Wooton Staffordshire

The historic boundaries of Staffordshire cover much of what is now the metropolitan county of West Midlands. An administrative county of Staffordshire was set up in 1889 under the Local Government Act 1888 covering the county except the county boroughs of Wolverhampton, Walsall, and West Bromwich in the south (the area known as the Black Country), and Hanley in the north. The Act also saw the towns of Tamworth (partly in Warwickshire) and Burton upon Trent (partly in Derbyshire) united entirely in Staffordshire.

In 1553 Queen Mary made Lichfield a county separate from the rest of Staffordshire. It remained so until 1888.

Handsworth and Perry Barr became part of the county borough of Birmingham in the early 20th century, and thus associated with Warwickshire. Burton, in the east of the county, became a county borough in 1901, and was followed by Smethwick, another Black Country town in 1907. In 1910 the six towns of the Staffordshire Potteries, including Hanley, became the single county borough of Stoke-on-Trent.

A major reorganisation in the Black Country in 1966, under the recommendation of the Local Government Commission for England led to the creation of an area of contiguous county boroughs. The County Borough of Warley was formed by the merger of the county borough of Smethwick and municipal borough of Rowley Regis with the Worcestershire borough of Oldbury : the resulting county borough was associated with Worcestershire. Meanwhile, the county borough of Dudley, historically a detached part of Worcestershire, expanded and became associated with Staffordshire instead. This reorganisation led to the administrative county of Staffordshire having a thin protusion passing between the county boroughs (to the east) and Shropshire, to the west, to form a short border with Worcestershire.

Under the Local Government Act 1972, on April 1, 1974 the county boroughs of the Black Country and the Staffordshire urban district of Aldridge-Brownhills became, along with Birmingham, Solihull, and Coventry and other districts, a new metropolitan county of West Midlands. County boroughs were abolished, with Stoke becoming a non-metropolitan district in Staffordshire, and Burton forming an unparished area in the district of East Staffordshire. On April 1, 1997, under a recommendation of the Banham Commission, Stoke-on-Trent became a unitary authority independent of Staffordshire once more.

Three walks in one day

Denby Dale is steeped in history, and is first recorded in the history books as Denby Dyke, where the turnpike road crossed the River Dearne…some of the villages in the surrounding area have a history that goes back even further .

And of course, the famous Denby Dale Pie has been a regular event since the very first one in 1788.

Denby Dale Village History

Before the Industrial Revolution, Denby Dale, or Denby Dike as it was then known, was a very sparsely populated village, with a textile cottage industry. Relics of this hand-weaving industry still survive in several buildings which retain their typical weaving-chamber windows. The roads were mere dirt trackways, often impassable during the winter months and wheeled transport was brought to a standstill.

In 1825, the quiet location became a main crossroads of two turnpike roads - the Barnsley to Shepley Lane Head and the Wakefield to Denby Dale…25 years later and the railway had been built with surrounding factories and mills. And the village prospered – well placed to supply the textile industry with raw materials, coal for power, a water supply and transport to move the products to and from markets. Added to this were the inherent skills set within the local workforce of the textile industry, supplemented by external resource, keen for the new work in the mills.

And so the population of the village greatly increased and it became necessary to build terraces of houses to accommodate the people who began to arrive to fill the demand for factory workers. For many years into the nineteenth century children provided cheap labour in the mills, often working for up to twelve hours or more a day.

Denby Dale is world famous as the 'Pie Village', a name acquired from the tradition of baking record-breaking huge pies. It's a tradition that dates back to 1788, when a pie was baked and shared by the villagers to celebrate the return to health of King George III. There have been a further 9 pies, baked at irregular intervals and for various events from celebrating the repeal of the Corn Laws to raising funds for Huddersfield Royal Infirmary. The Millennium Pie of 2000 was 12 meters long and weighed 12 tonnes. Visitors can view the dish for the 1964 pie, which was baked to raise funds for a village hall, outside the resulting Pie Hall on Wakefield Road. The dish, 18ft x 6ft, is now a flower planter.

Pies are not the only thing done on a large scale in this area. Visible from most of Denby, and indeed from the M1 and the M62 is the TV mast at Emley. At a height of 330m, Emley Mast is the tallest self-supporting structure in Britain. It was completed in 1971 and replaced an earlier mast that came down in dramatic fashion when a combination of high winds and ice building up on the guide ropes, brought the structure crashing down in the spring of 1969.

