Preserving Our Past Fred Dibnah's World of Steam, Steel and Stone

I'd suppose you'd think that I'm here to actually knock this thing down, but this is not the case.

We're here actually to restore it and we've fitted

round it 16 new iron bands to help preserve our industrial heritage.

Fred was best known for felling chimneys, but that was the job he liked least.

His real interest was in restoring them and keeping them standing and it was this work and the places

it took him to that had the biggest influence on him.

Fred when he had to knock down a chimney was very upset

because, of course, he started off

as a young man, a very young boy,

watching the steeplejacks climbing the big chimneys and repairing them.

And when it came full circle and time to demolish them he was very sad.

He confided in me on many occasions.

We would get the old photographs out and look.

And he'd study them and think, "Aye well that's no longer there.

"I remember a time on the Bolton skyline when you could see dozens and dozens of these big things."

And it was a great, great sadness in Fred that he had to demolish so many chimneys really.

I think in his job as a steeplejack in moving round all

these factories and so on, he would see the beauty of Victorian work.

First of all the chimneys themselves, the brickwork on

those was, you know, outstanding and he would know that first of all, and no doubt since chimneys are attached

to boiler houses he would walk round the associated boiler houses

and look at the workmanship in there and I suppose he'd start with the brickwork which wasn't just ordinary

kind of house brickwork, it was very good brickwork and had a very good finish on it and was quite artistic.

Fred lived through an age in which we started off by knocking down

a large part of the Victoria heritage, and then grew to value it.

And he was obviously engaged on both sides of the argument because he was

involved with knocking down the great chimneys of the mills.

At the same time he was involved with lovingly restoring

steam machinery, bringing it to a wider public.

One of the restoration projects that he took on was here at Weathericks Country Pottery in Cumbria.

This weird and wonderful creation behind me is what's known as a blunger.

And about five years ago, you know, I came here to look at the steam engine and the boiler,

and this creation willow herbs growing out of top of it

and it were in great danger of disappearing into ground forever.

And we got the job of restoring it and, more or less, it's practically a brand new one.

There's only the gearing and the bearings and...some of the ironwork is original.

Across the other side of the road there were a big clay pit and they dug the clay out of the pit,

and brought it up here on a railway, and tipped it into this

ginormous Kenwood Chef cake mixer...

..and added water. And the water and the machinery mixed all the clay up,

and all the pebbles fell to the bottom and then, when it became

the consistency of Aero milk chocolate,

they flooded it off down the trough and into a lagoon over there and then they pumped the water off

the top back to another pond which is situated at t'other side of the site.

And when it had set nice and hard they cut it out in blocks and made the pots out of it.

And like we've now restored it to working order and of course it's

driven by the steam engine which is in this engine house over here.

This is Josephine, you know, this is the engine that drives the plunger outside and it took me

and me assistant about six months or seven months to restore it, you know.

We pulled the thing to bits, we carted it back to Bolton

and restored it all and brought it back here and here it is now driving all the machinery in the pottery.

This passion for preserving the past came over in everything that Fred did.

Fred was very important in making us aware of the heritage around us, not just in the great town halls

and the great railway stations

but actually in the small-scale domestic architecture and artefacts.

And I think about the sort of things he was collecting himself - pieces of shop fronts which were going to

decay and had been painted and nobody took any care of any more.

And he rescued them and showed us that these things are all around us.

Little engines that would end up on a scrap heap that were part of our industrial heritage.

All of these engines were lovingly restored by Fred but the restoration projects he is best remembered for

are his steam roller and his traction engine.

After 27 years and two divorces and a lot of hard graft,

we've only got 100 pound on but we're going to give it a go and see what happens.

I know it'll go round but it's what it'll sound like is the important thing.

So this bit here we go -

handle forward,

regulator open. Nothing happened. Wait a minute. Ah.

Well, we're going backwards, we'll try it forwards.

Magic.

WHISTLE BLOWS

All them years and never knowing really whether it were ever going to make it or not and

when you think we nearly made a new un and all.

We have made a new un.

A lot of people that he was with

at the steam rallies, they were just the same.

They were all people that were born out of their time because

they all wished to preserve the things that they do.

And it's not so important the fact that, you know, why they've

saved something, it's important the fact that they have.

