From the Chronicle files - Thursday 26th June 2025

Even non-league football pitches look as good at the end of the season these days as they did at the beginning, but it wasn’t always the case. 

Just take a look at the Surrey Street home of Glossop FC on a wintry day in 1986 when the Hillmen played Stalybridge Celtic Reserves. There was more mud than grass back then. No wonder the game ended goalless.

In other sports news and 75 years ago Glossop Velo star Cliff Sparkes was beating 35 riders from 11 North West clubs to win the 1950 Manchester road race which took place on a two lap course centred on Marple and Disley.

Cliff was in contention for most of the 45 miles and in the closing stages burst to the leading pack to win in a sprint finish.

Meanwhile, a return to cricket proved successful for First Division Burnley centre-forward Alfred Clarke, also 75 years ago, who was back with Mottram following a footballing tour in Germany with the Turf Moor club.

In a Glossop and District League game against Hadfield St. Andrew’s, he finished with eight wickets for 38 as the villagers won by just four runs.

On what was described by the Chronicle as the hottest day of the year, concerned trades councillors spent two hours on a sweltering June day in 1950 talking about ‘a stink’.

A meeting in Glossop Labour Club was to hear Derbyshire County Council’s reply to the trades council’s complaints of obnoxious smells from Lancashire Chemical Industries’ plant on Dinting Lane.

The response was that it was doubtful if a statutory nuisance existed, but that did not go down well with the councillors or Edward Blakemore who lived close to the factory who said: “The children are always coming in with running eyes and noses.”

The Chronicle was talking about a new Domesday Book for Derbyshire after the Government asked every county council in the country to make a detailed list of every footpath and bridleway within its boundaries  to make sure they were not lost.

The newspaper claimed it was a huge task for the council and asked everyone in Glossopdale to send details of rights of way where they lived.

There were calls for cycling in Glossop’s Manor Park to be ‘rigorously banned’ following allegations that teenage riders were dangerously tearing around the town’s biggest attraction.

The council had just laid asphalt paths in the children’s playground and formal gardens, which according to visitors were being used by the young cyclists as race tracks.

Council house tenants in Longdendale were taking in lodgers to make a little money on the side and ease the post-war housing shortage in Broadbottom, Hollingworth and Mottram.

But they were told by the urban district council that in future they must make an official application before taking anyone in.

Fred Wilson from Pikes Lane, Glossop, was back home after travelling 1,000 miles in 16 days on a cycling tour of Belgium and Holland that set him back just £25.

Joining Fred on the marathon pedal push were his friends Maurice Gitten of Queen Street and Herbert Warren of Sunlaw Street.

Three boys were each fined 10 shillings at Glossop Juvenile Court for not having licences for air guns and for shooting them in public places, while a 17-year-old motorcyclist was ordered to pay £2 for carrying a pillion passenger.

A lad who rode his bike on a footpath had his cased dismissed.

Charlesworth councillors were complaining that North Western Road Car Company’s decision to scrap the 7am bus service from the village to Glossop meant people were unable to get to work on time.

But bus bosses said there was no alternative as it was only carrying on average 18 passengers per trip.

It was lovely weather for cricket but looking gloomy for Glossop CC and their supporters as the North Road side slipped to their third Lancashire and Cheshire League defeat on the run.

Opener Ambrose Handforth hit 66 and Ron Partridge 23, but they were the only successes as the town team was bowled out for 161 against Prestwich, who cruised past the total with four wickets to spare.

Hadfield St. Charles was just one point behind Mount Pleasant in the Glossop Sunday School League.

Mount Pleasant had played a game more after an eight-wicket haul by J. Mitcheson secured victory over Padfield. Results were: St. Mary’s 72 for four declared, Princess Street 66; Tabernacle 51, Mount Pleasant 116; Padfield 55, St. Charles 63-4.

Bowlers were taking the honours in the Glossop Industrial League.

The dry, hard, unpredictable and usually unprepared pitches produced a flurry of low scores, as results showed: Turn Lee 41-for six, Volcrepe 29; Maconochie’s 22,  Hawkshead 33;  Glossop Gs Company 45, Wood Brothers 156.

The Glossop Chronicle was reporting ‘chaos on the track’ in the winter of 1986 - but it had nothing to with snow and ice or leaves on the line.

A mechanical digger working on the railway at Hazel Grove cut through a power cable, which affected services including cancelling trains from New Mills, Newtown and Disley.

New Mills Town Council wanted to make the most from local beauty spot the Torrs and had asked university graduate Dawn Hath to help.

Councillors were keen to create a visitor attraction there and at the beginning of 1986 Dawn was starting work on a 12-month long project to identify the area’s wildlife to create a management plan.

Shoppers in Gamesley got a chance to meet an Olympic athlete when they popped into their local supermarket on a February day in 1986.

English international 100 metres hurdler Shirley Strong had been invited to open the Hugh Fay store on Winster Mews.

Glossop cricketer Hervey Ashton was taking time off from his job at Woolley Bridge textile firm John Walton’ s in May 1950 to chase his dream of playing the game professionally.

The wicket keeper/batsman had impressed in a Derbyshire County Cricket Club second eleven game against Warwickshire and was signed on for the remainder of the season.