Jump to content

Hi Everyone, I'm New!


Guest nicknock

Recommended Posts

Guest nicknock

Hi all

Fascinating site - it's going to keep distracting me from work, I can just tell!

Family history has brought me here: Cloughs, Fowlers and Firths mainly... I was born in Sheffield, but I've never lived there and don't know it very well and I'm often finding questions thrown up by my research - which I'll now be able to pass on! Hope I'll be able to contribute too.

Bye for now

Nicknock

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi all

Fascinating site - it's going to keep distracting me from work, I can just tell!

Family history has brought me here: Cloughs, Fowlers and Firths mainly... I was born in Sheffield, but I've never lived there and don't know it very well and I'm often finding questions thrown up by my research - which I'll now be able to pass on! Hope I'll be able to contribute too.

Bye for now

Nicknock

Hi and welcome to the Forum! Bring 'em on, we love a challenge, and welcome your contributions, the more the merrier!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi all

Fascinating site - it's going to keep distracting me from work, I can just tell!

Family history has brought me here: Cloughs, Fowlers and Firths mainly... I was born in Sheffield, but I've never lived there and don't know it very well and I'm often finding questions thrown up by my research - which I'll now be able to pass on! Hope I'll be able to contribute too.

Bye for now

Nicknock

Welcome to Sheffield History nicknock.

Notice in your profile to the left of your post that your family history research by surname includes a couple of well known prominent Sheffield names, - Firth (as in Firth Brown Steel) and Loxley (as in the place just northwest of Sheffield)

Any family connections?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi all

Fascinating site - it's going to keep distracting me from work, I can just tell!

Family history has brought me here: Cloughs, Fowlers and Firths mainly... I was born in Sheffield, but I've never lived there and don't know it very well and I'm often finding questions thrown up by my research - which I'll now be able to pass on! Hope I'll be able to contribute too.

Bye for now

Nicknock

From your list of interests it looks as though we have quite a bit in common ie History, Books, Garden and Graphic Design. I've kept chickens but never pigs.

Gender? I met an old bloke who lived out in the bush in Tasmania. He told me he had 3 kids - one of each :unsure:

Hope you enjoy the site.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest nicknock

Thanks everyone for your interest, pleased to meet you all.

Re my family tree interests, yes I do have connections to those Firths. My 3 x gt grandfather was Edward Firth, bro of Mark and son of Thomas who founded the original Firth steel firm, Thos Firth & Sons. And my grandmother is a Fowler, grew up at Crookesmoor (a house called Crookesmoor House which I've never been able to find, think it may be under the uni). Her forebears lived in Wadsley Hall. They were land-agents for the Duke of Norfolk, I think, and her ? x gt uncle was John Fowler of Forth Bridge fame. All very illustrious, sadly not much evidence of it all now!

As for the Loxleys, I'm not aware of a specific link with the place, although I suppose wayback it's likely - I've traced them back to the Bradfield/Ecclesfield areas so far.

My Clough family were actually originally from the East Riding but my gg grandfather Thomas Carter Clough lived in Sheffield and was with the 12th Yorks & Lancs regiment.

Gender? I'm one of the first two! ;-) Are you a graphic designer Thylacine?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks everyone for your interest, pleased to meet you all.

I think, and her ? x gt uncle was John Fowler of Forth Bridge fame.

Quote from an old episode of "The likely lads" in which Rodney appears in a quiz show, -

Quizmaster.

Who built the Forth bridge?

Rodney

I don't even know who built the first three! lol

Interestingly this is the "other" John Fowler who was a famous Victorian engineer.

Due to my interest in steam traction engines I am more familiar with John Fowler the agricultural engineer from Leeds (John Fowler and Co. Leeds)

This John Fowler invented the 2 engine method of steam ploughing and produced the engines to do it.

Unfortunately he was involved in an accident involving a plough and his foot

Tetanus set in and he died in 1865 aged 38.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks everyone for your interest, pleased to meet you all.

And my grandmother is a Fowler, grew up at Crookesmoor (a house called Crookesmoor House which I've never been able to find, think it may be under the uni).

Here it is nickknock:

Link to 1849 Map

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this would be the site of Crookesmoor House - on the right, now, as you say, Uni buildings.

(Department of Landscape I think)

Google Streetview

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest nicknock

Thanks Vox, that's brilliant - knew I was going to love this site!