-I've got three more like this.

-Aha.

-Good Lord!

Who gave you a passport to come here? How are you?

I don't come so often now.

-A long time no see, Fred.

-It's been ten years, aye yes.

-It is indeed.

-Maybe more than that.

-Absolutely.

-How are you?

-Good to see you. I'm well, and you?

And it was thanks to Fred that the efforts of enthusiasts like this were brought to our attention.

Here in this building, there's a dedicated bunch of ladies and gentlemen who have been restoring

mill engines for the last 40, well 30-odd years, and I think I'll nip inside and see how they're doing.

Hello, Fred.

-Fancy meeting you.

-Aye, well, I know I get about a bit, you know.

The last time I saw this it were in a million pieces.

You're doing quite well there, it's...

-I haven't counted, but it seems like a million at times.

-It's looking pretty good, in't it?

-It's almost ready for...once you've put all the bits and various rods on...

-Yep, it's nearly finished.

Light a fire underneath it.

It's been on the shop floor for the last 30 years about,

but, er, we've been working on it at this level now for about two years.

Yeah, yeah, not very far off. It looks like...

We're getting near the end.

-All the hard work's been done, hasn't it?

-It certainly has.

How heavy's this beam?

At a rough guess, about seven tons I should think.

-It's a fair piece of iron.

-That's what I call a real work of art that, Fred.

There's more went into the skill of making this than Picasso ever put into one of the expensive paintings.

Aye, yeah that's a fact, yeah.

-That's my humble opinion.

-Well, he were drunk half the time, weren't he?

I suppose some of the blokes that put this up were drunk half the time.

More than likely, yeah, yeah.

I'm looking forward to seeing it running, to be quite honest.

-I bet you are.

-I didn't think I'd live to see that, but looks like I'm going to do.

He was in at a time when the sort of first generation of industry and old

machinery enthusiasts were about, when people were just beginning to get the idea of rescuing traction

engines from scrap yards and of raising historic boats and repairing them.

I couldn't really think of a nicer place

to restore a paddle boat on than here on the bonny banks of Loch Lomond.

I think I'll go and have a chat with the lads who are doing it.

They've got a big hard task in front of them.

He was in right at the beginning of that and

I think that and those wide-eyed...

loonies will have influenced him cos he's one of them.

Ding! Ding!

Now then, Michael, you've got your work cut out there, haven't you, mate?

-Yes. Lot of work here.

-I see you've done the other one on the other side.

-Yes, that took a few days.

-Yeah, I bet it did, yeah.

I know I've got one of them and progress is very slow but

when you've done it, you know, it get...it's amazing what thickness of corrosion it bangs loose, innit?

Well, they've been putting layers of paint on since 1953 probably.

Yeah and just flicking a bit off when they did it, yeah.

-Really wasting paint doing it that way.

-It is, yes.

You're better off getting it down to bottom.

How long have you had it like?

-Well, we came along about five years ago and it was a very sorry state indeed.

-I can imagine, yeah.

She was very derelict and rusty.

-Yeah.

-And had been lying for a number of years in that state.

Yeah yeah, yeah.

So we've been coming down every Saturday for the last five years and...

How many of a team have you got?

It varies from 5 to 12, 15 maybe.

-Relying on enthusiasm on the day.

-On a good day, yes.

Fred's programmes have helped everybody to understand exactly what

preserving the heritage is all about and why it's so important to us.

And it wasn't just ships and engines and big machines that he wanted to see preserved.

He champions more ordinary buildings.

We all know about great palaces and cathedrals and so on but Fred talks

about ordinary industrial buildings as well and where

people lived and where people worked and that's just as important a part of our social history.

One of the great things that Fred did for us was to show us the

variety of places in Britain that need to be preserved for future

generations and there's one way in which we can all get involved and he shows how volunteers, just members

of the public maybe with special skills or maybe people who are just enthusiastic can get involved.

Somewhere like Cold Harbour Mill which is full of volunteers who are all

hugely involved in preserving and maintaining that place so that we can all enjoy it.

Now then, John,

you won't hit it too hard. It's a bit moth-eaten, innit, you know?

It is a bit. They've had their money's worth out of this one, haven't they?

Must have been a bit on tight side with all these patches.

