History uncovered and a milestone day in Didsbury Park
HISTORY OF DIDSBURY PARK - BREAKING NEWS: PARK OPENING DATES FINALLY DISCOVERED
As a result of Louise's relentless and clever research, we have been able to narrow down, to within a few years, the opening dates of both the Recreation Ground (the smaller forerunner of Didsbury Park) and Didsbury Park itself. Having discovered this information Louise has been able to direct her research towards the local newspapers around these times and found some amazing results.
I am delighted to report that this week we can now confidently reveal the date when the Recreation Ground was opened and next week we hope to reveal when Didsbury Park itself, as we know it today was opened.
Above as picture 1 is a copy of a page from the Stockport Chronicle dated Monday 18th May 1896. Halfway down column 5 there is a fascinating article entitled RECREATION FOR THE PEOPLE. It is quite difficult to read from the original copy so I have retyped it here:
Recreation for the people.
On Saturday afternoon Lord Egerton of Tatton, accompanied by the Duchess of Buckingham, opened three recreation grounds - the land having been presented by his lordship. The first ceremony took place at Withington, where Lord Egerton was presented with a gold key. The gold key is a replica of the ordinary steel key which is to be used to open and close the gates of the recreation grounds, but the head portion has been altered so as to hold the “coat of arms” of Withington, which are raised and enameled in colours.
The key is made out of 18 carat gold, solid cast, and it is cased in a handsome velvet casket, and upon the outside is a gold shield, with the inscription, “Presented to the Right Honourable Lord Egerton of Tatton on the occasion of the opening of the Recreation Grounds Withington, May, 1896.” Later on in the afternoon Lord Egerton proceeded to Didsbury and Chorlton-cum-Hardy, at each of which places he opened recreation grounds.
So there we have it! It is official. The Recreation Ground - with its only entrance, being the same one as exists today on Wilmslow Road, was opened on Saturday 16th May 1896 by Lord Egerton of Tatton.
However we have even more exciting news to come, next week, when we hope to unveil the date when the Recreation Ground was enlarged, re-designed and renamed as Didsbury Park. Watch this space!
By the way, if you do have a few spare minutes I would encourage you to read some of the other articles on this page from the Stockport Chronicle e.g. under the headline of "Plucky conduct of Cheshire constable" you can read how a constable shot a man who stole an albert chain valued at £3 from a jeweller's in Crewe. The constable was considered to be a hero. Or you might like to read the latest report from South Africa where Earl Grey had a skirmish with rebels. - It is certainly an eye opener on life and attitudes in South Manchester and Cheshire 129 years ago.
LAST WEDNESDAY - 31 VOLUNTEERS ENJOY AN EXCELLENT CURRY NIGHT!
Once again, last Wednesday evening, we had a wonderful social night in the large private room at the Sangam restaurant in Didsbury. On a particularly cold, wet and dark evening the excellent spicy Indian food was very well received by the 31 volunteers in attendance. The food was good and the company was excellent and Grace's Mum Cath won the top prize of a bottle of prosecco, in the free draw.
A fabulous happy evening was had by all.
TODAY
Despite the cold and rain first thing this morning we still had a great turnout of 47 volunteers willing to brave the showers.
Our volunteers included 5 volunteers from Microsoft, and two independent volunteers Connor and Matt from industry, Anna and students from Brentwood High School, who returned this week full of enthusiasm for planting more bulbs. They successfully planted even more daffodils in the woodland area. We were also pleased to welcome Sigad and his job coach Sheeba from Bridge College, and for the third week running we were delighted to welcome young Alexander accompanied by his Dad Chris. Everybody was made very welcome.
TODAY - MILESTONE DAY FOR THE NEW BENCH INSTALLATION
After many weeks of volunteering when we have not had a full complement of heavy gang volunteers, today we were blessed with a huge contingent who were qualified to make sure that we finally successfully completed the installation this morning. Our team today consisted of Adrian, Murray, Richard, Gary, David, Emmanuel, Carl N and Rob and they soon had the bench concreted into place.
By the time of our coffee break this morning we decided that we should all celebrate this major achievement of the installation of this lovely new curved bench by having a team photo. However as the concrete around the anchors was not quite completely set, we decided that only the lightest volunteer should be allowed to sit on it whilst the photograph was taken. So Brenda was chosen to model the bench and Emma kindly volunteered to take the photograph which we see here as picture 2. It really does look good!
