Morley councillor Terry Grayshon on what makes the market town so special

As a child growing up in Morley, I’d often go into the town centre to help my mother with shopping; it took longer for mother to talk to people she bumped into than it did to actually do the shopping.

Even as a child the Victorian grandeur of Morley Town Hall Stood out, little did I know that my life would become so intertwined with the building.

Opened in 1895 by arguably Morley’s most famous son, Liberal Prime Minister HH Asquith, the Grade I listed building maintains many of its original features and the suite of Civic Rooms on the upper floor are a sight to behold.

Thankfully, they were left undisturbed following Morley’s enforced joining with Leeds in 1974 and are well worth a visit on the next Heritage Open Day.

Often used as a location for filming, Heartbeat, The Royal, Emmerdale and South Riding to name a few have used the town hall to help tell their story of civic importance and use the former court room to administer justice in their storylines.

The Grand Old Lady of Queen Street is, like us all, showing her age these days; but help is at hand as she is to be a recipient of part of the Morley Town Fund. This will see her return to be the central focal point in Morley, serving the community as was intended by those great Victorians who built her all those years go.

One of the benefits of the Morley Town Hall is the clock, complete with Westminster Chime bells, is that it can be seen and heard from a distance, as a child this was useful to know.

Morley has changed a lot since I was a boy, gone are many of the fields and green spaces that existed. We would often go out into the fields in Morley and play most of the day, the Town Hall clock telling us when it was time to return home.

Cotton Mill Fields, leading from Morley to Churwell were often somewhere we would spend time. There was a small beck running along which eventually disappeared into a small tunnel under therailway line, only to reappear and continue its journey.

Some of the fields are still there, where the rhubarb grew is now grazing for horses and the beck has been culverted. I still visit the fields several times a week, but it’s no longer for playing.

Three times a week I run from Morley to my office at the Arlington Business Centre, going across the Cotton Mill Fields and along what is now called the Woodland Walk, at the back of the White Rose shopping centre, which of course didn’t exist when we used to play down there.

Scatcherd Park and the impressive War Memorial is another favourite place to visit. We’re lucky in Morley to have several parks, but this one is nearest the town centre. When I was a kid, the old Borough Council used to have hundreds of coloured lights in the trees at Christmas, alas this doesn’t happen anymore.

Back in a time when the trees were filled with coloured lights at Christmas, the parade of shops opposite Scatcherd Park, heading down to Morley Bottoms were all thriving businesses. Shops like the Sports Centre, Jack Wilcox (Shoes and Cobbler) The Farmhouse (cheese, eggs, bacon, coffee etc) were all busy.

But times change, as do people’s shopping habits; in Morley we are fortunate to have a good mix of shops and, of course, the Market in the town centre.

Morley is faring better than many small town centres and it is nice to still be able to wander down Queen Street and be able to buy a number of things without the need to visit one of the large supermarkets, unless you want to of course.

Queen Street still manages to bring people into Morley with a selection of independent retailers as well as national chain stores and is well worth a visit.

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