h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Half of Joy Division were from Macclesfield! Drummer Stephen Morris and the late, great Ian Curtis - a wonderful talent, if apparently not a very nice person. Which of course means that a quarter of New Order are from Macclesfield.

And of course, Davy Jones of the Monkees came from Stockport: until recently, his family ran a fishing tackle / sports goods / cycle parts store on Gorton Road in Reddish. Alas, his uncle retired, the useful shop closed down, and it's now yet another bloody solicitors / estate agency.

ah well...

"Even Lancashire didn't want you; so you became Merseyside people politically speaking."

So true... even more so culturally speaking, I would say. People in Widnes generally seem to associate with Liverpool a lot more easily than Chester, for example. Which is a shame, in my opinion - Chester is one of the nicest places in England.

Also, Widnes and Warrington are both in the Liverpool diocese of the Church of England; I think Runcorn is in the Chester diocese? Certainly there's no love lost between Runcorn and Widnes, even though they form a parliamentary constituency!

I would have liked to have been born in Lancashire; sadly I was born in Liverpool, and after the county boundaries were changed in 1974 anyway. I suppose you're right, it's better to be Cestrian!

An interesting point, and one which surfaces from time to time as a running disagreement between the City of Manchester and Stockport, is where exactly the border falls between Cheshire and Lancashire, as this would also definitively define where Stockport ends and Manchester begins.

As things stand, Manchester and Stockport run seamlessly into each other and you would think the county line would just be a matter of fine tuning.

However, where money is involved, things are rarely so simple. For instance, the McVities biscuit factory is a huge enterprise employing thousands and it's slap-bang on the county line, quite possibly straddling both sides. From McVities' point of view, they're far happier to pay local business tax to Stockport, as Stockport has traditionally charged lower rates of local tax than Manchester would levy. But Manchester, for the same reason (tax revenue), would quite like McVities' factory to be reclassified as being wholly or in the main part in Manchester.

Similarly, at the Bull's Head in North Reddish, there is a confused situation where THREE local authorities meet (Manchester, Stockport and Tameside) in what is at the moment an uneasy sort of status-quo.

But the bigger issue is where Cheshire ends and Manchester (Lancashire)begins. On the one hand both local authorities have been corralled together as part of the Greater Manchester artificiality: but almost nobody in Stockport ends their address as "Stockport, Greater Manchester". Universally, it's still the technically improper usage of "Stockport, Cheshire" - Stopfordians voting with an older loyalty.

Traditionally the dividing line is the course of the River Mersey, which rises in Stockport.

Manchester, with its collective eyes on acquiring the prosperous Stockport suburbs of Heaton Moor and Heaton Mersey, which are north of the Mersey line, argues these north-western districts of Stockport should be counted as part of Manchester for local government (and therefore taxation) purposes. Strategically, these two Heatons are an eastward extension of the EXTREMELY prosperous Manchester suburbs of Parrs Wood and Didsbury: Manchester, lacking upmarket ABC1 areas and burdened with C2DE districts like Burnage, Wythenshawe, Moston, Longsight, wouldn't mind its property portfolio and hence its revenue base going upmarket.

Meanwhile Stockport, which has no intentions of losing the Heatons (which are technically in Lancashire, to be fair)argues back with "well, if that's the case, Reddish and Brinnington are also north of Lancashire Hill and the Mersey, and you're welcome to THOSE districts any time you like, aren't they more in keeping with Manchester?" (ie, Reddish is a socially depressed suburb that has seen much better days, and which includes the locally notorious "Poet's Estate", where some Utopian thinker thought council housing tenants could be spiritually uplifted by living on Browning Road, Longford Road, Keats Avenue, et c. Dream on. Brinnington is ALL socially depressed council housing and is thought of as Chavsville).

Manchester refuses the kind offer of Reddish and Brinnington, but still has its acquisitive eyes set on Heatons Moor and Mersey.

Lancashire Hill rises at the confluence of the rivers Goyt and Tame to form the Mersey in Stockport town centre: the bottom of the hill, as Stockport oldies will tell you, is in Cheshire, and the top is in Lancashire. (In East Stockport, the River Goyt is thought of as being an eastward extension of the Mersey and is considered to mark the county line)

Hoping this adds local colour and may be useful to someone!