How long before you've got the wheel going again?

Well, it's about a two year project.

Yeah, yeah.

You've got somebody that give you some nice sheets of tin have you?

Oh, yes, a local engineering firm have been very good to us.

Shall we go and have a look at your beam engine?

-What a good idea.

-Yeah, come on.

This is it, is it, then?

-This is the thing that replaced the water wheels?

-It certainly did.

Yes, in the mid-19th century

they brought in steam power and this is where the

first beam engine sat and was more reliable of course than water power.

Especially when they'd had an hot summer and there were no water in the pond.

Yeah, it's an interesting engine this, innit?

There's a lot of unusual bits and bobs about it.

I mean this linkage from here to the stop valve, you know, it's magnificent, innit?

-Who needs a gym when you've got them sort of things?

-Well, there you go.

-It's all heavy stuff, isn't it?

-Yeah.

-Yes, it takes us a day to warm up the boiler.

-Warm the boiler.

To boil steam up and cos, of course, we've got the two big engines to run as well.

So let's go have a look at the other big engine.

This other one's a bit more modern, isn't it - more the turn-of-the-century job?

That's right. When the beam engine was scrapped here the other engine was fitted.

We'll go and have a look at the other one.

-Good idea.

-I've been inside a few...

Fred had a particular interest in the preservation of our industrial heritage,

but in his programmes he looked at much wider conservation issues.

Mmm, bath time.

Fred's big contribution, in terms of issues and standards and values

with conservation, is he highlighted technology.

There's a tendency for people to highlight the appearance of things

rather than the way that things are put together and what they're made of and how they work.

And I think Fred's way of looking at a medieval structure is a very refreshing way of doing it.

This is the church of the hospital of St Cross and building started in 1135

and this is the only major bit that's survived

cos when it were first built it had a thatched roof,

but some time in the 14th century it acquired the lead one.

Round the other side they're taking part of it off so we'll be able to go and see

how the Normans put a roof on a church like this one.

He's looking at it saying, "How did they put these particular

"timbers together, what order was it done in?"

"How were the loads transmitted,"

all of that sort of thing. "How do they get those pegs in there?"

"How are they going to maintain this thing?"

A practical view - and we don't often hear that about old things.

We hear about sort of flowerings of the human spirit on a grand scale, but we don't very often hear

the detail of how it's made and of how it's maintained.

And I think that sort of practicality really

strikes a chord with a lot of people and is one of the reasons why he was such a great man.

Morning, Fred.

Hello, Stuart. I've come to see what you're doing in your tent up here.

To have a look how the Normans built big thick walls.

-Or not so thick.

-Yeah, yeah.

Well, yeah, it's a bit...

What were down the middle there like?

-Well, when we started work here this was concrete - concrete was put in by the Victorians.

-Ah, yeah.

It had originally had a wooden gutter all the way through here,

cladding laid, and when that rotted away with age, the Victorians had just discovered concrete and

decided to pour the whole gutter in concrete and then cover it in lead.

But what happened was the...the concrete acted like a wick.

Where it touched the wall it drew all the moisture in and that

travelled right through the concrete and you can see what it's done here.

-Yeah.

-It's eaten the wood away.

The death-watch beetle have made a meal of it, they like soft timber

and that's what they've chosen to eat first.

-Yeah, you can see how it's kicking over, in't it?

-Absolutely, yes.

The spread of the roof is slowly rolling this and these joints at one time would have been tight.

Have you seen any of these deadly death-watch beetles?

Yes, we have, yes. We had a grub yesterday,

but we decided it had already done enough damage and I'm afraid I squashed it.

Fred was a very good communicator and very

good at explaining how buildings worked and how they stood up.

If buildings can't stand up, there's no point in having them.

And if people can understand how buildings are put together in the past it can be a guide to how it can

be repaired in the future and also help people really appreciate what's going on with their buildings.

See you've got a dustbin full of building materials.

This is our flints. The great thing about this is that they're the originals.

-Yeah, they're quite heavy stuff, innit?

-It is, yes.

-A lot of weight in that.

-Yeah, yeah.

We'll lose a percentage here.

-Oh, yeah.

-But we replace them off the fields.

-It's how they did it in the first place.

-Used to go out with the buckets.

-Absolutely.

