boxfrenzy
23-09-2010, 10:52 PM
Today we are in Todmorden, a well to do market type town in West Yorkshire. It a weekday, and the streets are busy with shoppers, mothers with toddlers and the buzz of traffic. An older and battered looking car pulls off the main street and into a car park by a college. Two men climb out, and, collecting a few bits and pieces from the boot, enjoy a boiled sweet before walking across the carpark. One turns back and trots back to the car to remove the Global Positioning Satellite Apparatus that is velcroed to the dashboard after he broke the sucker thing that went on his windscreen. Within minutes, they are inside a derelict building and setting up some camera equipment. This readers, is the Abraham Ormerod Medical Centre.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4146/5017562598_6a01987285.jpg
Todmorden is nice. I had seen it on the news last week when Prince Charles visited to see the free food idea that the town has. Vegetable plots line the side of the road, and in front of the medical centre, and locals are encouraged to come down and take what they need. Prince Charles wasn't the first royal to visit here. In 1938 the Princess Royal visited here to open the Medical centre. I hoped it looked better than today when she visited.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4104/5017560886_a77e5da37e.jpg
Inside was in a poor condition. Lead had gone from the roof and the interior was damaged and trashed.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4085/5017562348_a4d73770a8.jpg http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4148/5017561426_1d3ee2b15a.jpg
During March 1975, a very bad thing happened here. One of the G.P's, a man named Fred killed one of his patients, Eva Lyons, the day before her 71st birthday. Fred had been prescribing morphine for himself for a while, and it wasn't long before he was found out, and in 1975, Harold Frederick Shipman was sacked from practicing here. He would go on to murder 215 patients in Hyde near Manchester.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4113/5016954673_2f316e91fd.jpg
It was an interesting place to wander around, although it is difficult to see what will happen. There was a sad inevitability that this place will be left until it is set on fire, or falls down.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4130/5016954297_07d3bed4d8.jpg
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4146/5017562598_6a01987285.jpg
Todmorden is nice. I had seen it on the news last week when Prince Charles visited to see the free food idea that the town has. Vegetable plots line the side of the road, and in front of the medical centre, and locals are encouraged to come down and take what they need. Prince Charles wasn't the first royal to visit here. In 1938 the Princess Royal visited here to open the Medical centre. I hoped it looked better than today when she visited.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4104/5017560886_a77e5da37e.jpg
Inside was in a poor condition. Lead had gone from the roof and the interior was damaged and trashed.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4085/5017562348_a4d73770a8.jpg http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4148/5017561426_1d3ee2b15a.jpg
During March 1975, a very bad thing happened here. One of the G.P's, a man named Fred killed one of his patients, Eva Lyons, the day before her 71st birthday. Fred had been prescribing morphine for himself for a while, and it wasn't long before he was found out, and in 1975, Harold Frederick Shipman was sacked from practicing here. He would go on to murder 215 patients in Hyde near Manchester.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4113/5016954673_2f316e91fd.jpg
It was an interesting place to wander around, although it is difficult to see what will happen. There was a sad inevitability that this place will be left until it is set on fire, or falls down.
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4130/5016954297_07d3bed4d8.jpg