HISTORY - Street Names (updated 2/4/03 with Shallcross Lane & Wakelams Fold, see below)

Street Names admin@yampy.co.uk Local policeman PC Nick Gostling recently sent us the following: Whilst on patrol the other day I wondered about the street names in Gornal. The word 'street' comes from Roman times and tends to relate to Roman Roads. The word which precedes Street generally relates to a place or building near to the street. The question is, does anyone know where the 'temple' or 'abbey' were? Also what about 'zoar'? There's a partial answer regarding 'Abbey' on our Abbey Farm page (click here), but Nick has raised an interesting question that deserves a Yampy page of its own. We have always wondered about the main street in the village for example. One can understand how a road gradually acquires the name 'High Street' as it gains importance, but in Gornal we have gone the other way; our High Street changed its name to Louise Street. Who was this Louise? She must have been quite a girl! Which Flavell is remembered in Flavell's Lane? And which Wakelam in Wakelams Fold? If you have any information about any street name in Gornal please get in touch. Nobody else will document this if we don't, so let's make a definitive list for posterity.

Grosvenor Road / Graveyard Thanks Nicholas for the following: Grosvenor Road was apparently Graveyard Road, there was a Graveyard Farm as the area was once a Quaker burial ground. The name was changed for obvious reasons, but who chose Grosvenor I don't know. On the 1901 map of Gornal Grosvenor Road is indeed called Graveyard Road, and more generally the district is given as 'Graveyard'. The farm mentioned by Nicholas is also shown. One explanation we have heard for the name is that the area lay just outside the old Dudley boundaries, and that during the Great Plague the rule was that dead bodies had to be taken out of town limits. However, according to a 1932 church pamphlet: "the district called the Graveyard is said to have been a burying place for the inhabitants at that end of the parish who declined to use the churchyard at Sedgley because it was too far away."

Shallcross Lane (off Summer Lane) The Rev. Harold Shallcross, L. Th., (click for photo) was instituted vicar of St. James' Church Lower Gornal on 23rd october 1931, and described by a contemporary as "very keen on reducing our burdens, and associates himself with all the social activities in the parish".

Wakelam's Fold (off Louise Street) In the 1930's W. Wakelam and family ran the Woodman pub that still lies along this tiny lane connecting Louise Street to Musk Lane and New Street click here to see a 1932 advertisement for the pub. The lane appears on the 1901 map of Gornal, but is not marked with a name.