Sheffield myths

[Doctor Drew]

There used to be a rumour about a nuclear bunker underneath the "egg box" town hall building. I worked on both the demolition of this and also the building of the St Pauls hotel and can catagorically state that no such bunker existed. There is a natural spring rising at a point under the winter gardens though.

[BasilRathbon]

There used to be a rumour about a nuclear bunker underneath the "egg box" town hall building. I worked on both the demolition of this and also the building of the St Pauls hotel and can catagorically state that no such bunker existed.

 

You didn't go down far enough then. The bunker is actually over a mile underground and is also linked by a secret passageway to both the basement of the Central Library and the beer cellar of the Queens Head pub at the bus station. This was because anyone trying to survive a nuclear war might have to stay in the bunker for months and it was felt they'd need both something to read and plenty of booze to get them through the ordeal.

 

 

 

Hope that helps!

[al_partridge]

Although most of their younger fans deny it, any fan over 60 will tell you that their original nickname was actually 'The Pigs'. The following is an extract from the 'Sheffield Sport' archives of the Sheffield Local History Society, which can be viewed by anyone at the Central Library.

 

"The Wednesday" sports club was formed on 4th September 1867. The club was founded as a "Gentleman's Cricket Society." The football club was not founded until 13 years later, and first played its games at Bramall Lane and the Olive Grove Sports Ground in Heeley before moving to a new stadium in the Owlerton district of Sheffield. The club was also sometimes referred to “The Cutlers”.

 

The first Ordnance Survey maps (1850's) mark a building close to where the stadium now stands as 'Swine Cottage'. They also show another farm on Penistone Road, south of where the North Stand is situated, which was also believed to be a medium-sized piggery. Pork farming is thought to have been practised in the area since the early 1800's, and did not cease until around 1900 when the city's rapid expansion put an end to urban livestock production. At its height the "Owlerton Piggery," as it was known, provided work for some 50 employees.

 

Initial discussions about a nickname began soon after the Wednesday arrived at Owlerton. In reference to their new home, most club officials were in favour of "The Owls." However, another suggestion was also popular. In view of the area's strong tradition of pork farming, a popular grass-roots alternative was "The Pigs."

 

Although the name "Owls" prevailed, many working class supporters continued to refer to their team as "t'pigs." A popular song of the time "They may be t'Owls to some, (but they'll always be pigs to me)" was performed in music halls across South Yorkshire. As late as the 1920's, fans used to welcome their team onto the field with the characteristic grunting sound we still associate with the club. This peculiarity was once referred to by BBC commentator Edward Milburn, who famously described Hillsborough as a "sea of grunts”.

 

What's even more embarrassing than the fact that a blade sat and wrote that rubbish whilst littering it with even the most basic of inaccuracies is that so many blades constantly bring it up and try to present it as "fact".

 

Doesn't matter how many times you regurgitate a load of fiction, it doesn't make it true. I note that some of the more glaring errors have been removed in this version, but plenty remain.

[Annoni_mouse]

The statue atop the town hall is often eroniously described as being the Roman God Vulcan.

 

Infact the statue was re carved in the early 80's in the image of Sheffield luminary Marti Cain.

 

The more you know...

[Womerry2]

* The University Architecture department is up at the top of the Arts Tower to make them suffer for having designed the thing.

 

That is a fact! (My father says so, and he was there when they allocated the floors.)

[CashBack13]

I love myths, does anyone have any myths on/about sheffield???

 

That it is a "Friendly" City!

[CashBack13]

Thats becasue you incude stockport, bury, alti and the sourrounding towns.

 

Which are towns in their own right and existed before the urban sprwal created

 

the area known as "Greater Manchester"

 

Sheffield is actually bigger than manchester.

 

Manchester itself!, (That's all the bits inside the ring of the M60 for those who get confused!) isn't a great deal bigger than Sheffield but the Town Centre is, and it feels a lot bigger because there's more building work and much higher skyscrapers than Sheffield. Plus there's a lot more there than Sheffield Centre!

[CashBack13]

Wednesday are a sleeping giant.

 

I can live with the sleeping bit; does that make it half a myth?

 

Sleeping giant means that we were a top team/a regular in the top league once upon a time and we've got a reasonably big stadium! See Also: Forest,Leeds,Derby etc

[the snowman]

Yeah, started by one of them to take the heat off their bacon resembling red and white stripes!

I once read about a fellow nicknamed 'spring heeled Jack' who was supposed to jump out and scare people on their travels around the Norfolk park area. I can't remember the exact date but I think it was in Victorian times when imaginations ran a bit wild.

 

"when imaginations ran a bit wild"

 

God imagine the posts if SF was around then lol

[nick2]

Infact the statue was re carved in the early 80's in the image of Sheffield luminary Marti Cain.

 

Did Marti Cain have a willy then ?

 

You learn something new every day.