CHARNEY HALL Before and After

First posted 4/2/2019
Post updated Apr 2023 : Photos of Cricket Pavilion and Bat Store added, credit John Cranna

Charney Hall School abt. 1935

Grove House, the original school building can be seen on the near rhs of the picture

Charney Hall School Site 2019

Both photographs are taken from Yewbarrow ‘Face’

To give people an indication as to how the original school buildings relate to the subsequent redevelopment I have superimposed ‘before and after’ site plans and aerial views. Old survey maps never seem to relate exactly to their modern equivalent and this applies equally to aerial photographs and Google Earth projections. Both have to be projected at identical scales which is a bit ‘hit and miss’ especially with the aerial perspective where the angle of elevation has also to be estimated (actually guessed)!



What was the point of that do I hear you say? 

Well if you walk up Charney Court and stand between nos. 3 and 5 and lift your eyes in the direction of the Bay, you would be able to reconnect with that magnificent view as seen from the School Dining Room! The view beyond, like a familiar mountain panorama and Grange high street, remains the same. The Bay makes sure of that!

If no. 2 Charney Court ever develops settlement around the front gable, the change in foundation depth where the swimming pool was filled and then built over may be responsible…

And for those who still enjoy a game of cricket the ‘R’ in Ashmount Gardens probably locates the cricket square - perhaps a potential site for a rematch in the middle of the estate road at one of those forthcoming old boys’ reunions OR for a staged scarecrow display, complete with wickets, cricket whites, pads and school colours caps!



March 2023 : John Cranna has just submitted an old photograph of the Cricket Pavilion and Bat Store. With the magic of a digital app I’ve added a little colour… The Bat store looks a bit worse for wear but John’s persistence has located it in someone’s garden! This is the last extant building directly related to Charney Hall School, perhaps worthy of a blue disc!! So now it’s a garden store to a house, no. 3 Ashmount Gardens. Well done John!




See also ‘Charney Hall Grounds’

Comments

Andrew Holmes-Higgin said…
I visited Charney shortly before it was demolished, though I didn’t know that at the time. My Dad and I were visiting the Ulverston area (where we’re from) as we’d been out of the country since I left Charney when it closed in 1973. We thought it might be interesting to see what had happened to the school, so drove over to Grange. This would have been early Spring 1978 as best as I can remember.

We came up the driveway and parked out front, the whole place being very empty and overgrown. I don’t remember seeing any Keep Out signs or anything like that, so we continued on in. The Memorial Hall door was wide open, and inside it looked the same as before but completely empty, and the floor covered in dry leaves that had blown in. I went back through the little courtyard where we always played football, and the big door that led into the washing area with the shoe lockers was also wide open, and again the floor was completely covered in dry dead leaves. It was REALLY spooky in there, and had it not been a bright sunny day I would absolutely not have gone in. I went down the corridor towards the classrooms and found those empty, the windows surprisingly unbroken. I turned towards the dining room and at that moment I heard – or thought I heard – a voice upstairs and some footsteps on the staircase, so I turned and fled as fast as I could. Ran out to the car and told my Dad “Let‘s get out of here” and we did. If indeed anyone was up there it might have been some tramps or squatters or who knows who might have found that vast empty building a good place to stay or hide out.

I returned in maybe 1983 on another visit, and on rounding the corner into the driveway, was absolutely stunned to see NOTHING there at all, except what was then a brand-new housing estate. In those pre-internet days I had no way of keeping up on Grange news, and perhaps the demolition of a derelict old building didn’t even make it into the local papers, so I don’t know how it came to be demolished and replaced. I’ve searched some of the online newspaper archives for any stories about the demolition but have found nothing. The local records office would probably have something, but I’d rather spend my time following the stories here on this wonderful blog about what life there was like, back in the day!
3 April 2023 at 19:38
Tilak Paul said…
This is an absolutely wonderful Post by Keith with the assistance of John. I can imagine the effort and hours expended in triangulating and juxtaposing and superimposing maps and pictures and diagrams etc for this Post. It is also fantastic and one has to applaud the “Sherlock Holmes” efforts in locating the old Cricket/Bat Store and that it has found some use in a Resident’s Back Garden. It is great that a small remnant of the School remains. I wonder whether the woodwork for the Cricket Pavilion and other Wooden Buildings and the Carpenter’s Workshop and the Stone from the Shooting Range and the Memorial Hall and even the main Building has ended being used elsewhere being recycled before recycling became fashionable as it is now. I don’t know many Schools had their own Flag Pole like Charney Hall had and I am hoping this Flag Pole has not been chopped up but is being utilised elsewhere. I wonder what happened to the Charney Hall Flag that used to be raised. I agree this Cricket/Bat Store warrants a Blue Plaque to signify it is Historical Importance. The initial Main Picture of the School for the Post I have seen somewhere before but not with such details and clarity. Its amazing to see the vintage type Motor Vehicle just before the School Gates and the grounds without the swimming pool and the sloping lower pitch and bank between the lower and upper pitch where we used to run sleighs when the snow had fallen. I am planning a further Post to send to Keith when time permits with additional memories in relation to this Main Picture.

Also I really enjoyed reading Andrew’s “Stephen King” type Horror Moments and Memories of the visit to the School with his Dad. I certainly do not think I would have had to guts to venture into the School alone at that age!

4 April 2023 at 10:38
Chris Wilson said…
On the 1935 photo it would appear that the woodwork shop was absent! It was presumably a later addition. I tried unsuccessfully sometime during the '80s to get to the "Face", but was blocked by high fencing, so it is good to see that someone (Keith?) has managed to find a route. I must try again! Brilliant post,
Chris Wilson '59-'63
5 April 2023 at 08:48
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