0:00:04 > 0:00:09For Victorian Britons, George Bradshaw was a household name.
0:00:09 > 0:00:11At a time when railways were new,
0:00:11 > 0:00:16Bradshaw's guidebook inspired them to take to the tracks.
0:00:16 > 0:00:18I'm using a Bradshaw's guide
0:00:18 > 0:00:21to understand how trains transformed Britain,
0:00:21 > 0:00:26its landscape, its industries, society and leisure time.
0:00:26 > 0:00:31As I crisscross the country 150 years later, it helps me
0:00:31 > 0:00:33to discover the Britain of today.
0:00:51 > 0:00:53I'm continuing my journey
0:00:53 > 0:00:57through the verdant landscape of northwest England
0:00:57 > 0:00:59towards its industrial heart,
0:00:59 > 0:01:03where the Victorian working class lived and worked
0:01:03 > 0:01:09in a new cityscape of factories, railway stations and terraced houses.
0:01:09 > 0:01:11On this journey, I want to find out
0:01:11 > 0:01:14what daily life was like for the nation's first urban workers
0:01:14 > 0:01:18and how they documented it in art and poetry.
0:01:24 > 0:01:27This week I'm travelling through northwest England
0:01:27 > 0:01:29to the West Midlands.
0:01:29 > 0:01:31I started in Cumbria,
0:01:31 > 0:01:36winding south through the spectacular countryside of the Lake District,
0:01:36 > 0:01:38and I'm continuing on to Lancashire,
0:01:38 > 0:01:41heart of the Industrial Revolution,
0:01:41 > 0:01:43before I head further south to Staffordshire.
0:01:46 > 0:01:49On today's stretch I begin in Preston,
0:01:49 > 0:01:52travel southeast to a market town, Darwen,
0:01:52 > 0:01:55discover a dark tale in Entwistle
0:01:55 > 0:01:59and hear stories of matchstick men in Salford.
0:01:59 > 0:02:01I'll end this leg on Kersal Moor.
0:02:03 > 0:02:08In this episode, I dabble in 21st-century technology...
0:02:08 > 0:02:09Feels like some medical procedure.
0:02:09 > 0:02:12..learn a thing or two about art...
0:02:12 > 0:02:15I'm sure you're almost about to say matchstick figures,
0:02:15 > 0:02:17aren't you, Michael? Well, matchsticks they are not.
0:02:17 > 0:02:19They are much more observed, much more acute.
0:02:19 > 0:02:23..and enjoy a good old Lancashire sing-song.
0:02:23 > 0:02:27# As they did when he meazur't me finger
0:02:27 > 0:02:31# For th' little gowd ring last neet. #
0:02:31 > 0:02:33Bravo!
0:02:40 > 0:02:43My journey continues to take me south,
0:02:43 > 0:02:47today towards the heart of Lancashire manufacturing.
0:02:47 > 0:02:50Bradshaw's tells me that Preston possessed,
0:02:50 > 0:02:53before the passing of the Great Reform Act of 1832,
0:02:53 > 0:02:57"the only real democratic electoral suffrage in the kingdom.
0:02:57 > 0:03:01"All its inhabitants above 21 years of age,
0:03:01 > 0:03:05"if free from the taint of pauperism, were entitled to a vote."
0:03:05 > 0:03:09The 19th century brought an industrial revolution but also
0:03:09 > 0:03:15a vast extension of the suffrage and improvements in conditions of work.
0:03:15 > 0:03:20And in those battles, some of the first shots were fired in Preston.
0:03:23 > 0:03:28The city sits between coastal plain, river valley and moorland.
0:03:28 > 0:03:31By the time my guidebook was published in the 1860s,
0:03:31 > 0:03:33Preston had been transformed
0:03:33 > 0:03:38from an unassuming market town dotted with weavers' cottages
0:03:38 > 0:03:41into a densely-populated centre of 70,000 people
0:03:41 > 0:03:45built around 60 or so cotton mills.
0:03:45 > 0:03:48Today the factories are long gone,
0:03:48 > 0:03:51but the memory of their workers lives on.
0:03:51 > 0:03:55I'm meeting local historian and trade unionist Jim Leigh
0:03:55 > 0:03:56at Preston Market.
0:03:57 > 0:04:00According to Bradshaw's, there was a lot of industrial unrest
0:04:00 > 0:04:02in the first half of the 19th century.
