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Please follow this link regarding the pricing concerns which we voiced to Caroline Miller.
Pricing Concerns Answers from Caroline Miller
We started off our meeting with look at the Bardon Mill Pottery Kilns which Val has visited and recommends, easy to get to with a regular bus service (time table below) and rail links from Bardon Mill to Newcastle.
Here is a little sample from the web site which has some interesting storeys
The original founders Errington and Reay established their pottery at Bardon Mill in 1878 in the once water powered Woollen Mill which operated from the late seventeenth century. It remained a family business since Victorian times when it earned its nationwide reputation for high quality sanitary ware, drainage pipes and ornamental pottery for domestic use.
Errington Reay is a well-known and highly respected brand of British made pottery established in 1878. We are unique in being the last commercial pottery facility in Britain licensed to produce salt glaze - and today, we are proud that it is still a traditional family run pottery and a premium brand sought after for its individual salt glaze and top quality craftsmanship.
We had a short discussion on first world war war poets and about Ralph Erskine the architect of the Byker Wall. We finalised our comments regarding the current pricing and funding of Newcastle's Adult Learning which we will send to the head of Newcastle Adult Learning over the price increase and lack of concession for pensioners and the less well off. It appears that there are only concessions for people who are Job Seekers nothing for pensioners and people with low income.
We next discussed the proposed visit to the Ouseburn which was mentioned last month. The plan is to meet up on Wednesday August 3 10:30 outside the Tanners Arms on New Bridge Street for a heritage walk. We hope to visit the Cluny to see Eric's plague then down to the farm and the river side walk looking at various historic areas and using some of Maureen's Ouseburn Heritage magazines to inform us of its rich history.
Here is an extract about the Ouseburn from Newcastle The Biography by A.W Purdue which is reviewed further down the pages.
'To the east of the town centre there was a cluster of industries and workshops on the banks of the Ouseburn. Glass making there dated back to the seventeenth century and there were potteries, brickyards, a copperas works, a foundry, small boatyards and a ropery. A somewhat larger enterprise was Morrison's engineering works started at mid century to make marine engines, steam hammers and cranes. It failed in 1866 but was succeeded by a unique experiment when, under the aegis of Dr Rutherford, a Nonconformist minister and philanthropist, a co-operative was set up to take over the works; it to went bankrupt. More typical of the Ouesburn were manufactures which polluted the stream and spread noxious fumes, such as tanneries, dye works, the processing of bones into manure and chemical works for the valley was far enough from the town centre and genteel areas for these to be tolerated. Newcastle was far too upstream to be suitable for shipyards building large ships (Armstrong's was unusual and had not started off as a shipyard) and the first shipyards below Newcastle were at Walker, not yet part of the town, though increasingly physically and economically integrated with it.'
Review of Newcastle The Biography by A.W. Purdue, Amberley Publishing 2011 by Derek Trueman
The back cover of the book summary does not do the book the justice it deserves and unless you open up the book and flick through the chapters you may be put off by it.
You can buy the book from the Works at a cut down price of around £10 originally £16.99. It is a substantial history of Newcastle with the early Medieval and Tutor chapters setting the scene for the social and economic discussion in the latter chapters which reach their peak in the two long chapters Newcastle in the long eighteen century and the next chapter Victorian Newcastle, both chapters being around 70 pages long. It shows where Purdue's real interests concentrate. The wrangling of the Merchants, Bondsmen, Guilds men, Nobility and the Elders makes interesting reading along with the social impact as they merge together to form Newcastle's Polite Society.
Purdue has done extensive research and reading which punctuates the chapters with references from a wide range of authors. Its unfortunate that references are numbered and that to find out more you need to refer to the index at the back of the book, some people prefer full references in the page which they can thumbnail or mark the page to come back to. Another example of flipping backwards and forwards is with the illustrations which are very good and some quite rare; but they are in the middle of the book, understandably because of the expense of in line images on pages with print. Perhaps we have been spoilt by in line images and print in web pages.
The changing face of politics in Newcastle during the pre and post wars is another interesting aspect of the book and Newcastle's Councils limited vision and provision is highlighted just as it was in the Victorian period. The idea that planners thought that the working class would prefer flats to nice leafy suburban lanes of well cultivated front gardens and cars on drives struck a chord.
Overall a very informative book that dispels the myth of Newcastle's development and prosperity being solely dependant on coal and heavy industry rather than trading, commerce, administration and education.
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