Failsworth


Failsworth is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, Greater Manchester, England, north-east of Manchester city centre and south-west of Oldham. The orbital M60 motorway skirts its eastern boundary. The population at the 2011 census was 20,680. Historically part of Lancashire, until the 19th century Failsworth was a small farming township linked ecclesiastically with Manchester. Locals supplemented their farming income with domestic hand-loom weaving. The arrival of textile manufacturing led to unplanned growth into a mill town, marked architecturally by several redbrick cotton mills. The major landmark is the Failsworth Pole. Daisy Nook is a country park along the southern boundary with Droylsden.

Etymology

Failsworth derives from the Old English fegels and worth; it probably means an "enclosure with a special kind of fence".

History

Early settlement in the area rested on a road that runs today between Manchester and Yorkshire. This secondary road built by the Romans formed part of a network from Manchester up north, probably to Tadcaster near York. The section of road that ran through Failsworth remains in existence and is known as Roman Road. It was built above marshland and was laid on brushwood with a hard surface. Roman Road has also been known as "Street", a Saxon term meaning "metalled road",, indicating that it was also used in the Saxon period.
Evidence from early sources suggest that the area was occupied in Saxon times. The small hamlet was scattered with simple dwellings made of rough local stone, mud and clay, with thatched roofs. It was possibly located on ground higher than the surrounding marshland. Daily life there would have centred on animal husbandry and land cultivation.
Unmentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086, Failsworth does not appear in records until 1212, when the name was recorded as Fayleswrthe and the settlement was documented as a italic=no estate or manor, comprising four oxgangs of land. Two oxgangs at an annual rate of 4 shillings were payable by the tenant, Gilbert de Notton, to Adam de Prestwich, who in turn paid tax to King John. The remaining two oxgangs were held by the Lord of Manchester as part of his fee simple. The Byron family came to acquire all four oxgangs in the mid-13th century and so held the whole township. However, apart from a small estate in the township held by Cockersand Abbey, Failsworth was acquired by the Chetham family, which was then sold on to smaller holders.
By 1663, 50 households were registered in Failsworth. Daily life centred on natural resources, land cultivation and animal husbandry. In the 17th century, many were employed as labourers to work the land, though trademen such as a tailor, a felt maker, a shoemaker, a joiner and a weaver supported them. The earliest record of a place of worship at Dob Lane Chapel dates from 1698.
In 1774, 242 families lived in Failsworth with a total of some 1.400 inhabitants. By then a high proportion of them were involved in cloth manufacture. Development of the textile trade in England was supported by important legislation; between 1500 and 1760, a number of acts were passed to encourage cloth manufacture through the compulsory growing of flax. Grants were issued to flax growers and duties imposed on foreign imports. Manchester had an extensive linen trade using yarn imported from Holland and Ireland.
In 1914 the regular Daisy Nook Easter Fair ceased due to the outbreak of war, but reopened in 1920. On 8 June 2007, a 1946 depicting work by L. S. Lowry entitled "Good Friday, Daisy Nook" was sold for £3,772,000, then the highest price paid for one of his paintings at auction. Another painting by Lowry from 1953, "Fun Fair at Daisy Nook", sold for £3.4 million in 2011.

Timeline

Lying within the historic county boundaries of Lancashire since the early 12th century, Failsworth in the Middle Ages formed a township in the parish of Manchester, and hundred of Salford.
After the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834, Failsworth formed part of the Manchester Poor Law Union, an inter-parish unit founded to provide social security. Failsworth's first local authority was a local board of health established in 1863; Failsworth Local Board of Health was a regulatory body responsible for standards of hygiene and sanitation. After the Local Government Act 1894, the area of the local board became the Failsworth Urban District, a local government district in the administrative county of Lancashire. In 1933, there was a small exchange of land with neighbouring Manchester, and in 1954, parts of Limehurst Rural District were added to Failsworth Urban District. Under the Local Government Act 1972, Failsworth Urban District was abolished. Since 1 April 1974 it has formed an unparished area of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, a local government district within the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester. Failsworth contains two of the twenty wards of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham; Failsworth East and Failsworth West.
Failsworth forms part of Ashton-under-Lyne parliamentary constituency, represented in the House of Commons by Angela Rayner MP of the Labour Party.

Geography

At Failsworth lies north-north-west of London. Failsworth is the southernmost tip of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham. It shares boundaries with Manchester and Tameside. Failsworth is traversed by the A62 road from Manchester to Oldham, the former heavy rail line of the Oldham Loop, and the Rochdale Canal, which crosses the north-west corner. The M60 motorway passes through. For the Office for National Statistics, Failsworth forms part of the Greater Manchester Urban Area.
The land in Failsworth gently slopes from east to west, away from the Pennines and from the brooks that bound it on the north-west and south-east.
Failsworth has a country park, Daisy Nook, on its eastern border, on land mostly belonging to the National Trust. The undulating wooded land is popular for walking, horse riding, fishing and many other outdoor pursuits.

