Glossop Official Guide circa 1957

Issued under the auspices of the GLOSSOP TOWN COUNCIL

FOREWORD
This edition of the Glossop Guide is entirely locally produced.
The collection of the subject matter has been under the auspices of the Development Committee of the Borough Council. The high quality art paper has been given by Olive & Partington Limited and manufactured from wood pulp at their Turn Lee Works. The printing has been voluntarily undertaken by their associated company, the Charlestown Paper Converting Company, Limited. The photographs have been taken by local photographers, so that this guide is literally an “all Glossop production”.



GLOSSOP
Mr. Ivor Brown, in a witty article “Man, Pig and Pride” in ’"The Observer”, wrote:
The dismal centres of our northern industrial cities are redeemed by their suburbs on the Pennine flanks, where there is some air to breathe instead of fumes emerging from a static mass of motor-cars”.
Thirteen miles from the industrial fumes of Manchester is Glossop. The new electric train service will take you from one to the other in twenty-nine minutes. You may leave Manchester in one of its winter fogs and rise up to the foothills of the Peak District, where Glossop simmers in the sunshine and clean air. Glossop is a busy industrial town. Yet, unlike many manufacturing centres, it has retained its individuality in spite of steady industrial growth. Glossop has lost its rural isolation of a century and a half ago, but its industries do not dominate the town, as do those of most of the great northern cities. The North Derbyshire countryside surrounds and invades the very centre of the town.
Glossop is practically encircled by the Peak District National Park. The circle is completed by the proposed North Cheshire Green Belt. Kinder Scout (2,088 feet) is four miles to the south-east and Bleak Low (2,060 feet) four miles to the north-east.
The Scout is the highest point of the Peak, and the last southern height of the Pennine” —C. E. Montague wrote in his book of pleasures, “The Right Place”—“It used to be twice as high as it is. For years have planed a good two thousand feet of millstone grit and coal off the crown of the old Pennine arch. But at night, or when snow is falling and shutting you up, as you walk, in a moving white cell, the black spongy peat flat that is now the top of the Scout has the tight mountain glory of gloom. It raises the mountaineer’s spirits as black frost without makes your fire burn better within. See Kinder Downfall with all the little precipice curtained with ice and hung about with pendent six-foot lustres of crystal. Or in an equinoctial gale, when all the stream’s water is caught by the wind at the edge of the fall and thrown back through the air onto the high table from which it has tried to lip over”.
There are few roads in England to match the grandeur of the route from Glossop eastwards towards Sheffield. The road ascends from 600 feet above sea level to nearly 1,700 feet at its highest point. Only in the Lakeland country is there English scenery as splendid as these Derbyshire moors. The landscape is wild and rugged, with striking cliff-like “edges”, far reaching barren moors and fields bounded by grey stone walls. A pattern of streams, or “doughs” flow into the valleys. Near Glossop are the sources of the River Derwent, which forms the Yorkshire boundary, and of the Etherow, which separates Derbyshire from Cheshire.
Glossop takes this countryside into its heart. Within the boundaries of the town are four parks, five recreation grounds for young people, first class cricket and football grounds, and a golf course which appears to be part of the surrounding moorland.
In 1924 the Glossop Dale Estate was broken up and sold, and the Corporation bought Glossop Hall and grounds which were opened to the public as Manor Park. The Park’s sixty acres contain many picturesque walks as well as public tennis courts, bowling and putting greens. Another large stretch of grassland and woodland is available at Bankswood Park in the Hadfield district. Howard Park can be reached through Howard Street, which passes Central Station and North Road. From its twelve acres there are fine views of the town and surrounding country. Formal flower beds, lawns and an ornamental lake make it a delightful retreat.
There are several beautiful residential districts, mainly on the south facing slopes and around the old village centres. A group of buildings in the town— years old, was used as the characterful setting for a recent film of Walter Greenwood’s “The Cure for Love”.
Not the least of Glossop’s charms is a sense of community rare in these days of sprawling suburbs. Here, one can enjoy all the advantages of life in a small market town. Clubs and societies such as the Townswomen’s Guild, Rotary Club, W.E.A., Music Club and Amateur Repertory Society flourish in a manner out of all proportion to the size of the population (Details of the societies are given in later pages). Churches and Chapels of all denominations provide another avenue for full social life for their members, and the main political parties have active clubs for those interested in public affairs.
In recent years Glossop has continued to attract increasing numbers of people from Greater Manchester and many of these have been unstinting with their praise of Glossop as a shopping centre With a weekly two-day market and high-class shops catering for all tastes and purposes, Glossop people can buy all they need in the town at competitive prices.
Glossop does not seek to offer everything within its own boundaries, but the cultured life of Manchester, with its University, Halle Orchestra, theatres, sports, fashion houses and commercial life, is only half an hour’s journey away. The last train of the day from Manchester to Glossop leaves at 11-15 p.m.
Glossop is, moreover, as healthy a place as you could wish to live in. Statistical proof of this is to be found in the fact that one in five of the population of the town is of pensionable age.
It is as Montague said :
To get a berth as a parasite, to buy yourself out of the fight, to get quarters to sleep in and rations to draw, and never do a turn on guard nor shoulder a pack in return for it all—that would seem to be the aspiration nearest to the hearts of quite a host of puny shirkers. But carry it to the Pennines and rub it against the frayed edge of its stripped strata—the grit that makes millstones, the coal that drives the factory engines, the mountain limestone that holds up the whole crushed Pennine arch for the coal to break through at the compound fractures on its flanks. Such a contact brings out, as by some chemical test, the ingredient of baseness in those squalid dreams of embezzled ease”.



