The Rossendale Rambler

On a clear day you can see forever, or so a popular song would have us believe. Well, perhaps we can't see forever from the Rossendale Valley but there are a number of interesting places and landmarks that can be seen, some only on a clear day.The most prominent landmark to dominate the valley is the tower on Holcombe Hill. Erected in 1852 at a cost of £1000 and paid for by public subscription, it is a constant reminder of one of the area's outstanding personalities, Sir Robert Peel, second Baronet, the Lancashire lad who was responsible for the repeal of the Corn Laws, and also, in 1829, carrying through the Metropolitan Police Act and setting up the first disciplined police force, thereby giving rise to the name Peelers or Bobbies for the nation's first policemen.

Sadly, over the years, the Peel monument fell into disrepair and it wasn't until the latter part of the 1900's that the tower was renovated. Now it is possible once again to stand at the top of the tower and look out across the beautiful rolling hills and valleys of Rossendale, out across twelve counties. At night the tower stands bathed in light and is a welcoming sight to travellers returning to the valley.

Another tower that dominates the Lancashire skyline and is visible from some parts of Rossendale, is Darwen Tower. It is eighty feet high and was built to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. It stands 1225 feet high above sea level on a windy hill and one cannot fail to be impressed by its unusual design. It doesn't take much imagination to see from a distance that the tower resembles a miniature space rocket standing on a launching pad waiting for take-off.

But the most famous tower of all, not only in Lancashire but in Britain - excepting the Tower of London - must be Blackpool Tower, which can be seen from Cribden Hill.

It is difficult to imagine the play-ground of the North without its famous landmark but in 1891, when shares in the tower were offered to the public, only two-thirds of the £150,000 share offer was taken up, for Blackpool Tower at the time of its construction, was considered by many people to be a white elephant, a waste of time and money, and eventually the tower shares fell to just 10/- (50p) each. Little did people realise then that Blackpool Tower would become famous throughout the world and was destined to become a real money-spinner, as millions of holiday-makers congregated in its opulently furnished bars and dining-rooms, danced the night away to well-known orchestras in its ornate ballroom and ascend its iron skeleton to the observation platform 500ft above ground level.

Another metal structure, erected in more recent times and bearing testimony to mankind's technological progress, is Winter Hill Transmitting station. It is a sobering thought that when Blackpool Tower was planned the television set was not in existence and the radio, or wireless, as it was called, was only in its infancy.

Still from our view-point on Cribden Hill and looking north, in the distance can be seen the peaks of Ingleborough and Pen-y-ghent, but nearer to the Rossendale Valley is Pendle Hill, the reputed home of the Lancashire Witches, where, legend has it, on Halloween, witches fly across its summit on broom-sticks.

The association of Pendle Hill and the surrounding area with Witchcraft, Alice Nutter, Old Mother Demdike and others suspected of witchcraft, is part of Lancashire history but what is perhaps not so well-known, is its association with religion and the Religious Society of Friends. It was on the approach to Pendle Hill that George Fox, the founder of the Friends -or Quakers as they have become known -imagined that he saw the heavens open and heard the revelation that he was to instigate the Quaker Movement.

Looking south from Rossendale, on a clear day, the giant reflector at Jodrell Bank Experimental Station can be seen silhouetted against the sky-line twenty miles south of Manchester. The reflector measures 75 meters in diameter and is mounted on one of the world's largest, fully steerable radio telescopes. Just recently it has been set up to search the heavens for transmissions from outer space and should there be anyone out there, who knows, perhaps they are even now looking down on Rossendale .

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