Song of the sirens

You will remember that last week we were discussing the siren that was on top of Darlington Covered Market.

We reckon that there were more than 20,000 sirens put up around the country – at least 7,000 on tall buildings and another 11,000 on tall poles. They obviously originated during the Second World War but there was a second wave of siren installation in the early 1960s, around the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis. These were to sound a four minute warning in case of nuclear attack from the Soviets, and they were maintained as late as 1992.

A typical siren story is told by Peter Tarn, managing director of the Forge House Group on Darlington’s Albert Hill.

“Our building on Cleveland Trading Estate was constructed as a canteen to serve the huge number of workers engaged in munitions work at Darlington Forge,” he says. “The siren was mounted on the flat roof, and the cellar beneath the building was equipped with heavy steel blast-doors to act as an emergency bomb shelter.

“Our group has occupied the building since 1979, and a police officer called regularly to test it.

“In the 1990s, we provided access for the civil defence authorities to remove the siren and all that now remains is the steel bracket which used to carry it and the steel blast doors.”

John Hepplewhite was at the Memories talk to All Saints Church Fellowship in Hurworth on Tuesday, and he told us about the siren that was on hangar number two at Durham Tees Valley Airport until well into the 1970s. It had a separate supply of low voltage electricity that kept the siren revolving slowly – and silently – to prevent birds from nesting inside it. Did every siren constantly revolve?

Pam Davison and Andrew Bower both report that there was a siren in Harrowgate Hill at the top of North Road. Their descriptions suggests that it was on the old water tower. that in her childhood there was

“We used to look at it when walking to school in the mid-1980s,” says Andrew, “so I'm not sure if it was a siren or just excitable school children with overactive imaginations.”

Howard Wilson remembers a siren on the top of the Technical College in High Northgate in the mid-1960s when he attended the neighbouring Central Secondary School.

Beyond Darlington, Alan Ellwood of the Shildon History Recall Society says: “Shildon wagon works had a siren which remained in use into the 1970s as a works buzzer which could be heard all over town. It summoned men to work on morning shift, and again at about 1pm for those who went home for lunch, but I’m not sure about the night shift.

“It was still in place a few years ago on the back wall of what became the works canteen next to the old railway crossings.”

From Willington, Olive Linge reports that there was a siren on Springfield House, which was the headquarters of the Air Raid Precautions wardens.

“We were told that if the siren sounded on our way to school we had to return home if it was nearer,” she says. “It never happened but I am sure that home would have won.”

And then when Memories was addressing Aycliffe Village History Society, Enid Hugill presented herself. Her husband, Walter, had worked at the Darlington electrical firm of Cox-Walker in the 1950s and 1960s, and Cox-Walker had the contract to maintain sirens across the district. Walter remembers tending to sirens near the police house in Sadberge, near the cemetery in Richmond, just off the seafront at Redcar, near the West Cliff steps at Whitby and at the end of Scarborough pier.

What a great job that must have been: touring around some of the most beautiful places and tinkering with sirens.

Any more siren stories? Is there even one siren still in situ?

ON the front cover of Memories 281 was a picture of Darlington’s High Row in 1950 with the air raid siren top left. But several people had their eyes trained to the cars at the bottom.

“The one in the middle is a Triumph Dolomite made between 1934 and 1940,” said Barry Chapman. “It had a fantastic radiator called a waterfall.”

We also received a letter from Capt Mainwaring (Retired). He said: “What a splendid picture, but it seems quite a few motorists still didn’t know the war was over. Four cars still have headlight dimmer covers and two vehicles have white paint to outline the mudguards.”

The dimmer covers were to prevent lights shining during the blackout and it was law that the rear mudguards had to be painted with white matt paint to give other drivers a chance of spotting the vehicle in the gloom.

Certainly, the vehicle parked in the darkness outside the Covered Market appears to have white mudguards – well spotted, Capt Mainwaring.

IT never ceases to amaze us what Memories readers pick up on. For example, Memories 280 contained a spread of old photos of Bishop Auckland. One showed the demolition of the Odeon cinema in 1995.

“My father had a breaking ball like that in his scrapyard,” wrote Olive Basey of Brandon in a lovely letter. “It was called a snatch ball, and we used to break up cast iron with it. Steel was cut up with an oxy-acetylene torch. The sizeable pieces were loaded onto a lorry, taken to Brandon railway station from where they went to the Middlesbrough or Consett ironworks for reuse.”

THERE’S loads more correspondence from recent weeks to delve into – everything from Captain Cook’s house to gas lamplighters. Thanks to each and every one who gets in touch, and thanks for the kind words about how much people enjoy Memories. There will be more next week.