AROUND GLOSSOP
As a centre for the exploration of the Derbyshire and North Cheshire moorland, Glossop is very conveniently situated. Among the surrounding hills the famous Kinder Scout is the highest point, though its 2,088 feet are rivalled by the summits of Edale Moor (2,062 feet), now part of the Peak District National Park, Featherbed Moss (1,762), Fairbrook Naze (2,049) and Bleaklow Hill (2,060 feet). The landscape is wild and rugged, characterised by striking cliff-like “edges,” great barren moors and fields bounded by grey stone walls. A network of streams or "doughs” flow into the valleys and near Glossop are the sources of the River Derwent, which forms the Yorkshire boundary, and of the Etherow, which separates Derbyshire from Cheshire.
Some of the more popular walks, beauty spots and places of interest around Glossop are listed below.
SNAKE PASS. From Old Glossop by “Duke’s Drive,” or the Wharf and Mossy Lea, as it is known to-day, the famous “Doctor’s Gate,” an old Roman road, can be followed on to the Snake Pass. The road from Glossop to Ashopton is one of great grandeur, passing through wild moorland scenery at a height of about 1,700 feet. It affords splendid views of the rugged plateau of the Peak and leads to Ladybower Reservoir and Derwent Valley. The valley is usually regarded as that part lying between the source of the Derwent river on Bleaklow and the village of Bamford, some miles to the south. In 1899 the Derwent Valley Water Board began its scheme for providing reservoirs here to meet the expanding needs of the industrial population around. By 1912 the Derwent and Howden reservoirs had been constructed and in 1945 the third and southerley extension, Ladybower, was opened by the King and Queen. The largest of its kind in the British Isles, it took ten years to complete. Two villages well-known to lovers of the Derbyshire moorland—Ashopton and Derwent—now lie beneath the waters. Two miles of the old Glossop-Sheffield road are also under the water and a new road is carried over the arms of the reservoir by a massive concrete viaduct. The wide stretches of water in the Derwent Valley add a charm to the landscape which is not diminished by the fact that they are man-made lakes, although the loss of the picturesque villages and of Derwent Hall and Church are to be deplored.
KINDER SCOUT. The circular trip around Kinder Scout is the classic Peak District walk and the tracks are well defined, but the vast plateau at its summit is a dangerous place in bad weather. It is often approached from Glossop by the Hayfield Road which is a continuation of Chunal. A stiff task for even seasoned walkers, it offers, however, the reward of twenty-two miles of magnifi­cent scenery. Probably the most impressive aspect of Kinder Scout is that seen from the west, when the great gritstone precipices enclosing the Downfall look gigantic from the smaller hills around Hayfield reservoir.
MONK’S ROAD. An old Roman road linking Chunal with Charlesworth, runs along the top of Whiteley Nab, at about 1,000 feet above sea-level, and affords a panoramic view of the surrounding countryside, of the town itself and even as far as Liverpool on a clear day. From here the little villages of Rowarth and Mellor can be reached over the Coombes Rocks or by a winding road, and such landmarks as the Abbot’s Chair and Robin Hood's Picking Rods are well-known in the district. Hard by is Marple, famous for its Roman Bridge and boating lakes.
LONGDENDALE VALLEY. A miniature Lake District is formed by Manchester Corporation Reservoirs at the foot of the range of hills leading from Hadfield to Woodhead (famous for its railway tunnel). To the right towers Devil’s Elbow on the Derbyshire side and to the left, on the Cheshire side, lies Crowden Moor leading to the Brushes and so to Mossley. In this area, and often plainly seen from the higher points of the town, is the famous television mast cf Holme Moss.
Many more beauty spots can be discovered by the rambler or motorist in the Peak District National Park, while even the sea coast resorts of Lancashire and North Wales are possibilities for day trips from the town.

