Can Anybody Ever Remember The Smog In Sheffield?

[bazjea 10]

In my sixties now......

Born and lived in Hillsborough through the fifties, sixties, and the seventies.

Strange....I have no recollection of smog despite living close to hill foot steel, Daniel Doncasters, and the Neepsend power station.

 

 

Have a look at " Picture Sheffield " if you think there was no pollution in the

50s There is one of Owlerton Livesey St area taken in1958

 

http://www.picturesheffield.com/

Search Picture t06740

Edited July 11, 2014 by bazjea

[Daven 10]

Mum used to tell us that when you blew your nose the snot was black !

God only knows what it did to every ones lungs. I guess that's why COPD is so common amongst the elderly - that and smoking of course !

[Allen 38]

Have a look at " Picture Sheffield " if you think there was no pollution in the

50s There is one of Owlerton Livesey St area taken in1958

 

http://www.picturesheffield.com/

Search Picture t06740

Thanks for that. I've just taken a look.

I'm not disputing there was pollution. Smoke from the factories I do remember.

I don't, however, remember "smog" as described by some people on here.

My memories of that era were long hot summers, playing outdoors all day either on the hills behind Liversey street above wardsend cemetry, or up Rivelin valley.

[susie1 10]

I was born in 1948 and grew up at Hillsborough/Malin Bridge. When I was little, whenever there was smog, before we went outside, my mum used to make me put one of dad's folded-up (clean!) hankies over my mouth and nose and then she used to secure it in place with a woolly scarf tied at the back of my head. I hated it! She usually caught my hair in the knotted scarf - ow! - and I could hardly breathe and it made me very hot and sweaty. When I was a bit older and able to resist this torture, I remember going out in smog without aforesaid "protection" and it was vile. As other posts say, the smog tasted very sulphurous and, if you had a cold/cough, you would be tasting this horrible sulphur for ages afterwards, every time you coughed or blew your nose.

A few years ago, I visited Konya in Turkey, a city with extremely high levels of pollution. The smog there could been seen hanging in the air and the taste of it was very unpleasantly nostalgic of Sheffield smogs in the 50s.

Although we no longer have smogs here, I do wonder if the air pollution near busy roads eg the Parkway is just as harmful.

Edited July 13, 2014 by susie1

[Allen 38]

I find that incredible Susie1 ......

As said in my last post above I have no recollection of such smog.

You are just two years older than me. We lived within half a mile of each other, yet our recollections are miles apart.

My only protection against the weather was a pair of shorts in those long hot school holidays.

[old tup 30]

I suffer from bronchitis in various degrees that I blame on living beside Neepsend Power Station in my childhood,we resided in a cottage at the bottom of Liversey Street on their land!.They used to discharge thick yellow sulphurous clouds at regular periods,it was totally enveloping when it drifted low down,it made your eyes sore and runny,you choked on the foul smelling fumes there was no escape!.Eventualy they were forced to build a very high chimney with a filter system that cured it,but in my case the damage was done!.I could be wrong but I blame them for my condition they wouldn,t get away with it nowadays no way!.

[pigeon 11]

I suffer from bronchitis in various degrees that I blame on living beside Neepsend Power Station in my childhood,we resided in a cottage at the bottom of Liversey Street on their land!.They used to discharge thick yellow sulphurous clouds at regular periods,it was totally enveloping when it drifted low down,it made your eyes sore and runny,you choked on the foul smelling fumes there was no escape!.Eventualy they were forced to build a very high chimney with a filter system that cured it,but in my case the damage was done!.I could be wrong but I blame them for my condition they wouldn,t get away with it nowadays no way!.

 

I lived at Grimesthorpe similar atmosphere from steel works but then everyone smoked and drank so its 6 o 1 and half dozen of other !

[Kidorry 189]

I think a few on here are getting smog mixed up with fog.I lived in the wicker most of my life,during the 40s to 70s, and I can never remember smog as bad as described on here.Fog yes.

[Bald Eagle 12]

I worked at Orgreave coke ovens as a chemist around 1975. It was the pits! Surrounded by carcinogens, laboratories on fire from all the flammable fumes etc. One evening even the water lagoon caught fire! Chap came to test our water outfall into the river and burnt his hands with the chemicals in it. Later when I worked at Blackburn Meadows Power Station I remember walking in smog and my eyes burning with the acidity of it.

[chrishall 10]

In 1947 when I was six weeks old I was diagnosed with Pinks disease as were many of the same age at that time. This disease is caused by mercury poisoning, teething powders were blamed as they contained mercury then. The thing is my mum swore blind I never had them so I do sometimes wonder if it was airborne mercury via smog that was the culprit, a cover up by the authorities perhaps?

[Asaw 10]

Use to cstch the bus from the bottom of Portland street. It was murder ttying to identify the 88 Roscoe Bank in the smog less than 50 yds away

[raymondo1952 11]

Once went too the pictures down Mansfield Road,clear as a bell when we went in, When we came out you could not see your hand in front of your face frightening to drive in hope the smog never returns