Karen Allerton arts
The young people went out and about in Brinnington talking to local residents and capturing their stories and memories of working in the area, focusing on Needhams Foundry in particular.
Quotes from the conversations were built into the designs for the manhole covers created by the young people and in workshops with St Bernadettes Primary School Brinnington and an open session at Reddish Vale Community Centre.
The stunning casts that have been created are laid on the path that now runs along the former Stockport to Bredbury Railway Line, know locally as the Deadline, which starts at the entrance to Reddish Vale, next to the Portwood Roundabout.
FINISHED PATTERNS
They made grids and quite a few different moulds, did their own smelting and all that.
All the sewer covers in peoples gardens and yards say Needhams Foundry Stockport 1946
I worked at Needhams when I was 17 for 3 and a half, then I went into the army for National Service.
The pattern is the form and the shape of the cast. A cast can be no better than the pattern from which it has been made.
I was in the machine shop a Radial Arm Driller, making holes and screws to go into big projects.
Smelting heats the metal to over 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit when the impurities in the metal float to the surface and can be removed.
The sand casting process involves the use of a furnace, molten metal and a sand mould.
The pattern is pressed into the sand which forms the mould for the pattern.
My dad works at Needhams, worked there for years. Sometimes when theres a coal fire and you get that warm feeling, it smells like it smelt down at Needhams.
It was incredible how many people knew of Needhams and how many had seen their manhole covers when they were abroad, they have been spotted in India, Spain and America as well as all over Great Britain.
"I worked at Needhams when I was 17 for 3 and a half years, then I went into the army for National Service."
"I was in the machine shop, a Radial Arm Driller, making holes and screws to go into big projects. It was one of those things that you could just set up and leave it to do its own depth and everything."
"My dad worked at Needhams, worked there for years. Sometimes when there's a coal fire and you get that warm feeling, it smells like it smelt down at Needhams."
"All the sewer covers in peoples gardens and yards round here, take mine for example say Needhams
Foundry 1946."