Entering Padfield from Redgate

Sylvan Scene, Manor Park

INFORMATION-IN-BRIEF
AMBULANCE : 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Talbot Road, Glossop. (Glossop 504). 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Stalybridge 2650.
AREA OF BOROUGH : 3,324 acres.
BANKS : Barclays Bank Ltd., Norfolk Street, Glossop. District Bank Ltd., Norfolk Square, Glossop. Lloyds Bank Ltd., High Street East, Glossop Trustee Savings Bank, High Street West, Glossop.
BATHS : Swimming and Slipper Baths at Howard Park, Glossop. Hours of opening: Swimming Baths Mixed Bathing, Mondays to Fridays, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturdays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sundays, 8 a,m. to 10 a.m. (from first Sunday in May to last Sunday in August). The Slipper Baths open from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. (January February and March, Thursday Friday and Saturday only). Slipper Baths at Hadfield: Tuesdays to Fridays, 2 p.m. to .3 p.m. and 6-30 p.m. to 7-30 p.m. and Saturdays 10 a.m. to 1-30 p.m.
BUS SERVICES: Town services are as follows:—
Service No. 128 Old Glossop to Hadfield Station (via Wooley Bridge or Hadfield Road).
128a Whitfield to Padfield (via Dinting Road).
129 Glossop (Town Hall) to Simmondley Village.
Out of town services:—
Service No. 127 Royal Oak (Sheffield Road) to Stalybridge (via Newshaw Lane and Hadfield).
,, 127a Royal Oak to Stalybridge (via Cemetery Road and Hadfield).
125 Glossop (Norfolk Square) to Manchester (via Hyde).
6 Glossop (Norfolk Square) to Manchester Lower Mossley Street (via Stalybridge and Ashton).
85 Glossop (Henry Street) to Buxton (via Hayfield, Chinley and Chapel-en-le-Frith).
124 Glossop (Henry Street) to Marple Bridge (via Charlesworth and Chisworth).
39 Manchester to Sheffield bus (via Snake Pass) goes through Glossop, summer months only.
CAFES: Boulton's Cafe, Station Road, Hadfield. Bruckshaw’s Cafe, Norfolk Street, Glossop. Co-operative Cafe, High Street West, Glossop, Co-operative Cafe, Station Road, Hadfield. Lee’s Cafe, High Street West, Glossop. Lord's Cafe, High Street West, Glossop. Market Cafe, Market Hall, Glossop.
CEMETERY: Cemetery Road, off Woodhead Road. Tel.: Glossop 269.

View of Glossop from Dinting Arches		Residential Glossop
Parish Church & Old Cross, Old Glossop		In Simmondley Village

