MANCHESTALGIA WITH LEWIS THREADGOLD
Give us abit of background, Where you from? Why did you end up moving to Manchester?
I'm originally from Rugeley, a small town in the West Midlands, I moved here about 15 years ago when a load of our mates moved up for Uni, Me and Kendrick moved in with them to just skate, we came here because we already knew people and Manchester is so rad.
Your like an encyclopaedia of skate tricks. you know who's done what on which spot. I like that but do you think it's important to tell people anymore? Do kids coming up care about ABD?
I don't know anymore, i could argue both sides, everyone does tricks differently and the beauty of skateboarding is that you can do what you want. But I think it's definitely important to have some grasp on what has been done before at your local spots. Especially if you are filming or taking photos, nobody wants to see some snotty insta kid do the same trick someone legendary did 20 years ago. People should know the background of their scene and
what went down before them.
I don't think kids do care too much anymore, but they were all born in skateparks and on social media so i see why they don't.
Your said knowledge and enthusiasm has inspired you to basically log Manchester skateboarding through the Insta page @Manchestalgia
How did this come about and when did you start it?
Because I'm a skate geek haha, regularly watching all my old local and UK videos, moving house last year going through all my old skate mags and following @scienceversuslife and @swiftblazer and catching the odd Manchester photo got me thinking it would be sick to have a Greater Manchester based page with all the history in one place. I started it about a year ago around the start of lockdown, whch was the perfect time as everyone was sat around looking at their phones.
I love it and I know it's brought a lot of the older generation out of Retirement or even just hitting you up with pic's and stuff.
I feel like your really using Instagram for a good cause. What makes you want to archive all this stuff especially stuff that's kinda before your time?
I wanted these incredible old photos and video clips not everyone would have seen to be chronicled, to try and inspire the younger generation abit and educate them about the roots of our scene. I'm not necessarily the best person as I'm still learning so much myself, I didn't know a thing about the early 90s apart from the little bits about the town hall and BBC curbs, Goshen and all the vert scene around the area was like discovering another world. Learning more about all this history just makes me want to unearth more gems and offer a glimpse to back then.
Goshen March 18th 1990, Last mini ramp comp day before the Vert was built. Photo by Tim Leighton Boyce from RAD magazine May 1990.
What's been the raddest pic you've been sent or found? Talk us through it.
So many, people have sent their own photos from Bones Brigade tours at Goshen, H-street skating the Law Courts, I was most blown away by a Photo of Natas Kaupas skating the Split skates ramp doing a frontside ollie, it was from a private session, Jesse Martinez is there in the background on the deck of the ramp, he's just launching his ollie, its so sick, thanks to Big Woody for sending that one!
NATAS Frontside Ollie - Split Skates (Just next to Tesco on Church St) 1988, photo by Big Woody.
Ron Allen Law Courts Boardslide H-Street Advert. Sequence by Jo Burlo from Skateboard! Magazine 1989.
Neil Danns - Invert Photo by Tim Leighton
What are some of your oldest posts? is there any particular photo's that you think could be firsts? as in the first person to skate a spot?
I think the oldest posts so far are from a European Vert finals comp at Warrington Empire skate building in 1986, Neil Danns doing an invert and Bod Boyle blasting high shot by Tim Leighton Boyce from RAD magazine. Surely there is a bunch of firsts, most of the gnarly stuff Woody skated in his Sidewalk interview was untouched.One that springs to mind though is Ron Allen Boardsliding a big 10+ stair rail at the Law Courts surrounded by hundreds of kids after a Split skates signing. It was a sequence in a H-Street advert and a quick clip in Hokus Pokus, Only a handful of people were doing big rails and this has to be one of the biggest done back then, definitely in Manchester the biggest at the time!
Bod Boyle - Tim Leighton 1986
Jocke Olsson McTwist at Goshen by Ian Meany Lawton from Skateboard! - 1991
Give us your three personal best Posts so far and why?
Promotional 97- Dan Magee uploaded the whole VHS and sent it over, i've wanted to see this video since moving here and was blown away and hyped watching it, Manchester's answer to Eastern Exposure 3! The whole thing is on the instaTV and Youtube but hardly anyone has watched the full one which is annoying, stop readind this and watch it now, raw street lines in late 90s manchester with all the legends, I've been putting up short clips from it too, slowly going to individually upload each trick and line haha, I can't stress how much you need to see this if you skate here.
Femi Bukunola Frontside Tailslide at the Library by Ian Meany Lawton - This one was a double page spread in Skateboard! in 1991, the intro to a Manchester and Liverpool article and had Merseyside in large text across the top and had loads of text in the corner. I edited out all the text and got it looking like how the original would have, I've done others since but this was the first one that worked well without being able to tell it had been edited really.