And following the river Goyt upstream to where it and the Etherow merge, one could have followed the Etherow all the way to Yorkshire, up the old Longdendale road through Mottram, Holligworth and Tintwistle (now parts of Tameside and Derbyshire).

I notice that resident a of wonderland hasn't yet been mentioned - The Cheshire Cat (or if you're a Jasper Fforde reader, the Unitary Authority of Warrington Cat).

Now if we're entering into representations of Cheshire in literature, may I introduce the name of Alan Garner?

Among other novels aimed at older children, "The Weirdstone of Brisingamen" and "The Moon of Gomrath" should MOST DEFINITELY be mentioned here.

Written in the very early 1960's, both books are set in and around Alderley Edge and the surrounding countryside.

A disclaimer: these books are about Alderley Edge, quite possibly in wartime or no later than the middle 1950's. The map of the town appearing in the endplates is NOT Alderley as it is now; but how it was fifty years ago.

The kindly farmer who takes in two neat middle-class children whose accents are not those of Northern England (because their parents are an unspecified "away") would not exist now. His farm would in all probability be a Yuppie des res, and Alderley would lack working-class local voices: this town is now a yuppified overspill area for affluent Manchester workers seeking a place in the country.

Anyway, local myth and legend spill into the novels, principally of the wizard who dwells in the edge: the children, Colin and Susan, find themselves drawn into British folklore, meeting the last of the elves, fighting goblins and witches and (imported from Ireland for the day) Fomorian monsters with the evil eye.

Nothing is invented - everything is drawn from British Isles mythology,particularly from local Cheshire folklore, and this is the strength of the books. They are incredibly sympathetic to Paganism (at a time when books for children were still expected to contain an improving Christian message)and there is a suspicion at the end of "Gomrath" that the future paths of Colin and Susan will draw them deeper into the alternative England. Susan is almost certainly destined for Witchcraft (although not of the insipid Harry Potter variety: Garner's witchery is more terrifying and elemental and way older with very deep roots). Colin, meanwhile, would follow the path of the dead Albanac and join the "Children of Danu" - mediators between the two worlds, humans who need to live in both.

Especially in "Gomrath", the Cheshire countryside gets a starring credit: there is a wonderful sketch of the Edge and its surroundings, part map and part artwork, and the action ranges from Shining Tor, to the edge, to the Goyt valley, and yes - Etherow...

Read and enjoy!

An interesting entry about Stockport, Cheshire:- A564699

About the post-industrial skyline of North Stockport

Right. I'll go through and collate as much as I can from the above...there's loads of stuff here, but I could do with some help on 2 other aspects if thats ok.

Firstly...GOOD places to eat in Cheshire

Secondly. Famous people who live in the shire. I can name quite a few such as...

The guy who used to play Max Farnham
Ditto the above to Ron Dixon
There's a jockey who lives Broxton way who's name completely evades me right now.
Oh yeah...a couple of the Rasmus guys (someone mentioned them earlier)
That funny comedien guy...the one who's name I can't remember. aaah...Russ Abbott.

and so on and so forth....help on these bits would be sooo much appreciated as I think we've pretty much covered the back ground to Cheshire...need some up to date facts now

Hi Vicki

Caroline Thing, big blonde girl, played Mrs Merton, who created "The Royle Family" and "Early Doors" for TV, gathered a bit of a "rep company" about herself for both programmes.

While we don't have Caroline herself or any of the big names like Ricky Tomlinson, the bloke she co-writes with (Craig Cash?) lives in Stockport and is regularly seen in Central Library. Some of the other cast members are also Stockport based, but can't recall their names right now.

BTW, "Early Doors", from the context, is set in Stockport: there's an episode where the bloke who plays the travelling salesman, and the Cash character, are commiserating over roadworks which are holding up traffic. This was a gift, as even on first screening of the programme, the roadworks they were moaning about were still there in real non-TV life and we knew all the locations! (Whitehill Street; Houldsworth Square Reddish; Manchester road, Heaton Chapel...)

From this we were able to deduce that the TV series "Early Doors", where all the action occurs in a pub, is based on the Hope Tavern on Wellington Road North, which fits the geographical location perfectly and which (at the time) was a God-awful depressing, dark, ill-lit, dingy dive in desperate need of renovation, for which the word "Hope" was woefully incongruous as a name.