-On your back.

Ah, yes, times have changed. Farmers used to be glad for us to take them, now they want money for it.

They're hard up.

The outside of the vaulting looks a bit rough but, of course, inside it's lovely.

This line here that you can see, these stones, you can actually see those inside

and you'll see that really shows us how thick the vaulting is because inside you'll see that this

is right at the top of the piece you can see so this is all...

Yeah, about 14 or 15 inches thick.

Yes. The vaulting is basically an arch,

and an arch only works if it's got a weight on it so all this has just been put on top to add strength.

To keep it together. Yeah, yeah.

Really when you think they had no cement mixers, there must have been

armies of blokes mixing the mortar to keep the building going.

-We're 50, 60 feet up here, so all that's been carried up here.

-Yeah, yeah.

-Tons and tons of it.

-We've no idea what the actual weight is.

-Yeah, sand and lime, eh?

As soon as you show the general public a really skilled craftsman

doing what they do, most people are immediately fascinated and engaged by it

and, you know, naturally... And respectful of it, you know, great

crafts skills and there are sadly few of them in a lot of craft areas.

So I thought it was terrific that Fred actually first wanted

to get his hands dirty himself partly to show in a way which conveys how difficult this is

and also to celebrate the skills of people like, you know, stonemasons,

tile makers, of plasterers.

I mean, those are extraordinary levels of skill which today have largely been short circuited by

industrial manufacture of building materials,

by use of plasterboard instead.

And a lot of those skills are barely kept alive.

And it needs...it needs to publicity to remind people that they're there and to pay tribute to them

not least because we really need them to keep our historic buildings standing.

He was very good at seeing what was going on.

He very often dealt with topical things like the conservation at

Ightham Moat for example - actually looking at the way the walls had been constructed

originally and how trouble was being taken to do them in the original way so that it was genuine conservation.

And so often he would take an example,

he'd always want to have a go himself which was very important.

Right, this is where we mix, Fred.

As you can see we've already got the hole, a nice pot...

-Nice modern machinery.

-Yeah, and a shovel which you're...

If you put your gloves on I'll show...

-You want me to go in the cow muck?

-That's right, yeah.

Right.

Bit surgical these, aren't they?

That's right.

Now it's what? Approximately half of that full of...? Full of...?

That is the sifted cow dung.

Yeah. It's nice stuff is it?

-That's it.

-Yeah, wait a minute.

-You got it?

-Yeah.

-That's it.

Hmm, yes...

-You can tell it...

-Nice measure.

Oh, lovely(!) That's rich, innit?

THEY CHUCKLE

I was collecting this at seven o'clock this morning.

-Yeah, so it's fresh.

-The local, erm, dairy herd.

Yeah, yeah.

I've never been into rubber gloves.

How do you get that one off there?

-Here, pull!

-You're going to enjoy your toast and...

Oh, it's all right, I'm used to pretty rough things, you know.

-Heck. I tell you what, it takes a bit mixing doesn't it?

-Yeah.

Not, er... It isn't sort of easy

-to shove about.

-Just turn it over.

That's it, you've got it.

It's changing colour slowly.

Looking good, eh?

-I think you're almost there, Fred, yeah?

-Yeah.

What's the idea of the cow dung?

Well, it does give it more elasticity, you know, with the...

when you're spreading it, it also hardens...

Yeah.

-Acts as a hardener.

-I wonder who first invented it.

Yeah, well, obviously before the lime and that, it was wattle - and that was cow

and horse

straw and dung, wasn't it?

So they've used it for...

But it's...it's an adhesion as well, you know. It's...

The type of cow matters, does it?

That's right.

I would say he's done that before, meself.

-Well, I've mixed a bit of mortar in me time.

-Have you?

Yeah. Never with any cow muck in it.

See how you get on with that.

-I'll have a go.

-Have a go.

Do you want me to continue in a downwards direction?

That'd be nice.

Oh, bloody hell.

Let me put this on the hawk.

-Yeah, yeah, yeah.

-That's it.

Push it well in, cos it has to go though the lath to key...

Yeah, wait a minute.

That's all right, come on.

He could turn his hand to anything.

You mention it and he, he, he'd do a very good job

no matter what it were.

Now that's going to be there 800 years.

