Ghosts weave a web of intrigue

Although the factory had stood since the great fire of 1889, it wasn't the company's most visible face.

The "school furney", as the company was fondly known, was best known for its shop on the corner of Coniscliffe Road and Skinnergate.

The company was formed in the 1860s to sell religious literature to schools. Its first shop was on the corner of Russell Street and Northgate (now beneath the roundabout next to Marks and Spencer). This was known locally as "the Bible shop".

In 1895, the company bought the plot of land in Coniscliffe Road and instructed Darlington's most famous architect, GG Hoskins, to build one of his Gothic masterpieces. Fortunately, GG's son, Walter, was one of the furney's directors so the contract might have been cheap.

Hoskins' building opened in June 1897, and the Russell Street shop was sold off.

The school furnishing company remained in Coniscliffe Road, with its classic old shopfront, until 1954 when it sold Hoskins' shop to the Permanent Building Society. Lloyds Bank now occupies the building.

NOW occupying the school furney's 1963 factory on the East Mount Road site is Curtis Office Furniture, which moved there from Yarm Road seven years ago.

"For the first four years, the staff were convinced that we had a ghost," says Roger Curtis, the managing director.

"Fuelled by tales of those who died on the site in 1889, the girls were very concerned at the strange smell of burning hair that would suddenly pervade the office area and showroom entrance.

"It would appear without warning. Sometimes weeks would go by, sometimes months, and then suddenly it would happen again. We could find no explanation for this phenomena and were ready to believe it was a paranormal happening.

"Then one night, I was in the showroom late, the only person in the building, and the smell suddenly materialised - exceptionally strongly.

"I was determined to get to the root of it. I stood still and silent, looking around the showroom. Suddenly I spotted a whiff of blue smoke coming from the top of one of our uplighters.

"Inside was the cause of our ghostly smell: a large spider living out of sight in the light had woven webs over the top of a halogen bulb, spinning and spinning until its web reached such a density that it collapsed onto the bulb causing it to dissipate in a puff of smoke - our ghost."

Roger concludes: "A revised and more intense cleaning schedule has exorcised the problem completely."

FIVE people died in the 1889 furney fire, and their inquests were held in a room above the Railway Tavern, in Northgate.

Their bodies were laid out, covered in white sheets, in stalls in the stables behind the pub. At the crucial moment, the landlord lost the key to the stables and so the inquest was delayed by 45 minutes while he found it.

This led almost immediately to a proper mortuary being built on High Northgate with a jury room ready for inquests above it. When a new coroner was appointed in 1891, he was said to be delighted by the mortuary.

An 1891 map of High Northgate suggests that the mortuary was on the right-hand side as you leave town, opposite MacNay Street and just before the railway bridge. It appears to have been No 124, now a workshop which is slightly set forward from the streetline.

This building appears also to have been known as Faith House - but the only picture we can find of it was taken in 1974 and suggests that it was built in 1857.

This date stone is no longer on No 124 High Northgate, which has been altered recently, so if anyone has information which would solve this little riddle, we'd be grateful.

WENDY ACRES' grandfather, Arthur, and father, Jack, both worked at the furney. Arthur was a joiner and commercial traveller in the 1920s, and Jack was a joiner and draughtsman from 1928 to 1956. She remembers that, in his time, the company specialised in science laboratories for Durham University and school libraries, including the one fitted at Hummersknott School, Darlington.

Wendy also remembers that the furney ran annual staff charabanc outings. One year in the early 1950s she went with her father to Windermere. Another year they went to Whitby and on the way back stopped off in Stockton to see a variety show starring Harry Secombe.

A CENTURY-AND-A-HALF ago, our corner of the world was at the heart of horseracing. A month ago, Echo Memories told of West Australian, one of the greatest racehorses ever produced in this country. It was bred and is buried at Streatlam Castle, near Staindrop.

In 1853, West Australian became the first horse to win the Triple Crown - the 2,000 Guineas, the Derby and the St Leger - in the same season. Only 14 horses since have matched his achievement.