0:04:02 > 0:04:04Was there something very special about Preston?
0:04:04 > 0:04:08There was. Preston had a notoriety as a very militant town.
0:04:08 > 0:04:11I think it was a combination of extremely low wages
0:04:11 > 0:04:16paid in the town together with shockingly poor housing conditions.
0:04:16 > 0:04:2180% of the town depended on the mills for employment and housing.
0:04:21 > 0:04:25Workers faced long hours and dangerous conditions.
0:04:25 > 0:04:30Their houses were filthy, cramped and overcrowded, so disease spread fast.
0:04:30 > 0:04:32Towards the end of the 19th century,
0:04:32 > 0:04:37Preston had one of the highest rates of infant mortality in the country.
0:04:37 > 0:04:39I believe there was a big event in 1842.
0:04:39 > 0:04:41What was the background to that?
0:04:41 > 0:04:46A severe recession was gripping the country, unemployment was high
0:04:46 > 0:04:49and employers up and down the land began cutting wages.
0:04:49 > 0:04:53So there's a lot of anger and frustration out there.
0:04:53 > 0:04:58In response, a working-class movement, Chartism, tried to unite
0:04:58 > 0:05:03workers across Britain in a strike over pay and factory conditions.
0:05:03 > 0:05:08In August 1842, Preston's mill workers joined the protest.
0:05:09 > 0:05:11And how did matters develop?
0:05:11 > 0:05:15Groups of men and youths began assembling about the town.
0:05:15 > 0:05:18Soon these small groups converged into one large group,
0:05:18 > 0:05:23who then began visiting every mill and workshop across the town
0:05:23 > 0:05:26and successfully brought them to a standstill.
0:05:26 > 0:05:28The Mayor and magistrates,
0:05:28 > 0:05:31accompanied by a detachment of soldiers,
0:05:31 > 0:05:33resolved to confront the protestors.
0:05:35 > 0:05:39What had been a peaceful protest escalated into a violent one.
0:05:41 > 0:05:45Jim, it comes to be known as the Lune Street Riot. How?
0:05:45 > 0:05:49They went about stopping the mills wherever they could find them
0:05:49 > 0:05:51the following day.
0:05:51 > 0:05:54The strikers then began proceeding up Lune Street
0:05:54 > 0:05:57and it was here that they were confronted by the military.
0:05:57 > 0:06:00And it was there that the Riot Act was read out.
0:06:00 > 0:06:03We quite often refer to reading the Riot Act
0:06:03 > 0:06:05without perhaps thinking what it means,
0:06:05 > 0:06:07but I've got here what is read out
0:06:07 > 0:06:10by someone like the Mayor of Preston on such an occasion.
0:06:10 > 0:06:13"Our Sovereign Lady the Queen chargeth and commandeth all persons
0:06:13 > 0:06:17"being assembled immediately to disperse themselves and peaceably
0:06:17 > 0:06:21"to depart to their habitations or to their lawful businesses
0:06:21 > 0:06:24"upon the pains contained in the act
0:06:24 > 0:06:26"made in the first year of King George I
0:06:26 > 0:06:31"for preventing tumults and riotous assemblies. God save the Queen."
0:06:32 > 0:06:35The cotton workers refused to back down
0:06:35 > 0:06:39and the military opened fire, killing four of them.
0:06:39 > 0:06:43The tragic event of 1842 has not been forgotten
0:06:43 > 0:06:46and 150 years later
0:06:46 > 0:06:50a monument was erected to commemorate this fateful day.
0:06:50 > 0:06:55Jim, this is a very striking monument. What was its inspiration?
0:06:55 > 0:06:58I believe it's based on the famous Goya painting
0:06:58 > 0:07:01that depicted a scene from the Napoleonic Wars.
0:07:01 > 0:07:03And I see that flowers are laid.
0:07:03 > 0:07:07Yes, these are from Workers Memorial Day, which commemorates
0:07:07 > 0:07:10workers who died at work each year.
0:07:10 > 0:07:12Jim, you're a trade unionist,
0:07:12 > 0:07:14I'm sure you've been involved in a few disputes.
0:07:14 > 0:07:17How do you assess the significance of this event?
0:07:17 > 0:07:19This is extremely important.
0:07:19 > 0:07:23It's part of Preston's radical history which continues to this day.
