsend) that was at the bottom of garden behind 193 just 50 - 60 metres away. Unknown to myself and my wife, was that the village was coming under purchase order by the council. 

On moving there the terrace of houses occupant's welcomed us with warmth of, has tha' gorra job if so wear'. When telling them that I was going to be the new signalman, a sense of esteem came over and I was treated very much like a well-to-do character from a big estate. I must admit it was a good satifying welcome.

My neighbors were also unaware of the pending destruction of the community, having their abodes provided with their careers on the railways. Being railway cottages we assumed we would be passed by. (fact is, we were some of the first to be bludgeoned out by the council...)

A few months after moving in, we were awoken at about 1 in the morning. Thump thump thump sounds were coming up through the three storey buiding's floors. On investigating, I ended up out side at the top of the jennel to find one of my neighbors chopping down the 8 inch square post at the top of the steps with a double headed axe. On enquiring "What the ******* **** are you doing? His reply was "Need some firewood for the morning for mi dad, when he comes home from work"

His name was Sam and we ended up good friends. (Marshall) I think was his name, can't remember!

((Just to put it in now while I think of it, there was a house further down the road on the even number side that was full (or at least seemed that way) of *** men!!! I only remember them because they were depicted on ITV Calender news as a fore-runner to men living to-gether and in them days, 'Getting away with it'...Can't remeber full details but I suppose other people who lived near and next to them will!! And I suppose Calender will have recordings of their interview program.))

My house soon became uncared for by the estate agent who mysteriously over-night aquired the house from British Rail (E).

In a matter of weeks it became imposible to have a meal without the cieling falling on our heads when a freight train went past. The building was 3 stories high with cellars and as it deteriated (quite fast really) we moved from sleeping in the top bedroom into the second floor bedroom. And later I was fetching something from the top room and put my foot through the floor all the way up to my bum. Luckily the room's door underneath was open and I put my foot on it. To this day I still wonder if I'd have gone through the floor completely to go through next and so-on only to find myself in the cellar. The house was infested with woodworm and the estate agent did absolutely nothing so we didn't pay the rent for months (which was now £1.50 a wk)..

I found myself in a court on Queen Street showing my scars from the nails as I went through the floor. Never had to pay a penny off the arears and was allowed a reduced rent of 75 pence. So rich we were!!!

My career also became heavy with dark clouds looming on the horizon as BR shut down signal box after signal box in the north.

This took me onto a survival frame of mind and my old hobby of a few years came into gear, motorcycles! All of a sudden my self esteem of being well thought of, hit the deck.. He's an Hell Angel was said. 6' 4" tall, long ginger hair and most of all ' My Youth ' was feared from the out-set by the locals. It did get out of hand a few times. No I'm lieing! Lots of times because, another hells angel moved into one of the empty properties. He was a shunter at Brightside Freight Yard, till his life took on the redundancy from his job.

The community was slowly and surely turning from people we knew at the start to the estate agent renting the empty houses to just about anybody ( that means there were good and bad people moving in, mainly good ) This to myself made the village an open target for scrapmen and the likes. So, myself and Sam the wood chopper man, joined in. More or less as the old residents moved out, we moved in to collect scrap and even furniture before the scrapmen did.

Most of the time we knew the old occupants and they would tell us when they were moving. 

But alas the community died, my father was a railway worker for a great number of years and he knew just about everyone that lived in the railway cottages at Parkwood. It even got to the stage of him not knowing anyone at all. 

We moved from there to live at Sheffield Lane Top and I had no-where for the motercycles (dozens of them) left in the cellars. I found parts of my bikes turning up everywhere for years.

I could carry on but, the memories come in fits and starts.

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Still see Sam the woodcutter occasionally as I pass through Parson Cross, he nearly died when he got electrocuted in a works accident.

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My grandfather was an engine driver working with the Great Central and moved from Gainsborough to Sheffield in the very early 1920s. The family lived in a "Railway" house on Parkwood Springs and quickly hated the place and moved as soon as they could into a Corporation House. My mother never explained why they were so unhappy and I never did find out...perhaps it was neighbours?

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Guest bobman
On 5 August 2016 at 16:40, neddy said:

Still see Sam the woodcutter occasionally as I pass through Parson Cross, he nearly died when he got electrocuted in a works accident.

Did you know my dad aswell

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4 hours ago, bobman said:

Did you know my dad aswell

Can't say I did but may have spoken in passing if he went in the Parkwood Hotel, I used to call in occasionally.

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Guest bobman

My dads name is bob green, my grandad was frank green, he was a railway porter and a band conductor, apparently loads of people on the springs knew or knew of my grandad

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On 9/26/2009 at 13:55, DaveH said:

Here's a couple from the set of 1974 pictures which I have posted before (sorry).

 

They are of the old Sheffield Rolling Mills.

 

I think the area immediately behind these works is Parkwood springs

...or is it neepsend first and then Parkwood springs?

...or is Parkwood springs further up away from town?

 

post-822-1253969687_thumb.jpg

 

post-822-1253969719_thumb.jpg

The houses on the skyline in pic 1, are Woodside, Pye Bank, Pitsmoor, take your pick. The houses with the round roofs were  called Dutch houses or upside down houses. I lived in one of them and they provided splendid views of the valley towards where the picture was taken from.

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On 2/23/2018 at 19:43, neddy said:

Another one gone from the photo, R.I.P Harold Lamb.

Very sorry to hear about Harold he was in the same class as me at Hillfoot.  The last time we spoke was at the funeral of family friend Pat Dale, that would have been around three years ago. A sad loss.  W/E.

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1 hour ago, Waterside Echo said:

Very sorry to hear about Harold he was in the same class as me at Hillfoot.  The last time we spoke was at the funeral of family friend Pat Dale, that would have been around three years ago. A sad loss.  W/E.

I lost touch with Harold when he moved his business a very good mechanic.

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