Clog Shop Chronicles by John Ackworth
John Ackworth was the pen name of the Rev. Frederick R. Smith, a Methodist minister who was born in Snaith, Yorkshire, but spent much of his career as a circuit preacher in Lancashire. Clog Shop Chronicles was the first and most successful of his works. Set in the fictional 19th-century village of Beckside (said to be somewhere between Manchester and Bolton), the book consists of 12 tales of everyday life in a close-knit Methodist community, which continue into Beckside Lights (1897) and Doxy Dent (1899). Based on an entertaining group of characters who gather round the clog shop fire, the stories are sentimental at times, but Ackworth has a nice sense of irony and refrains from Methodist proselytizing. Ackworth was also a student of the Lancashire dialect and the spoken passages in his books are mostly written in a phonetic version of late 19th-century Bolton speech, which I have done my best to reproduce.
Listen on:
Episodes
Tuesday Jan 02, 2024
Monday Jan 01, 2024
Sunday Dec 31, 2023
Saturday Dec 30, 2023
Friday Dec 29, 2023
Thursday Dec 28, 2023
Wednesday Dec 27, 2023
Tuesday Dec 26, 2023
Monday Dec 25, 2023
Sunday Dec 24, 2023