Ping: Colin J - Is there something you're not telling us?

[Beebo]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16962898

What's going on in Hebden Bridge?

 

[Night Train]

What's going on in Hebden Bridge?

Nothing unusual is going on.
It seems a nice sensible place to me, I have spent much time there and not really noticed anything overtly 'in yer face'. People are pleasent, shops are interesting and a bit arty crafty and there are a few nice cafes.

 

[Globalti]

I like HB as well though Mrs Gti doesn't but I think that's more because it's a bit bourgeois and arty-farty. I once took a Ghanaian visitor there for tea and when I mentioned the town's reputation, he walked around with his neck swivelling and his eyes on stalks. Africa being almost militantly heterosexual, it must have upset him because he kept muttering: "Why? Why?"

Colin has a very interesting explanation of Hebden Bridge's recent social history and I'm sure he will be along soon to tell you about it.

 

[Crackle]

I had friends who lived there years ago, so I was a relatively frequent visitor. It had the same reputation then but I can't say I ever noticed as a visitor, it's a nice place, quirky but nice and every way out is up!

 

[BigonaBianchi]

I think its a shame that lesbian/gay couples feel the need to live in 'ghettos' for want of a better word. It's indicates to me that predjudice is still the 'norm' here and as such saftey in numbers is still the rule of the day..shame. I guess thats the case with most 'minority groups'. One of the main things I dislike about human nature (on the whole) is it's preference to target anybody that is in anyway different to the herd.

 

[ColinJ]

It's not exactly a secret!

Hebden Bridge hardly existed in the middle of the 19th century, but then came industrialisation. The Calder Valley had plenty of water available so mills sprang up everywhere, and towns for the workers. My little terraced house was built about that time. I moved in when it was 100 years old, at the end of the 1980s. So, for a time there was a lot of money about and all was fine.

Eventually, however, the global economy changed and textile jobs went to Asia. Mills started closing and the town began a long slow death. Young people couldn't find work and cleared off to more exciting places like Manchester and Leeds, maybe even London. House prices dropped. Properties were left empty and started to decay. Few people wanted to be here, despite the fact that it is a very pretty little town.

Then, something interesting happened... Groups of disgruntled hippies, artists and musicians from the big Northern cities found out about the place and how cheap it had become to buy property here. You could buy a house on a hilltop for less than £1,000 then They started coming here in increasing numbers in the late 60s and early 70s. The word got around and the town started to come back to life. It became a very trendy northern town. More Joss Sticks and Tarot Readings per hectare than almost anywhere else in the UK!

The changes to the local population gave it a nice 'feel'. There was an air of openness and tolerance. Obviously, there were gay and lesbian residents here at the time just as in any population. The thing is, it became a much gentler place to be 'out'. When gay/lesbian friends visited those living here, they noticed how much easier it was for them walking about holding hands, and so forth. So, following on the heels of the arty/hippy influx of 40 years ago, there was a later lesbian influx. I get the impression that it didn't quite happen to the same extent for gay men though for some reason. I could be wrong, but you see a lot of lesbian couples wandering about the town but I can't recall seeing many men walking about holding hands.

We've got a new invasion now - yuppies! The town is completely rejuvenated and house prices have rocketed. My house cost me £25k but is worth about £125k now. Once again young people are being forced out of the town. These are the children and grandchildren of those artists and hippies. So the town is going up-market and I think that it is a shame. From a cycling point of view it isn't good at all because of lot of the yuppies have jobs in Manchester and Leeds. There is only one road through the valley - the A646 - and that gets very busy for long periods during the day.

It is very interesting how these population changes develop. It seems that there are Tipping Points at work. Enough mills = prosperity. Shut down mills = deprivation. Cheap housing and pretty surroundings = a new type of town dweller. New type of town dweller = more hospitable to lesbians. More lesbians = even more lesbians. Popular town = rising house prices. Rising house prices = more desirable properties. Expensive properties = young people move out.

My niece and her partner have decided to have their wedding here in the summer (strictly - registration of civil partnership) because they feel accepted in the town.

 

[dellzeqq]

Hebden Bridge has had a lesbian community for ten years, and if Sophie Robhemend had been watching the BBC's own Clare Balding and her Dawes Super Galaxy dropping on the Bridge when she did her BBC4 Bike Round Britain programme she'd have known that. (Some of you will recall the fetid gnome A A Gill going on about it.)

Brighton has a huge gay population, but, relative to its size, I reckon the seafront and old town of Deal in Kent has the greatest concentration of gays and lesbians anywhere in the country.

 

[dan_bo]

Some excellent hills round there too. I could handle living there if it wasn't so bloody far from work.

 

[ColinJ]

Hebden Bridge has had a lesbian community for ten years

A lot longer than that dz - I used to go for a drink with a colleague once a week in one HB pub over 20 years ago and a group of lesbians always used to be sitting round a couple of tables pushed together in the corner of one room.

My colleague would go in there straight from work (pun not intended! ), whereas I'd go home and have a meal first and join him at about 9 pm. I arrived on one such evening and found that he was rather the worse for wear and not sitting at our usual table which was not far from the women's corner.

I asked why he'd moved and he explained that he'd nearly been lynched by the women a few minutes before so the landlord had told him to move. OMG - what on Earth had he done ...? Turned out that he'd wandered over to the women and told them that they ought to reconsider their sexual orientation because he was now available and they were all missing out - how bloody un-PC could one man get!

He'd managed to spoil the atmosphere of the whole pub, so I thought it was better to get him out of there. (I apologised to the women on his behalf, and told them that I'd have some strong words with him once he'd sobered up ...)

 

[Night Train]

Turned out that he'd wandered over to the women and told them that they ought to reconsider their sexual orientation because he was now available and they were all missing out - how bloody un-PC could one man get!

Never mind PC, that is just rude regardless of gender preference.

 

[ColinJ]

Never mind PC, that is just rude regardless of gender preference.

True, actually. If they had all been straight women it would still have been pretty awful, drunken, loutish behaviour. He went on to impress me further by throwing up on the way to the next pub. I had one pint and went home ...

 

[Beebo]

True, actually. If they had all been straight women it would still have been pretty awful, drunken, loutish behaviour. He went on to impress me further by throwing up on the way to the next pub. I had one pint and went home ...

There aren't many things worse than meeting up with mates who are drunk when you're sober.

 

[ColinJ]

There aren't many things worse than meeting up with mates who are drunk when you're sober.

Indeed! In my early 20s, I bet my mates that I could spend a month going to the pub with them and only drinking non-alcoholic drinks. I managed it, but it was awfully tedious! I came to the conclusion that I'd have to change mates or start drinking again and I think I made the wrong choice!

I spent another 5 years going to the pub most nights before it finally became too much for me, at which point I jacked it all in and went to university. I had a few drinks the first week there, but then decided to get serious and stopped drinking for my entire time at university, apart from on visits home.

 

[Globalti]

More embarrassing when somebody pisses off the regulars in your local. Part of the appeal of a local is the sense of belonging and you don't want to be receiving hostile vibes from other drinkers.

 

[DiddlyDodds]

As a bloke that has not made it in to the 21st PC century just yet , just the word "Lesbian" awakens all sorts of imagination athletics, the thought of a town full off Sam Fox types with long flowing blonde hair and amazing attributes is enough to want to sell up and move there this very moment.
Sadly life is not like that and so i will stay put as i have no chance of affording a house in Hebden until it is not popular anymore