Don't suppose you might happen to know when the original house was demolished? Looks like the right place on the map, but I'm wondering if they lived in a re-built version of the house. Their address was variously 422 Crookesmoor Rd (1891) or Crookesmoor House, Crookesmoor Rd (1911/1925) and the street number makes it sound like a house in a row, although it was definitely a grand pile. I always imagined it to be a Victorian townhouse but I really don't know. I suppose they may have lived in the original building with other houses being built along the road and numbering introduced to all for the post office....?

Thankyou!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Number 424 is the house just visible on the left.

The cobbled entrance, which would have been number 422, leads to a driveway which goes to the center of the site. Right where the old map shows the house to have been.

Google Streetview

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Crookesmoor Building was erected during the 1970's

Originally to house the Department for Law and Management.

I read somewhere that it may be in line for demolition at some point.

If it is, that's another short lifespan for a building in Sheffield. Crazy

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest nicknock

You're absolutely right. That is fascinating - thankyou so much for your help!

I did a bit of googling, and I'd picked up on the loss of historic buildings... seems sad and short-sighted.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks everyone for your interest, pleased to meet you all.

Gender? I'm one of the first two! ;-) Are you a graphic designer Thylacine?

I did graphic design at Randwick School of Art in Sydney in the early 70's when everything was done with technical pens, lettraset and coloured markers.

Now 85% of our work is done on computers. I'm a total Luddite, the only satisfaction I get now is from drawing and painting at home in my spare time.

What about you?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The University have The Unity Church on the opposite side of Crookesmoor Road.

They've called the accommodation part Crookesmoor House. Just to add a bit of confusion.

Rear view of Unity Church from Harcourt Road. Now called Crookesmoor House.

Front view of Unity Church Crookesmoor Road.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A DIRECTORY OF THE BOROUGH

AND PARISH OF SHEFFIELD, 1852

Hoole, Henry Elliot, manufacturer, (Hoole, Robson, & H) ; house: Crookesmoor House

-------------

1923

Sheepbridge Coal & Iron Co. Ltd.

Director

Fowler, R. W., Crookesmoor House, Sheffield

Source: 1923 Colliery Year Book and Coal Trades Directory

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Rugby School Register: From 1675 to 1867 Inclusive

Anstey Hoole Percival Francis, son of Henry Elliot Hoole, Esq. Crookes Moor House, Sheffield, aged 15, July 9

Still nothing else on "Fowler"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You probably know this already but he did the Wicker Arches.

John Fowler, who later gained fame for co-designing the Forth Railway Bridge in Scotland, was employed to engineer the extension and station (Victoria Station). Fowler's design included a 40-foot high, 750-yard viaduct over the Wicker and two island platforms 1000 ft long.

Source - www.dmm.org.uk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You probably know this already but he did the Wicker Arches.

John Fowler, who later gained fame for co-designing the Forth Railway Bridge in Scotland, was employed to engineer the extension and station (Victoria Station). Fowler's design included a 40-foot high, 750-yard viaduct over the Wicker and two island platforms 1000 ft long.

Source - www.dmm.org.uk

I didn't know that vox, thanks for the information.

Unlike Rodney in the Likely Lads I would be more likely to give a correct answer to the question "Who built the Forth bridge"

Rather than a correct answer to "Who built the Wicker Arches?"

Not too good for a Sheffield lad that is it!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest nicknock

Thanks for all the info, Vox. Didn't know about Wicker Arches, hadn't heard of them actually! And while I knew there was a Firth connection with Sheepbridge, I didn't know there was a Fowler one (R W Fowler was my gg grandfather, his wife was Agnes Firth, dau of Edward), and I didn't know he went to Rugby. So thanks very much...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest nicknock

hi thylacine

i did graphic design at ravensbourne college of design and communication in london (or chislehurst, more accurately) in the 80s! i design books now, mostly, working for myself. i too trained using technical pens etc. we used to have to 'hand render' type with rotrings. never had to do it since but i suppose it was a useful skill to learn. i think we had one computer between everyone, and i never bothered to join the queue because i didn't much like it! think i must have been in the last wave of pre-computer students... used a computer ever since. still don't like them much but hard to imagine life without them!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this would be the site of Crookesmoor House - on the right, now, as you say, Uni buildings.

(Department of Landscape I think)

Google Streetview

I used to live just up the road from Crookesmoor House from Sept. 1973 onwards and remember it being demolished. They had to take the wall down on the corner of Conduit Road and Crookesmoor Road to rebuild it and when they removed the soil behind it they discovered a long buried set of steps on the corner which they re-furbished and put the doorway in to allow them to be used again.

HD

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...