Local Life - Wigan - April 2020

25
heritage board will increase historical
awareness across the local community
and will be the starting point for a
series of Heritage Trails later this year.”
Here are a number of images
highlighting what the land now known
as Standish Rec has been used for
over the past two hundred years, but
for more information do pop along
and check out the heritage board at
Standish Rec.
Urban District Council decided that the village
needed a recreation ground where people
could meet and children could play.
They approached Henry Standish, who was the
Lord of the Manor at the time and owned much
of the land in Standish, and in 1909 he agreed
to let the council rent part of Squires Hey for
the purpose of a recreation ground for the
princely sum of £5 a year. In 1920 Henry died, and
his widow Helena De Perusse Standish went on to
gift the area to the council.
Prior to becoming a recreation area, the field
and surrounding area were used for a number of
commercial activities. Malt Kiln Farm used to be
sited on part of the
area,and for nearly
100 years trains ran
on a mineral railway,
known locally as ‘The
Line’.
Images Left to Right:
1.) Standish Counsellors – L to R - Adam Marsh, Debbie
Parkinson and Ray Whittingham
2.) Anne Marsden – wife of the late Standish footballing
legend Curly Marsden – who features on the board
3.) St Wilfrid’s FC Division 1 winning team in 1963/4. Curly
Marsden (Captain) holding the trophy
4.) Four veterans of St Wilfrid’s FC who played in the
1960s.
5.) Cows being taken across the Rec for milking at
High St Farm in 1944
6.) Steam engine crossing School Lane Standish -
carrying coal past the Rec to be processed at Gidlow
This railway, servicing
the area’s coal
mines was operational from
1856 through to 1932. It then
reopened in 1952 when the
Robin Hill drift mine opened
at Almond Brook and, for the
best part of a decade, extracted
200,000 tons of coal a year. The
Line eventually closed in 1963.
Jim added “We hope that the