1. Beginnings
How it all started
The
notice of a public meeting to be held on Tuesday January 27th 1970 may
be regarded as Wilsden Village Society’s first document but it might be
helpful to look at what led to that meeting being called.
On
the evening of March 25th 1969 two couples who had lived in Wilsden for
a few years reflected on how they were enjoying living there, but sorry
that they were not more involved with village life. This was partly
because they were all working in Bradford, fitting in housework in the
evenings and generally following a different pattern of shopping and
being about in the village from people who were in Wilsden during the
day. They realised too that much of their social life was still angled
towards the places they had come from and that this was typical of many
of the newer residents.
Creating community
The
Mechanics Institute, once a hub of village life, now stood gloomy and
almost deserted, apart from a metal worker who rented part of the ground
floor. They thought how good it would be to have a place like this
where people could drop in and find out about all the various
activities, somewhere that could be used by all ages and sections of the
community at times that suited them, somewhere particularly that would
encourage newcomers to look to Wilsden for more of their requirements
and counter the tendency to just eat and sleep here but assume one had
to go out for everything else.
Saving the village
The
other area of concern was the amount of demolition taking place. These
newcomers had come to Wilsden because they liked the look of it, its
separateness from neighbouring towns and its feeling of being a place in
its own right. Old cottages of no particular merit in themselves
contributed to the overall impression of Main Street and an alarming
number of gaps were beginning to appear, some of the sites being left as
dangerous eyesores. Other villages had become suburbs and the
conviction grew among the little group that this village was worth
fighting for, not a place of duck ponds and roses round the door, but
nevertheless offering something important to the quality of life.
Local government
There
was a sense of some urgency, with local government reorganisation
scheduled for 1974 which would mean bigger and more remote departments
to deal with and much less elected representation. Even on a council as
small as Bingley Urban District Council, councillors for any one village
could easily be outvoted when it came to allocating priorities or
getting support for local ideas.
Over
the next few weeks those four people talked to others, and found ready
echoes of their thoughts both among recent residents and those whose
roots went back many generations. All three local councillors for the
Wilsden ward of Bingley UDC were enthused – Maurice Calvert (Ind.),
Emily Hall (Con.) and Gerald Tyler (Con.) The notion of more local say
in local affairs was contrary to the general trend of the 1960s and
early 70s, with the exception of the Skeffington Report ‘People and
Planning’. Counc. Tyler was already interested in what this report had
to say about local involvement in planning and was wondering how its
recommendations could be implemented in Wilsden.
Invitation to a meeting
The
outcome of all these conversations was the decision to sound out
opinions more widely. In October 1969, Counc. Tyler wrote on behalf of
all three councillors to officers of communal organisations in the
village. He invited them to a meeting in the reading room at Royd House
on 4th November, enclosing this short statement on the topic to be
discussed.