CINEMAS: Empire Cinema, High Street West, Glossop. Picturedrome, Bank Street, Hadfield.
CITIZENS’ ADVICE BUREAU: Community House, Market Street, Glossop.
CONVENIENCES : (for men and women) Market Hall, Glossop. Manor Park (near pavilion). Station Road, Hadfield. Bankswood Park, Hadfield. Wooley Bridge (near Spread Eagle Hotel).
COUNCIL MEETING : Last Wednesday in month at 7-30 p.m.
COUNCIL OFFICES : Municipal Buildings, Glossop.
COUNTY MIDWIVES: Nurse Woodhouse, 57 Green Lane, Hadfield. Tel.: Glossop 51. Nurse Evans, 27 George Street, Glossop. Tel.: Glossop 530.
DISTRICT NURSES : Nurse Harper, 31 Queen’s Drive, Glossop. Tel.: Glossop 2933. Nurse Hallam, 2 Church Fold, Charlesworth. Nurses C. E. Lloyd and C. Overstall, 43 Newlands Drive, Hadfield. Tel.: Glossop 741.
EARLY CLOSING: Tuesday.
ELECTRICITY : Supplies by the North West area Electricity Board, local showrooms, 5 High Street West, Glossop.
EMPLOYERS’ ASSOCIATION: There is an active Employers’ Association formed some ten years ago primarily to negotiate with Government Departments and Local Authorities on any matters affecting the interests of local industry.
The Association also encourages, promotes and protects industries carried on in Glossop and District and obtains for its members the advantages of mutual co-operation.
New industries coming to Glossop would be welcome as members of the Association; it is felt that mutual advantage would be obtained. Applications for membership should be addressed to the Secretary, N. S. Morgan, Easton, High Street East, Glossop. Tel.: Glossop 254.
ESTATE AGENTS : R. L. Fogg & Co., 8 Market Street, Glossop. (Glossop 424). Arthur Goldthorpe, 8 Henry Street, Glossop. (Glossop 319).
FIRE STATION: Ellison Street, Glossop. (Glossop 569).
FUEL OFFICE : Conservative Club Buildings, Station Street, Glossop.
GARAGES: Newton & Heap Ltd., High Street East, (Glossop 180) and Arundel Street (Glossop 48) Glossop. Reliance Garage, Turnlee Road, Glossop. (Glossop 222). F. Lawton Sc Son, Albert Street, Hadfield. (Glossop 728). Wilde & Bennett, Station Road, Hadfield. (Glossop 119).
GAS: Supplies by the North Western Gas Board, Showrooms: High Street West, Glossop. Station Road, Hadfield.
HOTELS : Norfolk Arms, High Street West, Glossop. Howard Arms Hotel, High Street East, Glossop. Arundel Arms Hotel, Cemetery Road, Glossop. Queen’s Arms Hotel, Shepley Street, Glossop. Palatine Hotel, Station Road, Hadfield. Hadfield House Hotel, Hadfield Road, Hadfield.
LABOUR, MINISTRY of, EMPLOYMENT EXCHANGE : Howard Street, Glossop.

Central Public Library

Public Hall for Concerts

LIBRARIES : Victoria Hall. Glossop. (Newsroom, Lending Library and Reference section) Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays, 10 a.m. to 7-30 p.m. Tuesdays 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays 10 a.m. to 1 p.m, Saturdays 10 a m. to 4 p.m. (Glossop 616).
Hadfield Branch : Mondays and Wednesdays, 4-45 p.m. to 7-30 p.m Fridays, 1-45 p.m. to 4 p.m. and 5-30 p.m. to 7-30 p.m. (Glossop 589).
Whitfield Branch: Thursdays, 2 p.m. to 3-30 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 7-30 p.m. Newsrooms open daily.
LICENSING HOURS: 11-30 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 5-30 p.m. to 10-30 p.m. Sundays, 12 noon to 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. to 10 p.m.
MARKET DAYS : Friday and Saturday (covered market).
NATIONAL ASSISTANCE BOARD OFFICE: Co-operative Cafe, High Street West, Glossop. (Glossop 625).
NATIONAL INSURANCE OFFICE: Victoria Street, Glossop.
NEWSPAPER: “The Glossop Chronicle & Advertiser”, Office, High Street West, Glossop.
OFFICIALS OF THE COUNCIL:
Town Clerk and Solicitor, Colin Campbell.
Assistant Town Clerk, C. A. Simmonds.
Borough Surveyor and Water Engineer, E. C. Allen, M.C., A.R.I.C.S., A.M.I.Mun.E.
Deputy Borough Surveyor and Water Engineer, A. Ramsbottom.
Borough Treasurer, E. M. Boardman.
Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Mary Sutcliffe, M.A., M.B., B.Chir., D.P.H.
Chief Public Health Inspector and Housing Manager, E. Dunsmore, M.R.S.H., M.S.I.A.
Additional Public Health Inspector, T. D. Williams,M.M., A.R.S.H..M.S.I.A.
Librarian, Miss M. Sidebottom, A.L.A.
Baths Superintendent, E. Riley.
Parks & Cemetery Superintendent, W. Waterworth, D.Inst.P.A.
Town Hall Caretaker, Market Inspector, Mayor's Attendant, J. Townsend.
Weights & Measures Inspector, J. E. Robinson.
PARKING PLACES: Norfolk Street; Norfolk Square; Market Ground; Glossop Railway Station (payment); Drovers Arms, Hadfield Cross, Hadfield Railway Station (payment).

