Quote: Old Feller "My digs were right at the back of Greenall Whitley's brewery in the middle of St Helens.
The stench on a Monday when they were brewing was dreadful especially if I'd had a skinful the night before.
I do hope for that reason that the brewery has now gone otherwise the ground might suffer from that whiff on a Friday evening.'"
Blimey. You haven't been to St Helens for a very long time have you! The brewery was demolished decades ago and eventually turned into a bus station.
The Bears Paw as you knew it has long since gone too. As a child my parents used to take me and my sibs there for a fish'n'chip treat. Man, I have never tasted better fish'n'chips since. The building is still there and I don't know what it is at present. It was a bar at one point and it may have even been resurrected as the Bears Paw, I don't know as I don't tend to walk that way into town. But it isn't what it used to be anyway.
Pilkingtons are still around though. In fact, they are about to reinvest in the town for the second time in two years. Us Sintelliners had come to the sad conclusion that we were going to watch the last of our manufacturing industry disappear down the M6 but it seems it turned around and came back.
As for trains, don't even think about it if you're travelling from Leeds unless you plan to stay overnight in Sintellins. Unless you're coming from Liverpool or Wigan (or Manchester at a push) the connections are utter and total crap. Some bugger made the wrong turn in the 19th century and sent the main line to Warrington instead of Sintellins (and now we can't even get to Warrington, except for once an hour during in the day, although that could be seen as a blessing in some respects I suppose).
