The Rookery

Rear of the houses in Clay Terrace (The Rookery).

One of the things that is now surprising is the lack of "streets" i.e rows of terraced houses that you saw almost everywhere in conurbations, that grew up during the Industrial Revolution and later.

However, they have been and gone, the result of a post-war programme of "slum clearance" as was described by Lymm Urban District Council. Many streets had been thrown up in the mid 19th century to accommodate the population explosion. This picture, showing the the backs of Clay Terrace* was also known as 'The Rookery'. (In Dickens, a Rookery was slang for a slum).

The photograph was taken by Alan Taylor, who took so many important pictures of Lymm during the 1950s and 60s. Without his photographs, a whole slice of Lymm Life would have been lost and forgotten. Now, with his invaluable contributions to The Lymm Archive, we are ensuring that Lymm's story is accessible today and for future generations.

By the way, they may have been primitive but so many who lived there have very happy memories of growing up in a tight-knit community and no disrespect is meant by use of that evocative word "slum".

*Clay Terrace was off Booths Hill Rd opposite the junction to Newfield Road (which was built at around the same time).