Another striking landmark is the viaduct that spans the Dearne valley at Denby Dale. The original structure was made of wood, but fortunately this was replaced in 1880 before it had a chance to fall down. It carries trains on the Penistone Line between Sheffield and Huddersfield (and is a delightful railway that runs through attractive countryside and quaint stations). The busy line has recently been designated a community railway. The Penistone Line Partnership organises guided walks between stations, hosts monthly music trains and documents the history of the line with the Tracking Lives project. The Art Along the Line project has seen artists working with local groups to create artworks for various stations. Mosaics can be viewed at Denby Dale station.

Railway fans may also like to visit the Kirklees Light Railway, just a couple of miles along the road at Clayton West. It is a narrow gauge line, running along the route of a former standard gauge branch line that served local coal mines from 1879 and continued to carry passengers until 1983.

Emley

Emley Moor is one of the most powerful transmitters in the country at 870kW (analogue), plus Digital /Freeveiw at 10kW (apart from MUX6/D which is only 4kW).
It is the tallest free standing structure in the UK at 328m (a.g.l), that`s 1084 ft, also
see How High is High ?  The previous transmitter was a cable stayed mast which was even taller at 385m (the same design as Belmont) but this infamously blew down in 1969.
One theory was that a weak point in the design was found wanting by the unprecedented weather. Others speculated that there was so much ice on the cable stays that the weight broke them, after that the mast was doomed.... It had only been up for 5 years !
A team of Polish riggers were bought in to erect a temporary mast, apparently they were
the only people who were willing to work in the winter conditions prevailing at the time.
The replacement mast began transmitting 3 days and 23 hours later, impressive.
The very first Emley Moor transmitter was a steel lattice tower built in 1956 to broadcast
ITV on the old 405 line VHF system, and as such it worked in tandem with the original
Holme Moss mast, which transmitted the BBC (only one programme, BBC2 didn`t start till 1964) on VHF until 1984. Duplicated transmitters were / are also used at Sutton Coldfield / Lichfield, Crystal Palace / Croydon and Pontop Pike / Burnhope amongst others.  
This 1956 structure was rebuilt at Craigkelly in 1971 to provide UHF TV to SE Scotland.  
The present Emley Moor tower opened in 1971 and it is an elegant tapered concrete structure which is situated about half way between Huddersfield and Barnsley. This area of high ground is perfect for RF (Radio Frequency) transmission and both Holme Moss and Moorside Edge transmitters are visible (SW and WNW respectively) from the site. Emley Moors population coverage is the forth highest of any UK transmitter at about 4 million people and its signals are received in many large towns/cities including Sheffield, Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield and Doncaster. To many people Emley is iconic and fully deserving
of the Grade 2 listed status it received in 2002. For most locations in South Yorkshire the transmitter is NW and on a clear day it can be seen from many high points in Sheffield or (more obviously) from the M1. As one travels North it`s on the left. Whenever I return back home from a long journey, I see Emley and know there isn`t long to go now ! Incidentally, this stretch of the M1 was opened in 1968, doesn`t time fly.....

Clayton West

Clayton West is a village in West Yorkshire, England. It has a population of 2,648 (2001 census) . It is 9 miles (15 km) south east of Huddersfield and 7 miles (11 km) north west of Barnsley.

It is in the parish of Clayton West and High Hoyland. An attractive stone-built village, there is also a little light industry and a number of new housing developments.

Facilities in the village include a post office, a village store, four pubs and one school called Kayes First School.

It also has an excellent Scout Group which offers access to a number of outdoor activities including archery, target shooting, kayaking and much more.

Clayton West is located between the villages of High Hoyland, Scissett and Skelmanthorpe.

The river that runs though the village is called the River Dearne and was part of the 2007 United Kingdom floods.

The village coal mine(pit), "Park Mill", closed in 1989, having been somewhat bypassed by the events of the strike.

The village used to have a train station on a branch of the Penistone Line. However the station along with Skelmanthorpe was closed in 1983. The Kirklees Light Railway now operates trains from the former station.

Clayton West is occasionally used as a location for Britain's longest running comedy series Last of the Summer Wine, in which one of the village's four pubs, "The Shoulder of Mutton" in Church Lane, features prominently.

Once the site of a substantial nineteenth century cholera epidemic, Clayton West is locally referred to as "the fields of death". The name was a premonition of things to come; in 1924 18 locals were butchered in religious riots surrounding the supposed mystical essence of a local stone. Paraded on the streets of this backwater village every St Cuthberts day, the "the bishops knuckle" has been worshipped since the 11th century.