One of Blackburn town centre’s closed pubs may be turned into a heritage project. This scheme could regenerate its building by transforming it into a pub museum.
The Fleece on Penny Street has been closed for many years and its previous owner, Thwaites Brewery, would probably have liked to have seen it demolished. But our local council, in partnership with Maple Grove Developments, plans to buy Thwaites’ old brewery site. This includes the Fleece and former Waterloo/Daniel’s pub, currently being used by the Bureau of Blackburn, following the fire where they were based at St John’s church.
This pub, at one time known as the Golden Fleece, was used as a lock-up many years ago. These were various town centre pubs with secure cellars where drunks and vagabonds could be banged up overnight and dealt with next day. John Hall, a 19th century landlord of this pub, charged one shilling to lock drunks up during the day. His night time rate was 1s 6d. But the Fleece has since hosted many a voluntary lock-in since its days as a drunkard’s prison.
Our problem in Blackburn is pubs are disappearing at an alarming rate. This follows a similar situation with our old textile mills and factories. Blackburn’s skyline used to be thronged with mill chimneys, but now they are noticeable by their absence and have become quite a rarity. While not being an aesthetically pretty sight, they are still a huge part of our history and heritage as a cotton weaving town. Now there is a movement to make sure our old mill chimneys are preserved wherever possible.
Preserving our old pubs could also be a once in a lifetime opportunity to save another aspect of Blackburn’s working class culture and heritage. Sometimes people forget our town was known as an important brewing centre. Many people think this seems to be the case with some brewers which used to be based here and now want to see themselves in a more gentrified and rustic way than they were known for previously. But it should always be remembered: You can take the brewery out of Blackburn, but you can’t take Blackburn out of the brewery. Sadly, time has proven you can take pubs out of Blackburn, mostly never to return.
This idea of a pub museum actually originated in one of Blackburn’s pubs. What makes it different from all those other beer-sodden hare-brained schemes, which often come up in pubs, is this one is no pipe dream and might make it to the next rung. After all, along with the Fleece, we have plenty of premises available for such a project.