It's good to think that

we do something that's going to stand the...

test of time, doesn't it really?

-Yeah.

-That's enough for me.

That's great, any time you want a job with us...

Yeah. Does have a tendency to stick to the floor, doesn't it? I mean, that's all...

When you think how well it sticks to the floor it must stick to the...

-the...like the proverbial whatsit to the blanket, innit?

-That's right.

A lot of people who look at half-timbered houses don't really know that all this goes on.

It's quite a job, really, but at least it's going back as it was

-and that's a good thing, I think.

-Yeah.

-It's a...

It'll be lovely when it's done, won't it?

And Fred had plenty of experience of restoring an old building.

When I bought this house about 40 years ago, it basically were a two up and two down.

And, of course, as me family got bigger I got to do summat about it so

I like built as much on it again, you know.

You know all the wonderful buildings we've been looking at, you know - even castles and all that -

they've all been messed about with and extended one way and another, you know. Even kings were great DIY men.

There've been extensions done to the house in the days of the Earl of

Bradford but they didn't make a very good job of it, you know.

They completely omitted all the beading and the fancy work, but when I did mine,

I thought, "I'll try and reproduce what they did in 1854."

When I first did the moulding and the fancy bits, the little square

pieces were sort of very white material, you know, and they stood

out like a sore thumb so I made a mixture of mud and water out of the back garden and painted them and,

of course, God and the rain has done the rest with now quite a good match with the moulding.

But Fred's way of restoring things and making the new work

blend in with the old doesn't fit in with current conservation policy as he found out in Edinburgh.

This magnificent monument here on Prince's Street in Edinburgh,

was erected in remembrance of Sir Walter Scott the famous Scottish writer.

Recently there's been quite a lot of restoration work done

and they've used exactly the same stone but of course it'll never get as black as what the rest of it is

cos there won't be the same amount of smoke in Edinburgh as there used to be.

The thing is that I rather think that if I'd have done it I'd have daubed

a bit of mud on it, you know, made it blend in with the other.

But, apparently, the powers that be say, it's because the

future generations will be able to see where the late 20th-century

repairs were actually done to it, you see, in the future years to come.

Well, that's the official policy, but Fred's way would be more likely to win the popular vote.

When you're talking about saving Britain's heritage and

bringing it to people's attention I don't think anybody did as much as Fred in popularising it,

bringing it down to a level where everybody could understand it and wanted to get involved.

And he brought to our attention examples of preservation work in some of the most surprising places

like here in the Lloyds Building in London.

I thought I might show you something a little bit different.

If you'd like to come in here.

Wow!

Well, this, Fred, is something of a contrast. This is...

-Very posh.

-..this is a genuine...

This is a genuine Robert Adam dining room.

The reason it's here is that when we had virtually completed the

1958 building which is on the other side of Lime Street we found that part of Bowood House in Wiltshire,

which belonged to the Marquis of Lansdowne, was being demolished and this room was due to be destroyed

so Lloyds collectively purchased the room.

We also found that, happily, the original firm responsible for creating the room under...

-Still existed?

-..Adam's direction was still in existence, so we commissioned them

again and the whole room was cut into sections, brought to the City and recreated in the 1958 building.

Well, of course if you've done that once there's no reason why you can't do it again. That's right.

So when we moved from '58 to '86, the room came with us.

And the great thing about the room as you see it now is

that it's actually gone back to its original proportions.

-In the 1958 building, because of the height restriction it had a flat ceiling but here...

-You've got...

In fact, if Robert Adam walked through the room we like to think that he would recognise it.

One of the things I liked about Fred's programmes were the moments

when he would suddenly say, "I've got one of those at home."

And you'd think, "How amazing!"

But, of course, he had...and in some ways quite ordinary things that he had.

He had a bit of wood carving off the front of a house and he'd restored it and he'd done it up and he would

talk about it, sort of stroke it and make you look at it more carefully.

And he was very good at making you see the special in very ordinary things.

Believe it or not, you know, I've been looking

around while we've been talking and that cornice moulding up there -

across the end of my back kitchen I've got a piece almost exactly same.

I didn't know Robert Adam was a kitchen designer.

Well, no he had nowt to do with it, you know.

You can buy anything nowadays in shops.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd - 2006

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