Tinker's Monument, Pike Lowe, Fulstone

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Details

  • also known as: Tinker's Tower, Tinker's Folly, Tinker's Hobby
  • location: off Dick Edge Lane, Pike Lowe, Fulstone
  • status: no longer exists
  • category: tower and farmhouse

Tinker's Monument was a 40 foot tower, built circa 1851[1] by Ebenezer Tinker of Shepley Carr to serve as an astronomical observatory.[2] The tower was equipped with telescopes manufactured by George Creaser of Meltham, including a "power reflecting telescope" with a diameter of six inches. Adjoining the tower was a farmhouse, although it is uncertain if both were built at the same time.

The tower collapsed during strong winds on 21 January 1949, wrecking the adjoining farmhouse. Retired gamekeeper Nathaniel Whiteley was "struck on the head by a falling beam and temporarily trapped" however "he managed to struggle free and was little the worse".[3]

The then owner of the land, Major Brian Tinker of Meal Hill, had hoped to rebuild the tower but a public subscription had only managed to raise one third of the estimated £3,000 cost by May 1949.[4]

The site is currently private property and only the base of the ruined tower now remains. The area continues to be known locally as Tinker's Monument and is a popular cycling route due to the steep road gradients.

Gallery

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Further Reading

Location

Notes and References

  1. ↑ The tower is not marked on the first O.S. maps surveyed in the late 1840s and was described as being newly built in 1853, see "Pleasure Excursion to Pike Law" in Huddersfield Chronicle (09/Jul/1853).
  2. ↑ Some newspaper articles incorrectly refer to it being a war memorial "of some kind" or a huntsman's tower.
  3. ↑ "40-ft Tower Falls on Farm" in Yorkshire Evening Post (21/Jan/1949) and "Tower Falls on House" in Birmingham Daily Gazette (22/Jan/1949).
  4. ↑ "Damaged Monument" in Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer (02/Mar/1949) and "Tinker's Monument" in Yorkshire Evening Post (06/May/1949).