Postcard

  • Picture / Image:  Tower, New Brighton [Wirral,Merseyside, formerly Cheshire] - 621ft high
  • Publisher: Russell Series
  • Postally used: no
  • Stamp:  n/a
  • Postmark(s): n/a
  • Sent to:  n/a
  • Notes / condition: 

 

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Text from the free encyclopedia WIKIPEDIA may appear below to give a little background information (internal links may not  work) :

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New Brighton Tower was a steel lattice observation tower at New Brighton in the town of Wallasey, Cheshire (now in the Borough of Wirral, in Merseyside), England. It stood 567 feet (173 m) high, and was the tallest building in Great Britain when it opened some time between 1898 and 1900. Neglected during the First World War and requiring renovation the owners could not afford, dismantling of the tower began in 1919, and the metal was sold for scrap. The building at its base, housing the Tower Ballroom, continued in use until damaged by fire in 1969.

The tower was set in large grounds, which included a boating lake, a funfair, gardens, and a sports ground. The sports ground housed, at different times, a football team, an athletics track and a motorcycle speedway track. The Beatles played at the Tower Ballroom 27 times, more than at any other venue in the United Kingdom except the Cavern Club in nearby Liverpool.

In 1830, James Atherton purchased much of the land at Rock Point,[1] in the north-east corner of Wallasey opposite the city and docks of Liverpool.[2] He renamed it New Brighton and organised its development as a tourist destination.[3] In July 1896 a new group, the New Brighton Tower and Recreation Company, with a share capital of £300,000, purchased the estate of the demolished Rock Point House.[4] Their ambition was to create an observation tower in the grounds, designed to rival the Blackpool Tower,[5] while using the remaining grounds to create a more "elegant" atmosphere.[2] The New Brighton Tower and Recreation Company had more than 20 acres (8 ha) of land available to construct the tower, which enabled them to include more attractions than at Blackpool Tower.[2]

The company Maxwell and Tuke, who had designed Blackpool Tower buildings and Southport Winter Gardens,[6] was responsible for overseeing and supervising the project,[2] despite the deaths in 1893 of the company founders, James Maxwell and William Charles Tuke.[7] The excavations and laying of the foundations for the tower were contracted to William Clapham of Stockport.[2] The primary contractor for the tower was Andrew Handyside and Company, based in Derby.[8]

The ground breaking happened on 22 June 1896,[4] before the formation of the new company, completion of land purchase and announcement of contracts on 26 July 1896.[2] The construction of the steel lattice tower started in July 1897[4] and was completed some time between 1898 and 1900,[9][10] 5 years after the Blackpool Tower had been finished.[11] The grounds were opened before then for a short period in 1897 however.[12] New Brighton Tower was the tallest building in England, standing 567 feet (173 m) tall,[13] and 621 feet (189 m) above sea-level.[14] A total of 1,000 long tons (1,000 t) of mild or low-carbon steel was used,[15] at a cost of £120,000,[4] in contrast to the earlier Blackpool and Eiffel towers, both constructed using wrought iron.[8] The building below the New Brighton Tower, which was to contain the ballroom, was constructed by Peters and Sons of Rochdale.[2] It was a four-storey red-brick building with arched windows and hexagonal, copper-domed turrets.[16]

A series of accidents during the tower's construction resulted in the deaths of six workmen and serious injury to another. Two of the men, Jonathan Richardson and Alexander Stewart, were killed when a crane hook snapped and a girder fell and hit the scaffold platform on which they were standing, causing them to fall to the ground. A third man, John Daly, suffered serious injuries.[17] The other four were killed in separate incidents by falling off the tower structure.[4] A fire on the tower at 172 feet (52 m) in 1898 resulted in the death of a fire-fighter from the New Brighton Fire Brigade.[18] He fell 90 feet (27 m) while walking along a beam 6-inch (150 mm) wide to try and extinguish the flames.[19]

Tower building

New Brighton Tower regularly advertised itself as "the highest structure and finest place of amusement in the Kingdom".[20][21] A single entrance fee of one shilling (or a ticket for the summer season, costing 10s 6d)[20] was charged for entrance into the grounds, which included the gardens, the athletic grounds, the ballroom and the theatre. An additional charge of sixpence was levied on those who wished to go to the top of the tower.[4] There was a menagerie within the building, containing Nubian lions,[22] Russian wolves (which had eight cubs in 1914),[23] bears in a bear pit,[24] monkeys, elephants, stags, leopards and other animals.[22] There was also an aviary above the ballroom.[4] The Tower Building also contained a shooting gallery and a billiard saloon with five tables.[4]

Maxwell and Tuke clothed the entertainment buildings in hard-wearing, red Ruabon brick with terracotta and stone dressings, and the plan of the buildings was octagonal, with the Tower, also built on an octagonal plan, at its centre. The roofline of the three-to-four-storey building was dramatic, as four corners of the octagon were emphasised by tall pavilions with steeply pitched roofs topped by cupolas

Tower

The tower had four lifts, each capable of reaching the top in 90 seconds[22] and conveying up to 2000 people an hour.[2] The views from the top included the Liverpool skyline, the River Mersey estuary and the River Dee.[2] On a clear day, visitors could see across the Irish Sea to the Isle of Man, along with views of the Lake District and Welsh Mountains.[5] In its first year, the tower attracted up to half a million visitors to the top. At night, the tower was illuminated by fairy lights.[4]

On 7 September 1909, two visitors were left stranded at the top of the tower as the final lift car of the night descended without them. The woman and twelve-year-old child were not noticed during the final round of inspection and so, without a way to communicate with anyone on the ground, they spent the night on the tower until 10 am the following morning. They did not appear too concerned by the ordeal and left without giving their names to officials.[26]