Published Thursday 18 November 2021 at 15:32
It is often forgotten that Lakeland legend, Alfred Wainwright, lived the first 34 years of his life in Blackburn and actually gave more than 20 years of service working at Blackburn Town Hall.
November 2021 marks the 80th anniversary of Wainwright leaving his job as Accountancy Assistant in Blackburn Borough Treasurer’s department and finally moving from the town of his birth to take up a new job in Kendal.
“The Borough Treasurer submitted the resignation of Mr A. Wainwright, an Accountancy Assistant in his Department, on securing an appointment with the Kendal Borough Council.” Finance Committee Minutes 26 November 1941
Wainwright was born at 331 Audley Range in 1907 where there is now a blue plaque. He went to Accrington Road Elementary School, then spent a year at Blakey Moor School before starting work at the age of 13 in Blackburn Town Hall. He started in the Borough Engineer’s before joining the Borough Treasurer’s where he worked his way up through the grades and passed several accountancy exams. His exquisite handwriting, essential for neatly filling in the ledgers in the account books (pre-computer) became an important trademark of the guidebooks he later became famous for – the finely crafted ‘Pictorial Guides to the Lakeland Fells’. It is said he also picked up his pen and ink illustration techniques from a work colleague at Town Hall.
Wainwright first visited the Lake District in 1930, aged 23, having caught the bus to Windermere from Blackburn Boulevard. It was a holiday that transformed his life and made him want to spend all his free time in Lakeland. In November 1941, he applied for a job in the Treasurer’s Department of Kendal Borough Council and passed the interview. His dream of living in Lakeland was finally fulfilled. He moved his wife, Ruth, and son, Peter, from their semi-detached house on Shadsworth Road to a small Kendal council estate overlooked by Kendal Castle. He lived in Kendal for another 50 years and died in January 1991 aged 84 in Westmorland County Hospital.
The Lake District life of Wainwright is well known – he went on to produce numerous illustrated guidebooks to the North of England and even became Kendal’s Borough Treasurer. But the first 34 years of his life were spent almost entirely in Blackburn. There are still many places in the town we can associate with Wainwright’s life – the old Town Hall, Blakey Moor School, the site of the Boulevard and the Leeds & Liverpool Canal – which he crossed over every day on his walk to work. It was industrial Lancashire that had already shaped both his methodical writing techniques and the way he viewed the mountains.
Our guided walk will share Wainwright’s Blackburn stories as we explore his forgotten Lancashire roots and show how his hometown influenced his later work. Along the way we will read extracts from Wainwright’s own writings on the town and link the places he knew including his workplace, school and the Boulevard where he first caught the bus to the Lake District. We will also cross Wainwright Bridge, named after him.
A great way to get physically and mentally active outdoors and learn more about Wainwright and the Blackburn he lived in from 1907 to 1941.
Wednesday 24th November 2021, 12:00-13:00
Meet outside Blackburn Town Hall