It is only fair, however, to say that after the first series ended, the Hope was extensively redecorated insode and out, so somebody else must have twigged which actual Stockport pub "The Grapes" was meant to represent...

Accent-wise, the Early Doors crew all have variations on a theme of the Stockport accent, where Cheshire shades into South Manchester.

Oh, and Mike Yarwood, the Rory Bremner of his day (although while M.Y. did politicians, he steered well clear of political satire), is from Stockport: Offerton, I think. Rumuor has it he currently lives in retirement in Disley? Although this isn't known for sure: may need fact-checking.

And back to Caroline Aherne (remembered her name!)

Her "Mrs Merton" character is the sort of older lady of indeterminate age who you see a lot of in Stockport. (her chat show audience was chocca with elderly Stockport ladies bussed in for the day, in fact)

In fact, Aherne placed her in Heaton Norris, which is an unpretentious and down-to-earth central suburb not far from the town centre, largely made up of Coronation Street-style terraces populated by folk just like her.

There was a short-lived TV series, a gentle comedy, based around the premise of Mrs Merton living in her terraced home in Heaton Norris with son Malcolm (Craig Cash), who was portrayed as a jobless man-child in his thirties with something indefinably "wrong" with him, perhaps Aspergers or mild autism. The opening credits showed Mrs M in various local streets, including the very same bakery/cake shop on Churchill Street that my granny used to patronise...


This only lasted one series: people saw something "creepy" in the portrayal of the mother-son relationship, but I couldn't see it myself: very typical of some guys I've known in the past, there is more of this about than you might think! (For REALLY possessive mothers who won't let their sons grow up, go to the other side of my family in Wales. But there's a different entry for you)

Excellent stuff so far here!

And it's Caroline Aherne, I think!

Paully

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/brunel/F69001?thread=1171712 For the association between Reddish, Stockport, Cheshire and "Coronation Street", see above.

One more showbiz asociation of Stockport, Cheshire.

The actress who plays Daphne Moon in "Frasier" (Jane Leevis) has been panned for her attempt at a Manchester accent. However, if you listen very closely, there are enough cues and hooks in her speech to be able to locate the particular sub-accent she's trying for: it's actually a very good stab at South Manchester/Cheshire borders and would not be out of place in the whole southern crescent of Sale-Altrincham-Timperley-Northern Moor-Didsbury-Parrs Wood-Stockport Heatons.

(The producers of "Frasier" explain that it has to be a compromise between a "pure" Manchester accent and something that Americans can understand. Which is fair enough - the Yanks would NOT have got on with a NORTH Manchester accent at all!)

So I infer that Ms Leevis was coached by somebody from South Manchester or North Cheshire to get her accent together: most possibly North-East Cheshire. (ie, Stockport area?)

And one final btw: Joanne Whalley-Kilmer (Hollywood actress):- Stockport girl.

One outstandingly good eaterie:

Sanjoys Indian Cusine
St Petersgate
Stockport

Not your average tikka massalla house.

"Sanjoy" is actually the name of the owner's son: the restaurant is owned by the genial and likeable Dev, who believes in Indian sub-continent cooking as it should be, with the baltis and the tikka masalas taken right off the menu.

The food is both different and a considerable cut above "average" Indian. Elements of classical French cuisine make their way in at the edges, and the result is Indian food to die for. Real thought and imagination goes into preparation and cooking, and service is both prompt and unhurried. (you can linger over your meal for up to three hours, so book the whole evening)

Average cost, with drinks, £25-£30ph. (wine extra)

Reccomended!

Right...I'm busily putting something together on my computer at w*rk...will update the entry as soon as I can, but I'm taking the day off the project today.

Well, I think I deserve it with today being special and all

I'm delighted to announce that we already have two County entries in Peer Review, waiting to receive any bouquets or brickbats that people might lob in their general direction! If you're currently either working on or contributing to a County entry of your own right now, you might like to have a quick look to see how some other researchers have tackled this challenge. They are: County Fermanagh (A6092606) and Norfolk (A6108473).

Hope you enjoy reading them!

Paully

Editorial Note: This conversation has been moved from 'Challenge h2g2' to 'Cheshire, England, UK'.