Report from our Talks Programme
By Peter Keen

250th Anniversary Celebrations : Mr Joseph Boughey.

A joint event with St Helens Historical Society, at the Colours Restaurant, St Helens College, with the Mayor, Cllr Sheila Seddon and the Mayoress, Mrs Ann Forrest, in attendance.

Mrs Evelyn Knowles, President of the Historical Society, opened the proceedings, and introduced SCARS' President, Sir John Johnson, who Chaired the evening, and introduced the Speaker, the author and canal historian Mr. Joseph Boughey.

Mr Boughey began his presentation with a brief outline of the canal's origins and history, emphasising its importance to the development of the town of St. Helens. The canal opened to Broad Oak in 1757 bringing prosperity to coal owners, shareholders, Liverpool Councillors and Cheshire Salt Boilers for nearly eighty years before the coming of the railways and the changes in industrial location began its long slow decline.

Post 1919 traffic ceased above Newton Common Lock and the last commercial carrier, the Sankey Sugar Works, wound up its canal boat transport in the late 1950s. Mr Boughey disclosed the interesting fact that even then the canal was officially seen as an asset rather than a liability, and as such it was worth preserving, but as we now know, this came to nothing. Bridges were fixed, parts of the canal were filled in and all thoughts of restoration faded.

Mr.Boughey then went on to describe the rekindling of interest in the canal. In the late 1970s Widnes Borough Council restored part of the newest section of canal, between the River Mersey and the Runcorn Gap Railway's swing bridge onto Spike Island, dredging out the canal bed, installing moorings, restoring and re-gating one of the river locks and converting the other into slipways to launch vessels into both river and canal.

The next restoration took place under Warrington Newtown Corporation, a limited life organisation which nevertheless brought great changes to the area to the northwest of that town. Part of the Development Plan included the restoration of the canal between Bewsey Old Hall and Sankey Way, a new road entering Warrington from the west.

Elsewhere there was little activity until the 1980s when SCARS and St. Helens MBC began working on the northern sections of the canal, commencing at the New Double Locks and working gradually upstream towards the town centre, tackling the section alongside the new Technology Campus, the section between Standish Street and Corporation Street and lastly the section between Parr Street and Hardshaw Brook Culvert. SCARS had been working since 1985 at various locations along the canal, controlling vegetation growth, excavating remaining canal features and contributing to interpretation.

Mr Boughey was able to illustrate the above activities with a selection from his slide library. Some of them showed features now long gone, and some from interesting viewpoints. SCARS hopes to arrange an exchange of images so that some of these unique photographs can be added to its own archive. The Speaker rounded off his presentation by paying tribute to SCARS and the Historical Society for the valuable work carried out in publicising the importance of the canal, in surveying, researching and recording its history and in carrying out the restoration work which it is hoped will lead to its reopening.

There were obviously questions from the floor but time restraints meant that the meeting had to close after just a few of these. Despite this limitation, discussion carried on during the refreshments, always a measure of the success of a meeting, and this would have continued further had not the security man arrived to lock up.

The time devoted to the event by Speaker and special guests and the hospitality of the college in allowing the use of the premises was much appreciated by SCARS and the Historical Society. The event formed an excellent component of the Society's year of celebration to mark the 250th anniversary.

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