As twilight has set on the rattlechain lagoon cover up works, the week has seen more arrivals of birds than people for the first time in several months- and not a Heyrman in sight.
The geese have made it to the summit of the face. Well done guys!
All quiet on the Western Front
Some things remain though, not that easy to hide or conceal.
Whatever the future for this area, its past is defined. We will ensure that it is not forgotten- one of the main reasons why this website was set up. Another reason was to counter the sanctimonious prose of praise for the local “great industrialists” like Albright and Wilson. Add to their names the likes of Farley, Chance and Hunt, Izon etc etc, their portraits hang like Gods in old rooms they once frequented, many of them dressed in ceremoinial regalier they acquired from buying votes.
Then there is the frequent appraisal of how these characters of industry offered the donation of the “everlasting legacy” of a park for the people of the area. Trouble is they and their descendants are not paying for their upkeep through council tax today. And there are those who attempt a claim to fame of some relationship to these people, (obviously the poor ones).
Every area has these people; these are just some of those in the non entity of a borough called “sandwell”. If they “made this borough what it is today” you can see why they failed so badly. With bonfire night coming up, (a curious “celebration” of a plot which unfortunately did not succeed), I find myself wondering if it is not time to leave these people behind and have a ruddy good burn up of all their images, busts, portraits and scriptures that were created of the burns and scalds and shirts ripped of the back of local human labour. We live in their shadows,their toxic legacies and why- how long is this masquerade going to continue before we leave the 19th Century behind?
Their time is gone, they had their days and they filled them with grime, and if you look hard enough as we have, you will find them. Its been great spoiling the party of the chemical conmen.