0:07:28 > 0:07:32Little changed for the mill workers in the aftermath of the riot, but
0:07:32 > 0:07:37the event retains a symbolic place in Britain's working-class history.
0:07:46 > 0:07:49The next leg of my journey takes me southeast.
0:07:49 > 0:07:51I have to change at Blackburn
0:07:51 > 0:07:54before heading across the West Pennine moors.
0:07:57 > 0:07:59I'm on my way to Darwen.
0:07:59 > 0:08:03Bradshaw's tells me that the paper mills of Messrs Potter
0:08:03 > 0:08:09produced 400 miles of paper, weighing 40 tonnes, per day.
0:08:09 > 0:08:12Increasing quantities of paper were needed to adorn
0:08:12 > 0:08:14the walls of the middle classes,
0:08:14 > 0:08:19bringing the colours of nature into the Victorian drawing room.
0:08:25 > 0:08:30The town sits in a valley amid 90 square miles of open moorland.
0:08:31 > 0:08:34Following the arrival of the railway in 1847,
0:08:34 > 0:08:39Darwen, like many northern towns, began to develop industrially.
0:08:39 > 0:08:43The manufacture of paper and textiles led it to become
0:08:43 > 0:08:47one of the largest Victorian mill towns in Lancashire.
0:08:47 > 0:08:49The mills have long since shut
0:08:49 > 0:08:53but a paint factory rich in Victorian heritage is still
0:08:53 > 0:08:56going strong in the town today.
0:08:56 > 0:09:00It's here that I'm meeting customer services director Geraldine Huxley.
0:09:01 > 0:09:05Geraldine, the company mentioned in my Bradshaw's guide is Potters,
0:09:05 > 0:09:06which was making paper.
0:09:06 > 0:09:09What is the connection between that and today's company?
0:09:09 > 0:09:11Well, John Potter was a Manchester businessman
0:09:11 > 0:09:14and he came to live in the area and he married
0:09:14 > 0:09:18the daughter of the gentleman who invented the calico printing.
0:09:18 > 0:09:21He actually came into the business and took over and turned it into
0:09:21 > 0:09:25a mechanical operation rather than a manual operation.
0:09:25 > 0:09:31In 1839, the Potters developed a steam-driven surface printing machine
0:09:31 > 0:09:34which enabled them to mass-produce wallpaper.
0:09:34 > 0:09:38With the repeal of the wallpaper tax in 1836,
0:09:38 > 0:09:41wallpaper became a very important element
0:09:41 > 0:09:46of Victorian interior decoration, replacing panelling and tapestries.
0:09:46 > 0:09:50William Morris's Trellis pattern of 1864
0:09:50 > 0:09:55influenced generations of designers and remains popular today.
0:09:56 > 0:09:59Which came first in Darwen, wallpaper or paint?
0:09:59 > 0:10:03Wallpaper, definitely. Paint wasn't really experimented with until 1904,
0:10:03 > 0:10:05some 100 years later.
0:10:05 > 0:10:07In the Edwardian period,
0:10:07 > 0:10:11brighter, paler colours were made using synthetic dyes
0:10:11 > 0:10:14produced by the rapidly-developing chemical industry.
0:10:14 > 0:10:18Potters paint also played an important part beyond
0:10:18 > 0:10:20the homes of the middle classes.
0:10:20 > 0:10:23Something of special interest, I think you will find,
0:10:23 > 0:10:25is the palette of paints that were specially designed
0:10:25 > 0:10:27for the railway industry.
0:10:27 > 0:10:31"British Railways Eastern Region standard colour range for paint".
0:10:32 > 0:10:36Now, some of these are what I would expect, these kind of muted browns
0:10:36 > 0:10:39and beiges, but actually, some of them are quite bright.
0:10:39 > 0:10:42Look at this vivid yellow and look at that sort of scarlet colour.
0:10:42 > 0:10:44Very nice indeed.
0:10:45 > 0:10:47Today, the company produces
0:10:47 > 0:10:52a staggering 385,000 litres of paint per day -
0:10:52 > 0:10:57enough to fill 38 Olympic-sized swimming pools every year.
0:11:00 > 0:11:03I'm heading to the research and development department
0:11:03 > 0:11:04to meet David Booth.
0:11:06 > 0:11:08There's a vast range of colours here
0:11:08 > 0:11:12and a layman might think that all possible colours are here.