Demography

Population change

Economy

Failsworth is a centre for hat-making, which began as a cottage industry before the firm of Failsworth Hats was set up in 1903 to manufacture silk hats. For a time the company operated from a factory near the former Failsworth Council offices and it remains in the area to this day. Today, Failsworth's main areas of economic activity are electrical goods manufacture, and plastic production and distribution by Hubron Ltd. Many Failsworth residents work in Manchester, with which it has strong transport links that include the Metrolink tram service from Failsworth Metrolink station on the Oldham and Rochdale Line.
In July 2007, the Tesco supermarket chain a 24-hour Extra branch on the banks of the newly regenerated wharf. The move has not been welcomed by small shop-owners, who claim they have lost customers to the new store and may be forced to close. Tesco's arrival was expected to be a catalyst for bringing other stores, bars and restaurants to Failsworth. The only other large store in Failsworth is a branch of Morrisons in the converted Marlborough Mill.
Oldham Caravans, a subsidiary of Glossop Caravans, have an outlet in Oldham Road.

Landmarks

A major landmark is Failsworth Pole on Oldham Road. The first "political pole" was raised in 1793 although a local historian suggests there were others before and that maypoles probably stood on the site for centuries. The pole that now stands on the site replaces one blown down in 1950.
After a major restoration of the Pole, clock tower and gardens in 2006, a bronze statue of Benjamin Brierley was erected in the gardens.
At the road junction of the A62 with Ashton Road West stands the cenotaph, built in 1923 to remember over 200 Failsworth men who lost their lives in the First World War. Attendances at the cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday remain high, averaging around 2,000. The annual Remembrance parade is led by 202 Field Squadron, RE, which is based in Failsworth. In June 2007 the war memorial was rededicated after a £136,000 makeover, and opened by Colonel Sir John B. Timmins.

Education

The local comprehensive is The Co-operative Academy of Failsworth, which moved to a new building in 2008 which caters for children aged between 11–16 years of age. The £28 million project allowed secondary schooling in the town to come under one roof as opposed to the previous Lower and Upper schools on Partington Street and Brierley Avenue. The school has specialist Sports College status.

SchoolType/StatusHeadteacherOfSTEDLocationReference
The Co-operative Academy of FailsworthSecondary SchoolMr P Quirk105735'
Woodhouses VA Primary SchoolPrimary SchoolR Bentham105688'
South Failsworth Community Primary SchoolPrimary SchoolMrs Foy105656'
Higher Failsworth Primary SchoolPrimary & Infant SchoolSusan Kitchen134784'
St John's CE Primary SchoolPrimary School'
St John's CE Primary SchoolPrimary SchoolGerard Kehoe105712'
St Mary's RC Primary SchoolPrimary & Infant SchoolBernadette Cunningham105727'
Mather Street Primary SchoolPrimary SchoolJ Adams105649'
Pupil Support CentreSpecial SchoolNikki Shaw

Religious sites


NameDenominationLeaderLocationReference
The Holy FamilyChurch of EnglandFr Paul Hutchins'
St John'sChurch of England'
Woodhouses ChurchChurch of England'
St Mary'sRoman CatholicFr Patrick John McKeown'
Hope Methodist ChurchMethodist'
Roman Road Independent Methodist ChurchIndependent MethodistClifford Ward'
New Life ChurchAssemblies of GodElijah Boswell
Jack Kenyon
Andrew Black
David Newberry		'
Dob Lane Unitarian ChapelUnitarianist'
MacedoniaUnited Reformed ChurchRev Sheila Coop'
ZionOld Baptist Union'
FaithworksEvangel'
Failsworth Salvation Army Community ChurchThe Salvation ArmyLieutenants Simon & Victoria Rowney'

Transport

Failsworth's main thoroughfare is Oldham Road linking Manchester and Oldham. The M60 is an orbital motorway circling Greater Manchester, with access via Junction 22. Its completion in the Failsworth area around 1995–2000 saw the installation of a huge graded junction amongst other notable changes to the A62 and implementation of the motorway itself, leading to several rows of buildings around the junction being demolished.
There are frequent buses through Failsworth between Manchester city centre and Oldham on First Greater Manchester's 83 overground service. There is also a frequent service to Manchester city centre and to Huddersfield/Saddleworth via Oldham, with services 180 and 184. Other bus destinations from Failsworth are Ashton-under-Lyne, Chadderton, Huddersfield, Rochdale, Royton, Saddleworth and Shaw and Crompton.
Failsworth tram stop in Hardman Lane is on Manchester's Metrolink network. At peak times, trams run every 6 minutes towards via central Manchester and towards Rochdale or via Oldham. At off-peak times, trams run every 12 minutes to East Didsbury and Rochdale. Previously this was an unmanned rail station managed by Northern for passengers to transit to Manchester Victoria or Rochdale via Oldham. It closed in October 2009 for conversion to Metrolink under Phase 3a of its extension, and re-opened as a tram stop in 2012.

Twin town

CountryPlaceCounty / District / Region / StateOriginally twinned withDate
Landsberg am LechBavariaFailsworth Urban District1974–2008

Notable people