Gower Hey Wood ?

I believe the following photo to be taken in Gower Hey Wood with King George Road in the background. 
Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.


Mr Jesse Braddock and friend circa 1950's

Thanks to Mike Thelwell for loan of the photo.
Much appreciated.

Shanes Field aka Buttercup Meadow

Below is a photo of Shanes Field aka Buttercup Meadow or the field above Gower Hey Wood. It was taken in the late 1970's and you can just see the spire of Hyde Chapel on the horizon. The row of houses to the left are on Oxford Road.


  The day looked absolutely Beautiful, the flowers in the meadow stunning. I hope that with Gower Hey Conservation Groups excellent work and with the field now no longer being mowed, the field will eventually return to the beautiful wild flower meadow it used to be. Signs are good that this will happen.

Gower Hey Conservation Group

If ,like me, you are lucky enough to live near Gower Hey Woods then you will know all about the sterling work that is done by the Gower Hey Conservation Society.

For those people that are unaquainted with it , here is a brief description from the first issue of their new leaflet.

Please note that the group are always ready to welcome a new pair of hands to help them.
If you would like to find out more,  please visit www.tcv.org.uk  
or telephone Stuart Manson on 0161 368 8883




Many thanks to all the volunteers for keeping the woods clean and nice for us all to enjoy !!  :)

Gower Hey Wood.

 Here are a few recent photographs of Gower Hey Woods showing the ongoing work that is being done by the Gower Hey Conservation Group. They are doing a great job with the new pond and the woods look so much cleaner and nicer.


Any idea what species of tree this is? The bark is quite distinctive .


The new pond is looking good. Such an improvement on the dank, dark wetland that stood there before the pond was made.



The entrance to the woods via the Trans Pennine trail between Stockport Road and Apethorn Lane..

Last year , after visiting the woods to see the important work done by the Conservation Group, MP Jonathan Reynolds said  

"Members of the Gower Hey Wood Conservation Group have worked hard to ensure the local community can fully appreciate the natural and industrial heritage of the Gower Hey Wood area. And their commitment and effort should be congratulated."

...and so say all of us !

A big thank you to everyone for their continued sterling work ! :)

Views Around Hyde (3)

These are the two photos I took in Gower Hey Woods only days apart - on 26th and 30th November - last year. 

Dave

Thanks to Dave for these pictures from last November... as we are now approaching the same date I'm wondering if we are in for a similar sight soon... it as certainly been cold enough at night... yet the seasons still seem to be mixed up with flowers showing and both dead leaves and buds on the same trees. I've noticed that the Holly trees are very full of berries, and the birds are visiting the garden in greater numbers. Grit salt is being advertised, and snow shovels are for sale on the market. 

If you have pictures to share off the views you come across this winter please send them in and we can show of the beauty of Hyde in winter. 

Gower Hey

Another great photo sent to us by Sean Mayall.
"Gower Hey Woods swing park. The date is unknown. Me and my brother Alan on the slide"



This photo brought back many memories for me as I grew up close by and still live near. Such a shame that all the swings and roundabouts were removed but I suppose that is a sign of the times. If my memory serves me correctly , there was also a "witches hat" roundabout, a smaller roundabout and a sandpit. I cut my knee open on the slide once as it used to be locked up on a sunday but i would insist on climbing on it still!
Ahh , happy days :)



Aerial map from the 1970's showing where the swing park was situated. You can just make out the roundabouts by the circles. Stockport Road runs down to the right of the map. The land was originally owned by John Boardman according to Tithe maps from 1836-51

Views around Hyde (2)

One of my favourite places in Gee Cross - Gower Hey Woods. I am fortunate to live on the edge of it ,too.
Lots of lovely memories of this place.



Gower Hey Woods in winter.


Gower Hey Woods in Spring

Gower Hey Woods

 

The beautiful cobbled path leading into Gower Hey Woods in Summer and Winter.

Gower Hey Woods is an area of woodland situated in Gee Cross. It has its own conservation society which does a lot of good work in keeping it clean and safe for everyone to use.

www.tameside.gov.uk/countryside/gowerhey

There appears to have been a cotton mill situated in the bottom of the woods ,which was built in approx 1792 by Thomas Howard, son of Joseph Howard of Haughton Hall. Not much is known about the mill but the last known use for it was as a cotton waste bleaching mill run by Obadiah Broadhurst in 1874.

Map from 1836-51 , showing the mill . Note the old spelling !

Top Field known locally as either Shanes Field or Buttercup Meadow depending on your age!