0:11:12 > 0:11:16But I've been thinking about whether I could match this jacket here
0:11:16 > 0:11:20- and at first I thought it was something like that...- No.
0:11:20 > 0:11:22- Uh...- No, it's far too orange.
0:11:22 > 0:11:24Wait a minute, what about this one?
0:11:24 > 0:11:26That's the nearest, but it's too weak.
0:11:26 > 0:11:28So how will I match that up?
0:11:28 > 0:11:31What we can do is take your jacket and actually put it onto the machine
0:11:31 > 0:11:34and we'll get a prediction and make the paint up.
0:11:34 > 0:11:37So I could buy a colour like that and paint my wall,
0:11:37 > 0:11:40- just in case I wanted to camouflage myself at home.- You could, yes.
0:11:40 > 0:11:42- Can we give it a go? - Yeah, we can indeed.
0:11:42 > 0:11:45Right, can you please put your arm in there and push it up tight...
0:11:45 > 0:11:48Whoops! ..against the machine?
0:11:48 > 0:11:49Leave it there for a moment.
0:11:49 > 0:11:50This is very weird.
0:11:52 > 0:11:56A spectrophotometer analyses colour composition by measuring
0:11:56 > 0:11:59the reflected light from a sample.
0:11:59 > 0:12:03Feels like some medical procedure, like having my blood pressure taken!
0:12:03 > 0:12:06Now David selects a base paint
0:12:06 > 0:12:09and the appropriate pigments from a database.
0:12:11 > 0:12:14Oh! I can see those streams of colour going in there.
0:12:14 > 0:12:15It's the moment of truth.
0:12:17 > 0:12:18Whoa! Look at that!
0:12:20 > 0:12:23Portillo pink. Stock up now, it will be in fashion next year!
0:12:25 > 0:12:28I'd love to stay and paint the town pink,
0:12:28 > 0:12:31but I have a short journey to make before the day is out.
0:12:33 > 0:12:36I'm heading five miles south through East Lancashire
0:12:36 > 0:12:40on the Ribble Valley line to a rural station just north of Bolton.
0:12:42 > 0:12:45- Entwistle. Request stop? - That's correct.
0:12:45 > 0:12:47- Could we stop at Entwistle, please? - You certainly can.
0:12:47 > 0:12:50- Make it easier to get off. - Yes.- Thank you.
0:12:50 > 0:12:51Don't forget!
0:12:56 > 0:13:02So we've emerged into the light after passing through a very long tunnel,
0:13:02 > 0:13:05the Sough Tunnel, which I believe was quite an early
0:13:05 > 0:13:09piece of railway engineering about which I'd like to know more.
0:13:10 > 0:13:14On the south side of the Sough Tunnel sits Entwistle Station,
0:13:14 > 0:13:17set in a small village overlooking
0:13:17 > 0:13:20the rugged countryside of the lower Pennine hills.
0:13:20 > 0:13:22- Thank you very much. - Thank you. Nice to meet you.
0:13:22 > 0:13:25- I was afraid you might have forgotten - to stop, I mean.- Oh, no.
0:13:25 > 0:13:27Thank you. Thank you, bye-bye.
0:13:28 > 0:13:32I'm meeting local historian Eileen Cowen on the platform to find out
0:13:32 > 0:13:36more about the construction of the tunnel and the workforce behind it.
0:13:36 > 0:13:40- Eileen.- Hello.- Lovely to see you. - Welcome to Entwistle.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43I've just come through Sough Tunnel. Why did it have to be built?
0:13:43 > 0:13:48It was to carry the Blackburn-Darwen line through to Bolton
0:13:48 > 0:13:51and on to Manchester, which was very important for the industry
0:13:51 > 0:13:55in Darwen and Blackburn. And in the way was Cranberry Moss,
0:13:55 > 0:14:01which is 1,000 feet high, riddled with coal mines, water courses.
0:14:01 > 0:14:04Very, very bleak in winter, it really is.
0:14:06 > 0:14:11In 1848, the 1,850-metre tunnel was completed
0:14:11 > 0:14:13and the line through to Bolton opened.
0:14:15 > 0:14:16Who built it?
0:14:16 > 0:14:192,000 men worked there eventually.
0:14:19 > 0:14:23Not mechanised - using wheelbarrows, picks, shovels.