John Trenter Farmer, a.k.a Jab, Backside Lipslide BBC curbs by Tim Leighton Boyce
This is probably my all time favourite Manchester photo, it was a double page poster in RAD and it's just so perfect, you can see the motion and how fast he was going, styling it out amazing looking dope in that yellow tee and halfcabs, perfectly encapsulates that Curbs era.
What are the rules to be featured? From what years we talking?
Well i originally said anything upto 2012 and I have broke that recently posting the Kingpin article from 2014, for now no later than 2014 haha. The geographical areas have been pushed too, as long as it is near and aroudn greater manchester it goes! I posted Femi in LA but it is Femi!
Which Photographer do you think has the most pics on the page?
Leo Sharp no doubt, as far back as 95 in RAD and heavily through all the years after. Ian 'Meany' Lawton shot a tonne of the late 80s and early 90s stuff for Skate Action and Skateboard! Loads of Goshen vert and some of the early 90s street with Rik Cooper, Femi, Ste Malloy and countless others.
Give us your top three Femi Pics?
Everything and anything of Femi is golden, he had so much skill and talent,way ahead of his time and could have went all the way to the top. He did everything his own way, a true original, what other 16 year old skate kid ever has chosen to have a poem he wrote instead of a skate photo in his magazine checkout? Femi was on his own path.
First choice would be his RAD cover by Tim Leighton Boyce in 1988, he is only 14 in the pic, little baby faced boardslide, again the visible motion, the way he has thrown his arm across, his clothes and shoes, just a perfect example of the innocence of early street skating.
The previously mentioned Frontside Tailslide on the Library steps by Meany from Skateboard! Skating at night, styling it out looking dope as always skating hi top Ellesse's.
The LA photo i mentioned, Femi Heelflip the fence at the LAX Banks in 1995 by Rick Rosick. This was probably at the height of Femi's reign from his check out in the infamous Black Issue of Big Brother Magazine. Dripping with style looking fresh, a hugely caught heelflip over a legendary LA spot, imagine how good this would have looked if it was filmed! Femi really could have had it all at this point it seems, alongside so many heavy hitters of the time. No matter where Femi went he shined.
Goshen feature's quite heavily, Tell the youngsters (and myself ha) what it was and how important to the vert scene it was.
Goshen Leisure Centre was an integral part of not just the local scene but the whole of the UK scene. After Warrington closed there wasn't a permanent local ramp. Goshen opened in 89 and housed a massive mini ramp 32 foot wide with extensions. They cut this down to 24 foot to make room for the vert ramp a year later in 1990. The ramp was originally meant to be the old NEC ramp from a comp in Birmingham, they had issues installing so built a new one, Dave Arnold, Gooey and the locals. The ramp was known as the best in the country, big, smooth and fast. Hundreds of skaters from all over flocked to Bury and crammed into a leisure centre to witness the UK'S best mini ramp and vert comps and for demos from rockstars of the day like the Bones Brigade. There was barely a month that it wasn't featured in one of the mags durings its day.
Goshen March 18th 1990, Last mini ramp comp day before the Vert was built. Photo by Tim Leighton Boyce from RAD magazine May 1990.
Is there a spot in Manchester that has been featured through all the decades ?
Not too many have survived that long, the longest surviving would be the small banks on oxford road with the rails around them. Back in the 80s it was one of the main hot spots, it featured in skate action in like 88. The New Deal team skated them in the early 90s and it has been heavily rinsed in the years after it got 'skatestopped'.
Talk us through the photo of John Montesi (your first post) Who made you aware of it?
The John Montessi Frontside Noseslide on the bar around the top bank was from a New Deal tour in 1991, Kevin Banks shot it, a few of the team Montessi, Armando Barajas and Danny Sargent were over here and ended up skating street with locals,the BBC Curbs, The Uni Stairs and the banks. I came across it on Kev Banks instagram, he shot loads of the northwest stuff back then, loads of Rowley's early stuff and tonnes of Goshen.
Thankyou to all the photographers and filmers who have documented the scene over the years and everyone who has skated and played their part in shaping the scene. Everyone who has got in touch and sent photos or footage from the golden eras. Peace!
1 comment
What a find – great article….I remember Natas on the mini above split, I had my Jeff grosso signed. Loved Saturdays skating the law courts/Oxford road to name a few.
Finished my days breaking my wrist at Goshen sport centre, took up XC mtbing. One of our skating pals went on to a career in snowboarding – ‘Steve Bailey’
I still watch YouTube on today’s skaters, my Mrs thinks I’m nuts….49 next month.
Cheers for the memories, great times.
Steve
Steve
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