Flower Gardens, Manor Park		Bowling Greens and Pavilion, Manor Park
Wood's Baths, Howard Park		Children's Playground, Manor Park

PARKS: Manor Park (tennis, bowls, putting, children’s playground) Glossop. Howard Park, Dinting Road, Glossop. Bankswood Park, Hadfield.
PERSONAL HEALTH SERVICES: Municipal Buildings, Glossop.
Minor Ailments: Daily.
Orthopaedic: Second and fourth Tuesday in the month.
Ante-natal: First Wednesday in the month at 2 p.m.
Immunisation Clinics: Second Saturday in the month at 9 a.m. (also at Hadfield Library, fourth Saturday in the month, 9 a.m. to 10 a.m.).
Eye Clinic: First, third (and fifth Saturday morning in the month). Maternity and Child Welfare: Twice weekly at Municipal Buildings. Alternate Wednesdays at Hadfield Library.
A Psychiatrist visits the clinic by arrangement with the Medical Officer.
The Tuberculosis Dispensary Centre for Glossop is now at Ashton, but information can be obtained from the Medical Officer or Health Visitors. Wood’s Hospital, situated in Howard Park, is now used as a continuation hospital for Ashton District Infirmary.
Partington Maternity Home, North Road, Glossop. (Glossop 53).
Shire Hill Hospital for chronic sick cases, Bute Street, Glossop.
Whitfield House, residential accommodation centre under the National Assistance Act, Charlestown Road, Glossop.
Physio-therapeutic clinic, Shire Hill Hospital, Glossop.
POLICE STATION: Ellison Street, Glossop. (Glossop 488).
POPULATION: 17,730.
POSTAL FACILITIES: Head Post Office, Victoria Street, Glossop. Hours of opening 8-30 a.m. to 6-30 p.m. Town Sub-post offices at Old Glossop (Manor Park Road); Whitfield (Victoria Street); Dinting (High Street West); Hadfield (Station Road). Hours of business: 9 a.m to 6 p.m.; closed Tuesday, 1 p.m.
PRODUCT OF Id. RATE: £580.
RATEABLE VALUE: £153,576
RATES IN THE £ : 19s. 10d.
REGISTRAR OF BIRTHS, MARRIAGES AND DEATHS: Mrs. Astill, 28 Howard Street, Glossop. Hours of opening: Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays 10 a.m. to 12 noon; Wednesdays 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.; Fridays 10 a.m. to 12 noon and 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. and Saturdays 9 a.m. to 11 a.m.
SOCIAL SERVICES: There are numerous clubs catering for outdoor sports of cricket, football, hockey, golf, tennis, cycling, angling and bowls, and the local baths provide facilities for swimming and water polo.
Among the indoor activities there are clubs for chess, photography, rabbit and poultry-keeping, music, choral music, and drama. Townswomen’s Guild, Rotary Club, Inner Wheel, W.E.A., United Nations Organisation, Women’s Institute, and several Parent-Teachers Associations.
Royal Corps of Signals (headquarters) Dinting Lane. (Glossop 438).
British Legion (men’s and women’s sections).
St. John Ambulance (headquarters), High Street West, Glossop.
Youth Organisations include: Glossop Youth Club, Girl Guide and Boy Scout companies, a Junior Cinema Club, and Youth Organisations connected with various churches.
The elderly people of the town are looked after by the Old Age Pensioners’ Association, Old Men’s Corners, and the Old People’s Welfare Committee. There is also an extremely efficient Blind People’s Welfare Organisation.

Woodcock Grove, Corporation Housing Estate		Bankswood Close, Corporation Housing Estate
Royle Avenue, Glossop		High Street West

SCHOOLS: Secondary Schools:—
Grammar School, Talbot Street, Glossop.
West End Secondary Modern School, Chadwick Street, Glossop Castle Secondary Modern School, Hadfield Road, Hadfield.
Primary Schools:—
Dinting C. of E., Dinting Vale, Glossop.
Duke of Norfolk C. of E., Old Glossop.
Padfield County School, Post Street, Padfield.
St. Andrew’s C. of E., Railway Street, Hadfield.
St. Luke's C. of E., Talbot Street, Glossop.
Whitfield C. of E., Ashton Street, Glossop.
Zion Methodist, Simmondley Lane, Glossop.
Roman Catholic Schools:—
All Saints' R.C., Church Street, Old Glossop St. Charles’ R. C., Wooley Bridge Road, Hadfield St. Mary’s R.C., St. Mary's Road, Glossop.
Nursery Schools:—
Hadfield Nursery School, Jones Street, Hadfield.
Whitfield Day Nursery, off Victoria Street, Glossop (for children of working mothers only).
SUPERINTENDENT REGISTRAR : Municipal Buildings, Glossop. Hours of opening: Mondays to Fridays 10 a.m. to 12 noon and 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.; Saturdays 10 a.m. to 12 noon.
TAXIS: Glossop Carriage Co., Ltd, Howard Street, Glossop. (Glossop 39). F. Lawton & Son, Station Road, Hadfield. (Glossop 728). J. A. Hope & Son, Hope Street, Old Glossop. (Glossop 2874).
TELEPHONE KIOSKS : Norfolk Square; Rose Green; Victoria Hall; Charlestown; Shepley Mill Bridge; High Street West (the Junction); Whitfield Cross; Wooley Bridge; Old Glossop; Gamesley; Simmondley; Pikes Lane; Station Road, Hadfield, Platt Street, Padfield; Spinners Arms, Hadfield Road, Hadfield; Newlands Drive, Hadfield.
WEIGHTS AND MEASURES OFFICE : Norfolk Street, Glossop.
YOUTH EMPLOYMENT BUREAU: Surrey Street, Glossop.