0:14:23 > 0:14:27Some expert tunnellers, but a lot of them just using their strength.
0:14:28 > 0:14:32By the height of railway mania in the mid-19th century a quarter of
0:14:32 > 0:14:37a million navvies had laid 3,000 miles of track across Britain,
0:14:37 > 0:14:39transforming the rural landscape forever.
0:14:41 > 0:14:43Where would they be living?
0:14:43 > 0:14:46The majority of them lived up on the hilltops
0:14:46 > 0:14:49in shanties made out of turf and stone.
0:14:49 > 0:14:52What were conditions like in the camps where they lived?
0:14:52 > 0:14:55They were living in very exposed conditions.
0:14:55 > 0:14:58The land now is wet and bleak.
0:14:58 > 0:15:01In winter it's covered in snow a lot of the time,
0:15:01 > 0:15:04sometimes six foot high on the roads round here.
0:15:04 > 0:15:06And they worked through the winters.
0:15:06 > 0:15:11A navvy's life was harsh and the work was notoriously dangerous.
0:15:11 > 0:15:15Five lives were lost during the building of the Sough Tunnel.
0:15:16 > 0:15:19I count myself fortunate to have a warm bed for the night.
0:15:27 > 0:15:32Refreshed, I am ready to continue my journey across northwest England.
0:15:34 > 0:15:37I decided to spend the night in a delightful pub
0:15:37 > 0:15:43with a great view over the moors, and it's just by Entwistle Station.
0:15:43 > 0:15:45My train is at 8:21.
0:15:45 > 0:15:48Provided I leave here at 8:19 I should be in good time.
0:15:55 > 0:15:58Following my guidebook, I'm heading 15 miles south
0:15:58 > 0:16:02across the Lancashire border to Salford in Greater Manchester.
0:16:09 > 0:16:12Bradshaw's paints a marvellous picture
0:16:12 > 0:16:16of an English manufacturing town in the middle of the 19th century.
0:16:16 > 0:16:20"Thronged streets and narrow lanes stretch out on each side.
0:16:20 > 0:16:24"Mills and factories rise out of the dense mass of houses,
0:16:24 > 0:16:28"and a forest of chimneys towering upwards
0:16:28 > 0:16:32"point out the local seats of manufacturing."
0:16:32 > 0:16:39It took only an artist of Salford to add the matchstick men and women.
0:16:43 > 0:16:46The Industrial Revolution dramatically transformed Salford
0:16:46 > 0:16:51from a small market town on the banks of the River Irwell into a sprawling,
0:16:51 > 0:16:56smoke-filled conurbation housing a population of over 200,000.
0:16:56 > 0:16:57With overcrowded slums,
0:16:57 > 0:17:02at the time of my guidebook, areas of Salford were deprived and squalid.
0:17:05 > 0:17:08Lancashire artist Laurence Stephen Lowry
0:17:08 > 0:17:12famously captured the 20th-century legacy of Victorian Salford,
0:17:12 > 0:17:16of which just a hint still stands today.
0:17:16 > 0:17:20A fitting place to meet art historian William Feaver.
0:17:20 > 0:17:23What do you think attracted Lowry to depicting
0:17:23 > 0:17:26an industrial landscape with all its smoke and so on?
0:17:26 > 0:17:30He always lived here, it was utterly familiar to him.
0:17:30 > 0:17:32It was useful to be surrounded by your subject
0:17:32 > 0:17:36rather than to have to go out and find it too far away.
0:17:36 > 0:17:42He recognised that in the tones of grotty, smoky, dark, wet Manchester,
0:17:42 > 0:17:44there were very beautiful things to be seen.
0:17:44 > 0:17:49Born in 1887, Lowry recorded nearly a century of industrial life
0:17:49 > 0:17:52in Salford and Manchester.
0:17:52 > 0:17:56He was the first artist to engage with industrial working-class
0:17:56 > 0:17:59culture, which until then was viewed as unsavoury
0:17:59 > 0:18:02and scarcely worthy as a subject for art.
0:18:02 > 0:18:04Do you think he felt an empathy
0:18:04 > 0:18:06with the people he painted in these streets?
0:18:06 > 0:18:09Well, yes and no. His father had been a rent collector
0:18:09 > 0:18:12and he was a rent collector for a living for many years.
0:18:12 > 0:18:15He was obviously resented by some of the people he called on regularly
0:18:15 > 0:18:18and also he was familiar to them, so it worked both ways.