 Buttercup Meadow from my front garden. So beautiful!

Looks so different here.. hard to imagine it as such.

The Boggert Of Gower Hey

There once lived at Hyde a celebrated Dr. Wylde (an ancestor of the Thornley's), who bore a reputation for astrology. About 1730 a great sensation was occasioned ..... that there was a boggart in Gower Hey Wood, which made awful sounds at night. The inhabitants went in a body to ask the learned doctor to lay the spirit, and this he gladly consented to do. Noticing the direction of the sound he went in broad daylight to the spot which no one else dared approach, and there found that two branches of a tree, rubbing together with the motion of the wind, gave forth the doleful sound that had scared people from the wood. Telling no one of his discovery he quickly sawed one branch off, and then gravely announced that he had laid the spirit. Needless to say, after this, that his reputation for magic was unequalled in the neighbourhood, and for years his powers were firmly believed in.

From The History Of Hyde

By Thomas Middleton

A View Of Gee Cross

This is a view from Gower Hey House, looking over towards Gee Cross taken in 1914. In the year 1795 a book called “Forty Miles Round Manchester” the author “Aikins” said that Gee Cross was like a 'little town'. In 1800’s Gee Cross was known for it’s country fairs, folk came from miles around, these fairs could be very rough at times with many fights breaking out. Gee Cross was home to quite a few rouges and vagabonds, and it’s reputation was very bad…. And now??? Well nowts changed really ;o) ha!

Gower Hey House stood just behind where the gardens of the houses on Balmoral Avenue stands today. This is it in present day. Now it is two semi detached houses.

This is a stunning view of Hyde Chapel

Church Brow, Woodend Lane, and Captain Whitle's Wind

Just on the left is a footpath known as Church Brow that leads from Gower Road, as you cross the road theres a cobbled passageway that leads to Albert Road and towards the centre of Hyde. This footpath seems to form the boundary of Church Street - Woodend Lane

The building that juts out onto the road was an old farm known as Thornely Fold Farm, it was pulled down in 1909.

In the early 1970s this was our prefered way to walk to Greenfield Street School, it was around this point we had to make the decision to carry on walking towards Albert Street and a day spent at school.. or turning left onto Woodend Lane and spending the day wagging it from school and getting up to mischief on the Peak Forest Canal... I must admit by the time I'd been at Greeny for two years the pull of a day on the canal got greater.. in fact the pull of a dentists pliers was sometimes more appealing than a day sat in a classroom. Ha! that says more about me back then, than Greenfield Street school.

The red arrow on the map above shows the point the footpath crosses the road, it is interesting to note that this 1897 map shows the brook in the valley as Gorehay Brook.. but it is know and named as Gower Hey Brook, in fact the valley the brook runs through is known as Gower Hey.

...

The above photo is taken on Woodend Lane, looking back towards Church Street, the other picture as been treated to a make over in a drawing package on the computer... and shows St. Georges Church towering above the surrounding houses.

CAPTAIN WHITLE'S WIND

The name of Captain Whitle's Wind was given to a certain terrific and sudden hurricane which swept over parts of Hyde and surrounding districts sometime in the 1800s. The effect of this storm was tremendous, and the town bore many signs of the devastating powers of the gale. One Hyde story will suffice here. In the orchard adjoining the old white farm which stood near Church Brow, close to the St. George's Vicarage, a great tree was blown down, and for a long after was known as Captain Whitle's tree. Now for the derivation of the title. Captain Whitle lived at Hollingworth Hall, and was a stout old sea-dog of the days when English ships were reaping plunder on the Spanish main. He is said to have been officer on the first English ship of war that ever sailed the China seas. . The Captain died at Hollingworth, and was buried at Mottram Church, where, so runs the tale, when the bearers emerged from the church doors with the coffin on their shoulders to carry it to the grave, the storm referred to above burst on them in all its fury, blew the coffin from their grasp, and carried it, bump, bump, bump, down the old grave-yard, terrifying the beholders, as well as dashing them about with as little mercy as it treated the corpse. That gale was known henceforth as Captain Whitle's Wind not only in Mottram but far beyond the windings of pleasant Longdendale. The inhabitants of Mottram and its neighbouring towns and villagers were very superstitious, and many an old worthy would huddle up in the chimney corner on a fierce night, when the wind howled without, and the gale screamed past, firmly convinced that the gruff old seaman rode in ghostly state upon the wings of the storm.

From the book Annals Of Hyde by Thomas Middleton.