West Australian's mother was called Mowerina and was also bred at the Streatlam stud. But when it died in 1865 it was buried (and presumably still is) behind Croft Spa Hotel, where there was another famous stud.

This stud was run by Thomas Winteringham who had been brought up at a pub in Boroughbridge, North Yorkshire, which was, in the days before trains and cars, the overnight stopping place for horses travelling from Middleham and Richmond on their way to southern racecourses.

Thomas fell in love with horses, served an apprenticeship at Middleham and then ran Mr Jacques' stud at Easby Abbey. Then he was poached to run the stud at Croft Spa.

The most famous horse in his care was Alice Hawthorn, which won 52 races, including the Chester Cup, the Goodwood Cup and the Great Ebor Handicap. Its most famous offspring was Thormanby, with which Thomas won the Derby in 1860 and the Ascot Gold Cup.

When Alice Hawthorn died in 1861 of "cancer of the udder", it became the first racehorse to be buried at the hotel. The second was Mowerina, and then Burlesque - not a great winner but clearly a favourite of Thomas - was laid to rest at Croft.

Underhand - the only horse to win the Pitman's Derby three times - was the final of Winteringham's horses to be buried at the hotel.

"In concluding my report of the Croft Stud," wrote an expert in the Sporting Life in 1865, "I have the pleasure to state that a more complete and better managed establishment could not possibly be, and every animal about the place is in perfect health and magnificent condition."

When Thomas died in 1872, he had at least 22 racehorses owned by aristocrats from at home and abroad. The stud passed to his 15-year-old son, John, who was also a shrewd horseman.

However, when John died at the age of 29 in 1886, the famous Croft stud was broken up. During the First World War, the Army used the stables behind the hotel, but they have since been levelled for the car park.

MARY EASON, of Darlington, remembers being taken to the Croft Spa Hotel as a child one hot summer in the 1930s.

"I loved swimming," she says, "and I remember it exactly as the photograph shows.

"My father and I sat on one of the seats and had afternoon tea brought to us by a very smart young man. If I remember rightly, this cost my father 1/6d each."

In 1942, Mary was 21 and engaged to marry Captain Vernon McKittrick, of the Royal Ulster Rifles.

"My father hired a horse and cab to take us to Croft Spa Hotel," she recalls. "The sound of the horses' feet clop clopping was so romantic.

"In 1943, we were married and our honeymoon was one night at the Croft Spa Hotel. Then my husband had to rejoin his regiment."

MANY, many moons ago, Echo Memories was visiting Stooperdale, the splendid railway offices in Darlington which have just been given listed building status.

Jeanette Leckenby worked there from 1942 to 1955 as a punch card operator in the Hollerith room. In those pre-computer days, this was how the railway kept control of its stock and materials.

"We punched each card 45 times and we were expected to do 200 cards per hour," says Jeanette. "We worked 351/2 hours per week, so a computer is needed to work out how many times one finger pressed a key: 319,500 a week, or 15,975,000 per year, although we were allowed two weeks' holiday."

After Jeanette left, British Rail's first computer was installed in much of the groundfloor at Stooperdale to work out wages and pensions. Its name was Hector, and now the operators had to punch cards which would give it the information which would allow it to do its calculations.

Hector had three programmes to work out one railwayman's wages.

"The first programme takes in the hours from Sunday to Wednesday, the second for Thursday only, and the third from Friday up to Saturday midnight," said the BR Magazine of November 1958.

"There are an amazing number of individual variations in overtime pay, night shift working, expenses, tax, superannuation funds, sick clubs, sports associations, which explains why 900 calculations are needed to arrive at each man's pay."

The magazine said that Hector the computer would "knock the brain fag out of payroll work".

It concluded: "Ultimately, all sorts of less routine and more complicated work, such as railway timetable compilation will, it is hoped, be worked out on computers."

Hector was so groundbreaking that people came from all over the world to see it.

If you have any information on any of the items in today's column, please write to Echo Memories, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington DL1 1NF, or e-mail chris.lloyd

Published: 04/06/2002

Echo Memories, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington DL1 1NF, e-mail chris.lloyd@nne.co.uk or telephone (01325) 505062.