0:18:20 > 0:18:23Today, the largest public collection of his works is housed
0:18:23 > 0:18:26at The Lowry in Salford Quays.
0:18:26 > 0:18:29The arts complex opened in 2000
0:18:29 > 0:18:34as part of a £106 million docklands regeneration scheme.
0:18:34 > 0:18:36Michael, I thought you'd like to see this drawing
0:18:36 > 0:18:40because it's an illustration almost of what happened to Lowry once.
0:18:40 > 0:18:42He was on Pendlebury Station, missed his train,
0:18:42 > 0:18:44looking around for something to do,
0:18:44 > 0:18:47looked and saw the industrial landscape stretched around him -
0:18:47 > 0:18:50smoking chimneys, the people scurrying below him.
0:18:50 > 0:18:53And I suppose in a way this commemorates that eureka,
0:18:53 > 0:18:58bingo moment when he suddenly found himself a life's work ahead of him.
0:18:58 > 0:19:01Lowry's contemporaries often questioned
0:19:01 > 0:19:04what he saw in such ordinariness.
0:19:04 > 0:19:08- ARCHIVE RECORDING:- People often tell me that, "And why do you paint such and such subjects?"
0:19:08 > 0:19:11Well, I say, why shouldn't I paint them?
0:19:11 > 0:19:13I like to paint them, so why not?
0:19:15 > 0:19:17So here we see a Salford street,
0:19:17 > 0:19:19and, as ever, dominated by the smoking chimney stack.
0:19:19 > 0:19:22The houses and people are rendered quite simply.
0:19:22 > 0:19:24Would we be right to think of this as naive?
0:19:24 > 0:19:26You can say it's naive
0:19:26 > 0:19:28but actually I think it's much more subtle than naive.
0:19:28 > 0:19:31And I'm sure you're almost about to say matchstick figures,
0:19:31 > 0:19:34aren't you, Michael? Well, matchsticks they are not.
0:19:34 > 0:19:37They are much more observed, much more acute.
0:19:37 > 0:19:41Lowry painted the ordinary people he saw at work and at leisure
0:19:41 > 0:19:44on the streets of his native Lancashire.
0:19:44 > 0:19:48People call them matchsticks, matchstick figures.
0:19:48 > 0:19:49They may be. I don't mind.
0:19:49 > 0:19:51I don't think it matters,
0:19:51 > 0:19:54I paint the people as I see the people in my mind's eye.
0:19:55 > 0:19:59The people tend to be poor people.
0:19:59 > 0:20:03Does he display also a sympathy for people who are, I don't know,
0:20:03 > 0:20:05outcasts or left aside?
0:20:05 > 0:20:09He obviously saw that people worse off than himself were somehow
0:20:09 > 0:20:13rather like ants, always engaged on business, scurrying to and fro.
0:20:13 > 0:20:16All sorts of scenarios take place in his pictures
0:20:16 > 0:20:19and they are not as simple as they look. They are much more subtle,
0:20:19 > 0:20:23poetic and ultimately, I think, rather lonely.
0:20:24 > 0:20:25People often say that
0:20:25 > 0:20:28but I suppose I reflect myself in my figures - I'm bound to do.
0:20:28 > 0:20:30I'm bound to reflect myself in the figures
0:20:30 > 0:20:32and I'm a very lonely sort of a person.
0:20:34 > 0:20:35As a Salford man himself,
0:20:35 > 0:20:38with a concern for the plight of the working class,
0:20:38 > 0:20:41George Bradshaw might have empathised
0:20:41 > 0:20:44with Lowry's depiction of the city's people.
0:20:44 > 0:20:46Lowry's popularity is undeniable, isn't it?
0:20:46 > 0:20:49I first became aware of him because my grandfather managed to buy
0:20:49 > 0:20:53one or two, but his popularity has been enormous, hasn't it?
0:20:53 > 0:20:57In England, Britain, probably the most popular artist there is.
0:20:57 > 0:21:00In the wider world, less known, but he is a great artist,
0:21:00 > 0:21:03and there's no reason to plump him more than that.
0:21:04 > 0:21:08Lowry and Bradshaw, one in painting and one in words,
0:21:08 > 0:21:11recorded Britain's industrial landscape.