Picture 3 shows 5 members of the heavy gang, Richard, Rob, Adrian Murray and Gary, looking very proud of themselves as they return to the volunteers shelter having finished the installation of the new bench. The bench can be seen in the background of the photograph. Well done everyone. This new bench looks stunning! Thank you all!
TODAY - POPPY SEED SOWING AND PREPARATION FOR THE RAILING INFRASTRUCTURE CHANGES ON THE WILDFLOWER MEADOW
You could be forgiven for thinking that Picture 4 is a picture of volunteers saying their 'Angelus prayers' in the middle of the wild flower meadow. In fact it is a vary careful poppy seed sowing technique we are experimenting with to see if we can grow a bumper crop of poppies in the wild flower meadow this coming summer. I must take my hat off to the superb way that Gill B, Carl M and Chris kept at this task all morning. Excellent work everyone. Thank you.
Today we also started our preparation for the new fencing work around the wild flower meadow which is due to start in the first week in January. Firstly, as shown in picture 5, we can see James from Microsoft pruning the hedge. Once this was completed then Paul from Microsoft and Matt removed the hedging from the position where one of the new self closing pedestrian gates is going to be constructed and replanted it behind one of the benches where there is currently no hedging at all. This was a great piece of work. Thank you.
After James had completed his hedge trimming in the wild flower meadow, he then went on to work with Allen to trim the whole of the hedge around the Bird Garden. This was a huge tidy up of this hedge which looked so much better afterwards. Great job - Thank you both.
TODAY - THE SMALL MATTER OF 25,000 SPRING BULBS TO BE PLANTED - WEEK 2
Everybody involved in this activity today worked incredibly hard to enable us to break the back of this huge planting task. With a bit of luck next week we could finish it!
Picture 6 shows Lis, Sandra and Conner planting large daffodils in the woodland area.
Anna and the students from Brentwood High School were also planting large daffodils in a separate part of the woodland. This area will look stunning in the spring. Thank you.
Picture 7 shows 3 members of the Microsoft team planting large daffodils along the Wilmslow Road path. Another team of Christine, Lesley and Lucy were also planting daffodils towards the bottom of the path in recently weeded areas. Thank you all.
Louise also undertook a huge bulb planting job in the rose bed between the volunteers shelter and the wild flower meadow. Thank you Louise.
Picture 8 shows Jude and Julie who had been planting bulbs on the roundabout and close to the Gillbrook Road entrance. Thank you Julie and Jude.
TODAY - A FEW MORE LEAVES
We are gradually coming to the end of the leaf fall this year but we are still finding, particularly with the recent heavy rain that we still have to be vigilant with respect to slippery leaves on our paths around the park. Consequently today we had 3 groups working on cleaning the paths:
Picture 9 shows Lesley M in the middle of cleaning up the path from the volunteer's shelter. Thank you Lesley - this path look amazing.
Sigad and his job coach Sheba worked their way clearing leaves along the main path to the roundabout, as also did Alexander and dad Chris. Thank you both. This is an important pathway through the park and you all did a fabulous job.
And finally, picture 10 , shows Brenda proudly showing off her new lightweight buggy with its lightweight shovel and brush which will hopefully make life easier for her as she works at keeping the Gillbrook Road entrance spic and span. Do my eyes deceive me or has that elf Ernie, sneaked into the picture too!
TODAY - ELSEWHERE IN THE PARK
Elsewhere in the park we still had a lot of good work taking place:
Following his successful development of bug hotels in the woodland areas north of the Sandhurst Road vehicle entrance, today Kevin moved into the woodland south of the park entrance. This is amazing work Kevin. Thank you.
A huge thank you also to Gill N who not only managed a complex set of arrangements for coffee payments today but also managed to get around all the lecterns and notice boards and bring them all up to date. Well done Gill.
A special mention and thank you to Tristan also for continuing to develop the moss garden today as well as making a big contribution to the bulb planting. Great work Tristan!
REMINDER ABOUT CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS
Finally just a reminder that next Monday (1st December) will be a normal volunteering day with the usual 09:30 start and 13:00 finish but the following Monday (8th December) we will start at 09:30 but will we finish at 11:00 when we will then all make our way to the marquee in the DNC garden for Christmas carols sung by the Didsbury CoE Primary School choir, mince pies and mulled wine. We can then all have a very well deserved rest until returning on Monday 5th January 2026.
Thank you all once again for your amazing support.