PUB'S MAP SHOWS HOW BRIGG HAS CHANGED OVER 100 YEARS

 

There's an impressive large map of Brigg as it was in the early 20th century displayed on a wall near the rear entrance to the Black Bull, on Wrawby Street, which is well worth studying next time you are passing.
Which part of Brigg has seen the most change down the decades?
Opinions will differ but we'll suggest two - Bridge Street and the Old Courts area within the town centre.
Maps of Brigg from the late 19th and early 20th centuries show that Bridge Street was extensively populated and had industries now long gone.

Another map, NOT on show at the Black Bull, featuring Happy Land (top left).

An enclosed area of cheap housing, Happy Land, had a narrow pedestrian entrance off Bridge Street and was close to West Terrace and Engine Street.
In 1906/7 you could rent accommodation here for 3s 9d (19½p), information in our family archive suggests.
Was the court's name a tounge-in-cheek reference to rather grim circumstances?
Did it actually reflect a happy community spirit prevailing among residents?
Or with Happy Land being close to a couple of chapels, was its name a reference to the well-known hymn about a happy band of pilgrims?
As late as the 1960s there were still dwellings standing on Engine Street, Barnard Street and James Street, with some occupied.
Kiln Lane, on the other side of Bridge Street, also had old properties - since demolished.
The names Engine Street and Kiln Lane reflect industrial uses that disappeared long ago. Victoria Iron Works stood near the former; brickmaking was carried out at several locations on Island Carr.

Part of the interesting map on display at the Black Bull pub in Brigg.

Bridge Street was bisected in the early 1990s with the creation of the inner-relief road which cut a swathe through a row of old cottages, some of which were latterly used as shops.
They came down to make way for the diverted A18 with the easterly section of Bridge Street, as far as the County Bridge, becoming a virtual cul-de-sac.
Fortunately the Yarborough Hunt, having been closed since the late 1960s, just escaped the sweeping inner-relief road and was later refurbished and reopened.
The historic Brocklesby Ox pub also survived the road scheme and saw in the new millennium only to close. It was demolished in 2010, making way for new town housing.
Today's route to and from Brigg's main car park, Old Courts Road, remembers the various courtyards that had provided living accommodation for hundreds of people during the 19th century and the early decades of the 20th.
Many of these cottages fell into disrepair and were eventually demolished, over many years, with Brigg Urban District Council acquiring the land - bit by bit.
Some courtyards, such as College Yard, saw their cottages taken over by shops and businesses for use as workshops and storage buildings.
In the 1960s, brickwork and foundations could be seen on what became waste land, particularly during spring and summer when grass and weeds sprouted freely.
Brigg UDC then cleared the site to create the extensive shoppers' car park that's so familiar today.
Many families still living in old courtyard properties during the 1930s had an option to move to the newly-created Newlands council house estate.
A small row of restored properties on Chapel Court gives the only hint today of what half-a-dozen courtyards were like in previous centuries.
It's a shame that more cottages did not make it into the 21st century - and the disappearance of so many of them is at odds with the number of town centre buildings, including the 1760s Exchange, that have survived, mostly in commercial use.
For decades now we've had a Conservation Area in which many properties have been afforded listed building status to limit alterations and rule out demolition unless planners agree.
However, over many decades in the 20th century, knocking down small courtyard cottages in need of some tender loving care (or a good deal of it) was seen as being highly desirable.
Could, or should, some adjoining cottages have been repaired and their internal layouts altered to create a single dwelling large enough for modern family use?
Life in Brigg courtyards more than 100 years ago was no picnic by modern standards.
Water was usually provided by a solitary tap just inside the front door.
Some cottages had outside 'closets' at the back but 'night soil' buckets had to be carried through the property and left out for the dilly cart men to empty on Friday nights.
Those without privies had to make do with a row of communal toilets provided to the rear of some of the yards.
Part of today's Barnard Avenue loosely follows the route of the old Town Drain which was little more than an open sewer, emptied from time to time by farms which used the contents as manure for the fields.
A few people in recent weeks have been complaining about a pong in certain parts of Brigg town centre.
What must it have been like in Victorian times when approaching the Town Drain in summer?
Better off residents could probably smell its odour while shopping on Wrawby Street, but courtyards where the poor lived were a lot closer to the source of the stink than that!
An excellent book about the Courtyards of Brigg, edited by Nick Lyons, appeared in the early 1980s. Members of a local history group contributed and the memories of elderly Brigg residents who knew the courts when many people still lived there were included. Perhaps there's still a copy in the reference section of the town's library in the Angel building; there was one when the library was still based on Old Courts Road. A very fitting location for such a book.