25 YEARS AGO

CLERGY have told their parishioners: 'We won't be unpaid caretakers or museum keepers.' They have warned the congregation at St Augustine's, Tonge Moor, that if they don't do the cleaning at the church, then no-one else will.

The church recently had to declare the £12-a-week full-time caretaker redundant because of rising costs, and since then parishioners have been told it's their job to do the cleaning. The vicar, Father Donald Hadley, said today that part-time volunteers had come forward. 'We, the clergy, have our own work to do, and are just not able to look after the church as well,' he said.

50 YEARS AGO

ABE Greenhalgh, Olympic Games weight-lifter of the Bolton United Harriers and Athletic Club, one of the most remarkable athletes to arise in these parts, has fallen on luckless days.

He is in hospital with spinal trouble and lost the use of his legs. Two years ago Abe, a Boltonian living in Farnworth, finished 13th in the bantham weight class of the games.

The full story of Abe's achievement, however, is not that he performed magnificently among the world's greatest weight-lifters. As a child he broke his spine in a fall downstairs, and was more or less a wheel-chair invalid to the age of 14. To triumph over such a handicap and become an athlete of any kind was a minor wonder, but to win fame as a weight lifter was a miracle. On November 4, a physical culture display is to be staged for the benefit of his dependants (he has two children under the age of four).

125 YEARS AGO

From the Evening News, October 25, 1875

AN inquest was held on Wednesday, at the Town Hall, before Mr J. Taylor, borough coroner, on the body of Ann Buck, 55 years of age, charwoman, employed at the Victoria Hotel, who died on Tuesday afternoon through taking a dose of carbolic acid.

James Hope Ogden said he resided at the Victoria Hotel. Deceased came to the hotel about noon on Tuesday to assist the servants as a charwoman. She appeared then to be sober and fit for work, appearing in her usual health. He could tell by the smell of carbolic acid that the bottle containing it had been meddled with. The liquid had been obtained to destroy cockroaches, and deceased knew it was kept for that purpose. He saw the deceased about half past two o'clock, and found her very sick. He called for a doctor.

On Wednesday morning he found a half-pint tumbler in the cellar, which appeared to have contained carbolic acid. The bottle containing the acid was uncorked, and he had left it closed up. The Coroner said it was suggested that the deceased had a habit of 'slancing', and she thought she was drinking from a bottle containing gin or some other spirit; but it was for the jury to say whether that was their opinion, or that deceased had committed suicide. He did not think she had committed suicide. - A verdict of 'Death by misadventure from drinking carbolic acid' was returned.