Firm’s director was badly hurt in crash
HERE in our regular nostalgia feature we look back at stories in the Rochdale Observer from years gone by. Following on from last year’s 100 years ago feature, this year, we are turning back the clock to see what was being reported on 80 years ago:
●●YOUNG DIRECTOR BADLY INJURED
WITHIN a few miles of home after a journey from the south of England, Ian Whipp, aged 25, of Oakenshaw House, Whitworth, was involved in an accident on Queensway about four o’clock yesterday morning and received severe injuries.
Mr Whipp, who is a trained electrical engineer and director of Messrs Whipp and Bourne Limited, electrical engineers, for Castleton, was returning from a business trip to Portsmouth.
He was driving his car along Queensway in the direction of Oldham Road, near to Harley Lane, when it crashed into the rear of a stationary articulated vehicle and was completely wrecked.
Mr Whipp sustained head injuries, including the loss of his left eye and other less serious injuries and was removed as quickly as possible to the infirmary.
On enquiry last night the Observer was informed by a doctor attending Mr Whipp that his condition was as well as could be expected.
The vehicle into which Mr Whipp’s car crashed was loading with a 50-ton marine boiler which, as can be seen from the photograph, practically blocked up the roadway.
The vehicle is owned by a Sheffield firm and was being off side and could not be moved until yesterday afternoon.
Mr Whipp is the son of Mr Frank Whipp of Oakenshaw House, Whitworth, managing director of Messrs Whip and Bourne Limited and is a keen airman.
●●ROCHDALE AND ITS HEALTH
A GLANCE at the vital statistics in the annual report of the Medical Officer for Rochdale and a comparison with the figures 80 years ago enables us to see how much the standard of life and health have improved and how greatly the development of our modern health services have contributed to the prolongation of life.
Records show that in the early forties of last century, the death rate in the town was 32 per thousand of the population and in certain congested areas it stood at the appalling figure of 45 per thousand.
Last year it was down to 13.9 but even that is well above the average for the great towns or indeed the average for England and Wales.
Again, while we have reduced the rate of infantile mortality to 63 per 1,000 births, the average for the great towns and the country as a whole is several points lower.
But it is gratifying to find a reduction of maternal mortality, which is now back at 3.5 per 1,000 births.
Heart disease has taken the place once held by tuberculosis as the chief cause of death.
●●DISTRICT AND OLD AGE PENSIONS
THE monthly meeting of the County Old Age Pension Committee was held at the County Education Offices on Thursday.
Five cases were dealt with and, in each case, a pension at the rate of 10s, per week was allowed.
●●FIGHTING THE WET SEASON
GARDENERS, both professional and amateur, are sighing and praying for the return to the normal summer weather which is long overdue.
It has been a most trying season.
The hot spell before, during and after Whitsuntide was heartily welcomed by the holiday maker and is still recalled with joy; for the gardener it was a period of anxiety and travail. It was the second sowing time and planting time and the seed was apt to dry up and die in the parched surface soil, while young plants put out had a real struggle for existence.
And then when the weather broke and the rain came, to our secret delight, it kept on and on and the sun hid persistently behind the clouds and that has been what it has been doing ever since. ●●THE DIARY OF A WOMAN ABOUT TOWN A HEROINE to my mind couldn’t be better described than as a housewife who does all her own washing.
Particularly if in possession of a large and growing family – the sort that makes paragons of our ‘Little Women’ madcaps.
Of all the people, I think she deserves a gold medal.
Competition is close, too, with laundries so accommodating their modest charges somehow pale into insignificance before the terrific effort a whole day’s wash demands.
However, there’s lots of deserving folk getting nothing for a reward but virtue.