One thing thats very noticable on that photograph is just how smoky the atmosphere is.

Anyone under the age of 40 won't remember that buildings were always one colour - black, not because they were built from black bricks but because they were coated with a layer of soot - everything was, the black buildings in that photo aren't just the result of a bad negative, they really were all black.

Leeds Town Hall was completely black until the late sixties when it was cleaned after the Clean Air Act was passed banning the use of coal fires in certain districts, I remember moving to Cookridge in 1963 from Burley - Cookridge was one of the first "smokeless zones" and my dad moaned like hell because it took ages to get a fire going with smokeless coke instead of coal - he had to use a gas poker for ten minutes in the coke stove to get the stuff burning, yes thats right, we used gas to light a coal fire, why couldn't we just use gas on its own ?

rlLittle London 1969, looks like beirutrl

Are you sure it wasn't cleaned up later than that?

I'm sure I remember it being black, and the shock when it was sandblasted clean. I was born in 1970.

I remember similar shock when they did the same to what was City Of Leeds High School (now the council offices).

Little London has NEVER looked as good as Beirut!

And the time in the early 70s when someone working on the clock got stuck / injured / taken ill and it was one of the first 'air / sea rescues' (albeit without the sea !) when they flew a chopper in really close to winch the bloke out.

It may have been, it all sort of merges into one after a while

My Uncle Tommy was a decorator for the council and one of his jobs every year was to paint the lions on the Town Hall steps - we used to look out for him every time we got the bus down Burley Rd and along the Headrow and I seem to recall at some point asking if it was at all dangerous painting lions white and did he have to wait until they went to sleep, of course he told me that was the case.


I was 17 at the time.

This site states that the cleaning of the Town Hall was not proposed until 1972: www.francisfrith.co.uk/pageloade ... 2&start=40 When this picture was taken (1965), the town hall, with its 225ft tower and spectacular frontage of giant columns and pilasters, was in desperate need of a good clean to rid it of decades of soot and grime. In 1972 a proposal for cleaning was at last put on the agenda. However, the Labour group on the council objected

This site states that the cleaning of the Town Hall was not proposed until 1972: www.francisfrith.co.uk/pageloade ... 2&start=40 When this picture was taken (1965), the town hall, with its 225ft tower and spectacular frontage of giant columns and pilasters, was in desperate need of a good clean to rid it of decades of soot and grime. In 1972 a proposal for cleaning was at last put on the agenda. However, the Labour group on the council objected

Parkinson building wasn't built until 1951, so didn't have much chance of getting dirty.

The Parkinson Building has never impressed me. I've always thought it was no great shakes.

Does anyone know where the name Little London came from? I gather it must because it's as hospitable as Tower Hamlets?

rlcivic hall 1947rl

Booo - gerroff....

Another good photo, the site mentions all of the housing at the top left which was demolished for the Uni and inner ring road but also the bit in the bottom right is what used to be the civic theatre and above that is what was demolished to make way for Kitson College.

When you see photos like that you realise just what was ploughed down in the 1950's and 60's around there - far more than the building work that is going on now, and thats saying something.

Is that the approved school Blenheim to the top of the picture