The Skeleton
Work has now begun on the creation of the Workers Memorial. The steel skeleton, pictured, will be clad in tools to create figures of a man and child. The trustees have collected tools from the area and sent them to the sculptor at Dorset Forge to build the memorial. This is to give the statue a sense of local history and heritage. Some of the tools are well over 70 years old.
The statue will be located at the side of Steve Prescott Bridge in Vera Page Park, the site kindly donated by St Helens council
Many thanks to the donors and patrons for their most generous support. An special thanks goes to Unite the Union St Helens Central for their very generous donation which made all this possible
We are planning to unveil the Memorial on Sunday 28th April, which is International Workers Memorial Day and is celebrated, as it’s name suggests, globally
For the Eagle eyed & safety conscious, Richard, a trustee of the charity, already spotted the barrel of thinners under the bench and has been in contact with the sculptor to warn him of the potential danger, only to be told “it’s what we keep water in”. Not an ideal situation, but that’s sculptors for you
I send out many letters asking for support. This was without doubt the most unusual one I had done so far.
I wrote to Network Rail asking could they donate some sleepers and a few lengths of rail to form part of the plinth to our memorial.
I received a nice surprise when Shelly Quinton Hulme the Principal Project Manager for Network Rail got back to me and said they would be glad to help
The sleepers are of some significance, the location of the statue was at one time, many years ago railway sidings, thus adding more heritage to the memorial
So a big thank you goes out to Shelly and Network Rail for making this happen
The sleepers have arrived and work begins
Meanwhile at Dorset Forge things are taking shape
The statue is made up of recycled materials. The tools where collected from this area, some of the the tools have been passed from father to to son and some from tradesman to apprentice
Thursday 18th April
We still don’t have a statue
A spade hasn’t broken the ground
We plan to unveil the monument on Sunday 28th April
Next week will be a very busy week.
Keep watching
It’s going to the wire
Tuesday 23rd April
The statue has arrived from the workshop in Dorset. Delivered by the artist himself.
We have broken ground.
All’s well!!!! Up to now
Wed 24th April
A good day. Statue on site and safely unloaded
Pouring the concrete
The next stage is laying cobbles or setts to be precise
A good days work
3 days to go
Thursday 25th April
The cobbles stand in neat rows 
2 days to go
Friday 26th April
Pointing the cobbles and clearing the site
One thing we never planned for ” Storm Hannah” This has put the kibosh on things.
So as they say at Lords, Rain stopped play.
To be continued:-
The memorial was unveiled on Sunday 28th April 2019, by the Lord Mayor of St Helens Councillor Pat Ireland although not fully completed the ceremony was attended by a large gathering of about 100 people
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