WHILE many people are not catching a train during lockdown in 2020, life on a now closed Bradford railway from the 1970s has been recalled by a photographer who worked there.
Before Ian Beesley (pictured below) started his life as a photographer, he worked on Esholt Sewage Works Railway as a plate layer after leaving school in 1972.
Esholt Sewage Works Railway was a standard gauge works railway constructed in 1910 to serve a sewage works in Esholt.
The works were built to remove wool-grease and other wastes from effluent coming out of the many mills of the Bradford woollen district.
At its peak, the railway extended to 22 miles of track served by 11 locomotives, as well as a shorter section of narrow gauge railway served by three engines.
Trains were employed to remove solid waste from the site; several of the engines were converted to run on oil derived from recovered wool-grease.
The railway was closed completely in 1977, but the sewage works still continues to operate.
Bob Rowell after receiving his redundancy letter from Esholt Sewage Works Railway
Elizabeth pulling 'sets' from the press house
Eric Denny in the press shed taking care of Elizabeth
Mr Beesley's collection of black and white images chronicle what life was like for some of the sewage works employees in the 1970s when he worked alongside them and when he paid regular returns to the site.
After brief spells of employment at a mill and failing to land a job at Undercliffe cemetery as an apprentice gravedigger, Mr Beesley moved to Esholt sewage where he takes up the story.
He said: "I started in the gardens. At the side of Esholt Hall, which was the offices for the works, was a fantastic walled garden, where the council grew all the flowers for the civic receptions.
"It also grew fruit and veg, which would be sold to the workers on a Friday afternoon.
"As I was so thin, I was transferred to the boiler cleaning gang and spent a very hot summer climbing in and out of Lancashire boilers.
"Then I joined the railway gang as a plate layer, repairing the track, until I was promoted to engine driving assistant on Elizabeth, one of the last working steam engines in the North and which is now in Leeds Industrial Museum.
"I left in 1973 to go to Bradford Art College, but went back regular to photograph my colleagues.
"Most of the works were modernised in the late 1970s and I was commissioned by Yorkshire Water to document the changes.
"Last year I was appointed artist in residence by YWA to revisit the works and document the major development they are undertaking at the site presently."
The last day of production at Esholt Sewage Works Railway
Gilbert in the sheep dye workshop
Bob Rowell, front, and Geordie Bill, who both worked as platelayers at Esholt
Some of the press men at Esholt Sewage Works Railway
Who is Ian Beesley?
He was born in Bradford in 1954 and after leaving school in 1972 worked in a mill, a foundry before going to work at Esholt Sewage works, where he was part of the railway gang.
Encouraged by his workmates to go to college and find a career, he took up photography and eventually was accepted to study at Bradford Art College, after which he went to Bournemouth & Poole College of Art.
On graduating he was awarded a Kodak Scholarship for Social Documentation and started to document the demise of industry particularly in Bradford and West Yorkshire.
His work is held in the collections of Bradford City Art galleries and museums, the National Media Museum, the Imperial War Museum, the Royal Photographic Society, the V & A London, the National Coal Mining Museum for England and The Smithsonian Museum Washington USA. He has published 40 books.
In 2012 he was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society and in 2019 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Bradford for his outstanding contribution to the art and culture and the social and economic development of the city of Bradford.
He is currently artist in residence for the Bradford Institute for Health Research, Gallery Oldham and Yorkshire Water.
The press house at Esholt Sewage Works Railway
Washing overalls, left, and powder mill worker Harry Hargreaves
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