0:21:12 > 0:21:17And today, having read Bradshaw's vivid description of a manufacturing
0:21:17 > 0:21:21town in the 19th century, I like to hope that Lowry had read this book.
0:21:21 > 0:21:23I'm sure he did. But of course, what he did,
0:21:23 > 0:21:25he turned Bradshaw into a vision.
0:21:28 > 0:21:32It's time to hit the tracks and head for my final destination.
0:21:32 > 0:21:35I'm taking a short train ride north to Swinton,
0:21:35 > 0:21:39from which it's a ten-minute drive east to Kersal Moor.
0:21:44 > 0:21:45By the time of my guidebook,
0:21:45 > 0:21:49industrialisation had made its mark on the Lancashire landscape
0:21:49 > 0:21:53and the old pastoral ways were disappearing fast.
0:21:54 > 0:21:58The desire to preserve local identity became stronger than ever.
0:22:01 > 0:22:05Kersal Moor is a rural haven in Greater Manchester.
0:22:05 > 0:22:09It remains little changed from Bradshaw's day and I can see
0:22:09 > 0:22:14how it captured the imagination of 19th-century poet Edwin Waugh.
0:22:15 > 0:22:19I'm meeting Sid Calderbank, dialect enthusiast
0:22:19 > 0:22:22and member of the Edwin Waugh Society.
0:22:22 > 0:22:25Why should we now remember the Victorian poet Edwin Waugh?
0:22:25 > 0:22:29He was known in his lifetime as the Lancashire laureate.
0:22:29 > 0:22:32He was the prince of dialect poets.
0:22:32 > 0:22:37His works, his songs, stories and poems, spanned the whole of society.
0:22:37 > 0:22:40What sort of things was he writing about?
0:22:40 > 0:22:42He wrote about life in the mills,
0:22:42 > 0:22:45life in the factories, life in the towns.
0:22:45 > 0:22:51Born in 1817, Waugh penned poems in his native Lancashire tongue.
0:22:51 > 0:22:55He captured people's imagination at a time when
0:22:55 > 0:22:59urbanisation threatened to dilute local traditions.
0:22:59 > 0:23:03Lancashire's cotton industry had boomed in the mid-19th century,
0:23:03 > 0:23:07and its population doubled as workers from all over Britain migrated here.
0:23:09 > 0:23:12His best-known poem was written in 1856 -
0:23:12 > 0:23:15Come Whoam To Thi Childer An' Me -
0:23:15 > 0:23:17and it's a poem about a young wife
0:23:17 > 0:23:20who's at home and she's got all the housework done,
0:23:20 > 0:23:24she's got the two children off to bed but she can't settle them
0:23:24 > 0:23:26because they're crying. And she's crying too
0:23:26 > 0:23:28because he's down at the pub,
0:23:28 > 0:23:31so against all the social protocols of the time,
0:23:31 > 0:23:35she gets his hat and coat and she goes down to the pub
0:23:35 > 0:23:39to appeal, it turns out successfully, to his better nature.
0:23:39 > 0:23:43But when she gets there she finds he's not all bad after all,
0:23:43 > 0:23:46and that his pockets are filled with gifts for her and the kids
0:23:46 > 0:23:48that he's got from the market,
0:23:48 > 0:23:52and he's merely stopped off for a glass on his way back.
0:23:52 > 0:23:54So all ends happily.
0:23:54 > 0:23:57Waugh's poems were often set to music,
0:23:57 > 0:24:02and Sid has devoted the last three decades to restoring these works.
0:24:02 > 0:24:07To give me a flavour, he's arranged something rather special.
0:24:07 > 0:24:12And here we have the Red Rose String Quartet, and we can play for you...
0:24:12 > 0:24:14- Hello!- ..if you wish.- Hello!
0:24:14 > 0:24:18And if you'd like to join in, sir, there's the words.
0:24:18 > 0:24:20- Very good! Good afternoon. - Hello.- Hello.
