Mother of invention (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Mother of invention

3:37pm Monday 14th February 2011 in Features By Sally Clifford

There’s a quiet modesty about Keighley. Inventors, industrialists and brewers go about their daily business without fuss yet the products they produce have made a global impact.

Timothy Taylor – one of the town’s long-established companies – has been brewing here for 150 years but its global acclaim came when singer Madonna spoke of her penchant for its Landlord bitter.

Similarly, I recall marvelling at the fact the inventor of the mangle hailed from here. Who would have thought this bygone contraption which eased housewives’ washday woes was created in Keighley?

Emily Cummins, the young woman from Crosshills who became Barclays Woman of the Year, made a name for herself on a global scale creating sustainable devices, like refrigerators powered by dirty water and water carriers, to improve the quality of lives of people in Third World countries.

High on the hills above Keighley, Stephen Sharp is cutting, filing and shaping coppiced wood and horns ‘animals no longer need’ to create beautiful shepherds’ crooks and walking sticks.

A keen walker, he created his own crook and a hiking pole for his wife, Christine. A collection of his creations are showcased in an umbrella stand by the front door of his beautiful home – a converted farmhouse - just a few miles from the town centre.

The violinist, who also repairs and restores broken violins and bows, says: “I think the thing with Keighley is it has managed to keep re-inventing itself. It has moved with the times but it has kept its identity.”

Keighley’s architecture is indicative of a town passionate about preserving its past. The Victorian Royal Arcade, beneath which the remnants of a row of terraces were uncovered and retained within this retail space some years ago, and the ornate Cavendish Street canopy outside the parade of Edwardian shops funded by one of the town’s early entrepreneurs, Prince Smith, are fine examples of Keighley’s traditional characteristics.

Philip Smith, Keighley’s town centre manager, who, incidentally is no relation to the aforementioned bygone entrepreneur, said: “Prince Smith and his cousin were entrepreneurs more than 100 years ago and they created some of the buildings we see now. They were mill owners with thought for their workers.

“The library is the first Carnegie library in the country and that came as a result of a conversation between Prince Smith and Andrew Carnegie. He wanted to give an education to the people working in his mills and he put money into the library.”

Philip is part of the Keighley Town Centre Association, a partnership between Keighley Town Council, Bradford Council and the private sector. The association was set up in 2005 as a lobby group to increase the vitality of the town.

Promoting Keighley through events and initiatives throughout the year isn’t just a career to Philip. His drive and enthusiasm for the town’s progression is born out of Keighley being his birthplace.

Keighley’s success is his passion, and taking on the mantle of town centre manager four-and-a-half years ago has enabled Philip to be part of the process.

He speaks enthusiastically about the smart Airedale shopping centre, where shoppers can browse and buy undercover from the big-name stores mingling among the town’s long-established independent retailers.

He extolls the virtues of the improved transportation links bringing shoppers and tourists in by bus and rail, the newly-refurbished market hall attracting customers from far and wide and, indeed, the more recent celebrated opening of the £36m Leeds College Keighley Campus.

Projects such as these are indicative of a town which isn’t afraid to embrace change – as long as it is for the better.

“I want to see Keighley succeed and it has had some tough times in the recent past. It has got through those and it is a good, strong town. It has problems economically because of the recession but if we look at the town now and look at it last year in terms of business we lost 23 businesses last year but gained 28,” says Philip.

In its development, Keighley has a tenacity to re-use and recycle. Philip explains accommodation and business space has been absorbed largely within brownfield sites or by refurbishing existing premises.

Dalton Mills, part of which was damaged by fire earlier this year, is a wonderful example of providing redundant mills with another purpose.

Once the largest textile mill in the region, Dalton Mills employed thousands of people within Keighley and the Worth Valley. In later years it was remodelled to provide workspace for businesses. The building has also been used as a location for TV filming.

The refurbishment of the old hall has created space for community and business use while retaining a concert venue for 150. “It is making use of an original building that has been there nearly 100 years, if not more,” says Philip.

He talks of plans to entice high-level manufacturing into the town –something the Airedale Partnership, a regeneration initiative supported by the private sector, Bradford Council and Yorkshire Forward, eager to develop.

From both business and visitor perspective, Keighley – dubbed the capital of Airedale – is an attractive place for work and pleasure.

The town is proud to boast the largest station on the Airedale line. It also has a train on the line named after Ian Dewhirst, the town’s historian.

Its most popular and famous attraction, of course, is the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway. Descending the entrance steps at Keighley station you begin a journey into a bygone era of transportation.

The platform and its waiting rooms are styled as they would have been back in the day when the age of steam was booming, largely due to the wealthy mill magnates who helped to set up this line in the 19th century to transport goods around the valley and beyond.

When British Railways closed the line in 1962 a group of locals and railway enthusiasts set up a preservation society to save it. The line reopened to passenger traffic on June 29, 1968, and today is run by a growing band of dedicated volunteers.

The KWVR is a popular route transporting visitors and tourists to the Bronte village of Haworth and beyond. By the very nature of its characteristics from a bygone era, the railway has been used countless times as a backdrop in TV and film productions. The most famous being the film version of Edith Nesbit’s story, The Railway Children.

Generations of David Pearson’s family have lived in the Worth Valley and the railway has always been a special place.

Born in Keighley, David fondly recalls riding on the train from his home town with his parents and grandparents.

“It was just a little branch line and all the family used to know the staff on it. When it closed I was seven and I cried my eyes out.”

For David it was ‘the most natural thing in the world’ to become involved in the railway when the supporters rallied to save it.

Forty-three years later he is now the director of planning and external resources, which involves him finding partners such as sponsors to work with the railway on projects.

“The thing about the railway is it is the only complete railway anywhere in the world that is actually preserved.

“It was always very much a sort of family atmosphere and Keighley is that sort of place. Everybody knows everybody else and you are related to an awful lot of them as well, and the railway is just like that,” he says.

Paul North, manager of the Airedale and Manningham Master Plan, says Keighley ‘is a place with enormous potential.’ “The thing that is striking about Keighley is that it has diversity, it has its own identity and ambition and the fact it is a town but it has got a large rural surrounding means you have the best of both worlds.”