INDUSTRIAL GLOSSOP
Thirty years ago Glossop was a cotton town with three-quarters of its population employed in that industry. Within the last generation something in the nature of a second industrial revolution has taken place and the town has shown great resilience in adapting itself to the changed conditions.
Today diversity is the mark of the new textile industry. Staple fibre and filament rayon are both used in quantities nearly equal to that of cotton. Silk, wool, silk noil and hemp are other materials used in the area.
The bulk of the product of Glossop looms now goes to the Dominions, to Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada, all of which are higher-price, better quality markets—though similar in their demands—to the home market.
Variety is to be found, not only in the spinning and weaving sections of the industry, but in the finishing sections and rope manufacture. Methods of making cloth crease resistant and unshrinkable have been added to the long established bleaching, dyeing and printing.
The type of work done at the print works has changed. In addition to “native” prints an immense range of patterns in fast colours is printed on a continually increasing variety of cloth.
The old established paper making industry continues to expand and is almost unique in manufacturing its own pulp from imported timber.
The rope industry has grown in size chiefly because it has increased the variety of its products. Where formerly the emphasis was on driving ropes and banding, the old firms now make tyre yarns, pearl cords, cables, fishing lines, net yarns and belting yarns, while one of the newer firms has introduced the manufacture of sports netting.
Now one quarter of the insured population is engaged in basic industries that are related neither to textile nor to paper manufacture. This group of new industries includes twenty different and unrelated types of manufacture, all of which have been attracted to Glossop from other districts.
Why have these industries come to Glossop and why have they been so successfully established ?
Recent research suggested that:
1. Glossop is ideally situated near the centre of the triangle between the three great consuming areas of the North—the West Riding, Lancashire and the Midlands.
2. Transport facilities are exceptionally good. There is the fast electric service by rail to Manchester and Sheffield, and the town is as well placed for road services. An indication of this is shown by the hauling of bulky raw Material to Olive and Partington’s of the Inveresk Group, mentioned previously.
3. Buildings and building sites are readily available for development.
4. Glossop is found to be an attractive place to live in.
5. The people of Glossop are conscientious and hard workers. Employers interviewed were unanimous in their praise of this quality, which was responsible for the glove industry coming to Glossop in 1920 and for at least two firms coming to the town since the last war. One would hesitate to mention this as a location factor if it had not been such a constant theme in discussions with employers. It is not merely local pride that engenders this opinion, for with one exception, all those who have expressed it are outsiders, with considerable experience of workers in other parts of the textile region and with comparatively short residence in Glossop. There is evidence for the existence of this quality in an almost complete lack of absenteeism at Glossop, except for legitimate reasons.
Though Glossop enjoys full employment, there is a large potential labour force waiting for new industrial development. Though not revealed by the Ministry of Labour Statistics, it is nevertheless true that about 2,000 people travel from Glossop daily to factories situated between the town and Manchester. Many of these are engineers, sheet metal workers and electrical engineers. It is also possible that Glossop’s population may be largely increased by people from Manchester and other industrial areas.
The Town Council has shown its goodwill towards firms intending to develop industry in Glossop by making available a generous proportion of new council houses for key workers. On the Queen’s Drive Estate, twenty-four of the 118 houses were given to workers of particular importance to Glossop industries. None of these men had lived in Glossop before. The Council made it possible for their firms to bring them to the town.

Devil's Elbow from Cemetery Road

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Last updated: 2 February 2021