0:24:25 > 0:24:29# Our Dorothy's singin' i'th shippon
0:24:29 > 0:24:33# Our Jonathan's leawngin' i'th fowd
0:24:33 > 0:24:37# Our Tummy's at th' fair, where he lippens
0:24:37 > 0:24:41# O' swappin' his cowt for gowd
0:24:41 > 0:24:45# Me gronny's asleep wi' her knittin'
0:24:45 > 0:24:49# An' th' kittlins's playin' wi' yarn
0:24:49 > 0:24:53# Our Betty's gone out wi' a gallon
0:24:53 > 0:24:57# For th' lads as in warkin' i'th barn
0:24:57 > 0:25:00BOTH: # And it's oh, yon Robin, yon Robin
0:25:00 > 0:25:04# His e'en e'er twinkle't so breet
0:25:04 > 0:25:08# As they did when he meazur't me finger
0:25:08 > 0:25:12# For th' little gowd ring last neet. #
0:25:16 > 0:25:18Bravo!
0:25:25 > 0:25:29In the 1870s, Waugh's health deteriorated.
0:25:29 > 0:25:32He moved to Kersal Moor for its fresh air
0:25:32 > 0:25:36and was buried here after his death in 1890.
0:25:37 > 0:25:40The moors were important to Waugh.
0:25:40 > 0:25:43Are they important to Lancashire people generally?
0:25:43 > 0:25:46Oh, they were important to the whole population of the county.
0:25:46 > 0:25:48They were the lungs of Lancashire.
0:25:48 > 0:25:51If you can imagine 19th-century industrial Lancashire,
0:25:51 > 0:25:56it was dirty, it was dark, it was smelly and smoky,
0:25:56 > 0:25:59but we've always been very proud of the fact that you're never
0:25:59 > 0:26:01so far from the old moorland.
0:26:01 > 0:26:04You can be a quarter of an hour from the factory gates
0:26:04 > 0:26:06and you can be up here, where you can breathe.
0:26:08 > 0:26:13Waugh clearly did much to preserve the Lancashire dialect in his time.
0:26:13 > 0:26:18Today the mantle has passed to a handful of enthusiasts like Sid.
0:26:18 > 0:26:20Can you greet me in the local dialect?
0:26:20 > 0:26:21How do?
0:26:21 > 0:26:26How do? That's simple enough!
0:26:26 > 0:26:29- "How do?"- It is. You don't need any more than that, really.
0:26:29 > 0:26:30It means, "How do you do?"
0:26:30 > 0:26:34- "How do?"- Which, when it arrived in America, it became "howdy".
0:26:36 > 0:26:40The Lancashire dialect is full of terrific tongue-twisters,
0:26:40 > 0:26:45from polite greetings - "Aw'm gradely fain to si thi" -
0:26:45 > 0:26:49to, "Be sharp! T'pig's fo'n i'th cut!"
0:26:49 > 0:26:53which means, "Hurry up, the pig's fallen in the canal." Of course.
0:26:53 > 0:26:57And what are you doing about keeping the dialect alive?
0:26:57 > 0:26:59I'm trying to make it available,
0:26:59 > 0:27:03make it relevant to today's audiences, not only to preserve it
0:27:03 > 0:27:05but to bring it back to life.
0:27:06 > 0:27:10Sid has certainly brought back to life for me today
0:27:10 > 0:27:12a piece of Victorian Lancashire.
0:27:12 > 0:27:16With my lungs filled with the finest air in the county,
0:27:16 > 0:27:18I'm ready to return to the station.
0:27:19 > 0:27:24Life was tough for working people in industrial Lancashire.
0:27:24 > 0:27:27Wage cuts caused a bloody riot in Preston.
0:27:27 > 0:27:32The region was the world's most successful manufacturing hub,
0:27:32 > 0:27:36but the cost in terms of human suffering is visible
0:27:36 > 0:27:39in the smoky streets of Lowry's paintings.
0:27:39 > 0:27:45At least mill workers could escape, through the dialect of Edwin Waugh,
0:27:45 > 0:27:48to the beautiful moors of the Red Rose county.
0:27:56 > 0:28:00Next time, I feel the heat of modern glass-making...
0:28:00 > 0:28:04I've just walked past a furnace at 1,600 degrees Celsius
0:28:04 > 0:28:06and I can tell you it burns as you go by.
0:28:08 > 0:28:11..break into song with some not-too-drunken sailors...
0:28:11 > 0:28:15# Strike the bell, second mate, let's go below
0:28:15 > 0:28:18# Look out to windward, you can see it's going to blow... #
0:28:18 > 0:28:22..and experience life in service to a lady of the manor.
0:28:22 > 0:28:25Will there be much more to be polished this afternoon, Mr Douglas?
0:28:25 > 0:28:27Considerably more, Mr Portillo.