In the middle of researching a page to be added I found this really nice slideshow of old images of Rowntree’s, uploaded to YouTube by Anne Hurtado.
In relation to this website’s focus on the buildings and changing landscape of York, the most interesting images are perhaps those we can place easily, the exterior views of the factory buildings. Including some impressive aerial views.
Notes on the images follow, listed in order of appearance. Some I was confident about placing, others I wasn’t. Please feel free to add comments/clarification, etc, below.
0.31 Air raid shelter/tunnel. Where was this – anyone remember …?
0.38 Floodwater … did Haxby Road site flood, or is this the Tanner’s Moat/North St (original) factory site?
0.58 Must be Rowntree Halt, on the railway lines (now cycle track) alongside the Haxby Road site?
1.04 Haxby Road
1.09 Haxby Road, bridge over railway (now cycle track)
1.21 Looking across from Haxby Road buildings towards Wigginton Road, impressive building displaying ads, Rowntree Ave and other housing in background
1.26 Looking north, Wigginton Road on left
1.38 Haxby Road main entrance, with clock. Memorial library off camera to left
1.48 Haxby Rd bridge over rail line, Haley’s Terrace entrance to the right
1.59 That large Wigginton Rd building again, strangely marooned. Building alongside seems to be under construction
2.04 Across town, Rowntree Wharf on the Foss, still a familiar sight
2.16 Interesting aerial view – 1920s? – railway line runs across lower part, Wigginton Road building with ads is prominent, Cream Block facing Haxby Rd not yet built. Dining Block (now Nuffield Hospital) at bottom right
2.26 Interesting view looking south, Minster on horizon, Haxby Road to left. Haxby Road school chimney visible past the trees, as are the Foss Bank/Layerthorpe gas holders. Buildings facing railway line have been built, but not the Cream Block, which suggests a date between 1911-1936 (?)
3.00 Entering an air raid shelter? (Though I believe there was also an underpass between the factory and the dining block?)
3.17 Fire or bomb damage. Don’t think the Haxby Road site was damaged in the war, the old North St buildings were. This may be that site?
One of the Air Raid shelters was situated between the now Front door of the Nuffield Hospital and the car park. As a fireman with the York Fire Brigade we did some training there with breathing apparatus The shelter was disused Damp and dirty this was in the 1970s
Thanks Mike. Think that area is all flattened and tidied now isn’t it. Interesting though that the shelter clearly survived for several decades after the war.