Animal Testing Laboratory - Lodge Moor

[Eldonsmith]

Way back in the early '80s, there used to be some kind of animal testing lab near Lodge Moor Hospital (down a drive off of Blackbrook Rd, possibly Lodge Moor Rd).

 

I was just reading about BIBRA (an old animal testing company) and it reminded me, but I cannot find anything about it. Anyone got any photo's or knowledge? Exact location etc? I seem to remember there used to be vandalism in protest against the nature of the work but the local residents suffered - phone lines cut and cars damaged etc

 

Or did I imagine all this????

[Lostrider]

It was called (I think) Blackbrook (Vivisection) Laboratories. I did some work there during 1969. It had one room completey full of cages with hundreds of white rats. The numbers grew so rapidly they were euthanased on a weekly basis. I dont want to go to any further detail on the forum, but it was situated on the righthand side of the road from Lodge Moor Hospital end of Blackbrook Road. It was part of Sheffield University they had another department in the red brick building in near the arts tower.

[boston]

I had forgot about this place until reading this thread. As said earlier it was an awful place, we were working up there fitting some new gas burners and replacing pipework to the incinerator.

I was an apprentice, and it would be about 1978, and i remember the place really upset me at the time. Both the smell, and sight of the rats in cages was awful. The incinerator was used to burn the bodies after the experiments had been undertaken.

It was off Blackbrook road, and i dont know if the building still survives

[Eldonsmith]

The building has long gone - I think it was somewhere near what is now The Pines estate

Link to Google Maps

 

However, I went to fix things there a number of times, and I recall a longish drive with a car park at the end.

 

Funny I would have thought a lot more people would know of it. I guess there are people who were employed there reading this who choose not to disclose that which is ok, I am just curious.

 

Does anyone have a streetmap from the late '70s??

[me-and-pippo]

The building has long gone - I think it was somewhere near what is now The Pines estate

Link to Google Maps

 

However, I went to fix things there a number of times, and I recall a longish drive with a car park at the end.

 

Funny I would have thought a lot more people would know of it. I guess there are people who were employed there reading this who choose not to disclose that which is ok, I am just curious.

 

Does anyone have a streetmap from the late '70s??

The building is shown on my 1988 A-Z map,

it is marked as 'University of Sheffield (Field Laboratories)'

you are spot on with The Pines estate.

[normanmarina]

Got chased off there no end of times as a boy,used to climb over the fence which was between the grounds and a path which led up to redmires,that would be 69/70ish,nothing was particularly hidden away,not nice though!!Think its now a housing estate,wonder if any are haunted by rats?

[Babooshka]

I remember this as a kid, and recall hush hush conversations about the place. It had a very macabre reputation. I remember joining the anti-vivisection soc in the 80's, and sending lots of hate-vibes Blackbrook Rd way.

[Lostrider]

There were several rooms with lots of different types of animals. Other rooms contained large freezers. There was of course, the operating theatres. It was rumoured that when a dog went missing it ended up at Blackbrook. I certainly witnessed people bringing animals to the back door and "envelopes" being exchanged.

I think it opened in the 1920's.

[Eldonsmith]

The anti-vivsection group used to cut the cables on the telephone poles which fed the houses on Blackbrook Rd, also damage cars of residents just in case they belonged to Lab staff. Thanks me-and-pippo i remember now it was a University dept. Always a bad feel to the place.

[theripsaw]

My friend lived on Blackbrook Road and explored the place after it shut down. He remembers old blood stains all over the old lab tables and floors.

 

I know somebody who lives on the Pines estate (the site of the old facility) who is quite 'spiritual'. When she moved in she said she immediately noticed a strange feeling about the place. Then, at night she would sometimes hear screams wimperings and moans that sounded like 'tortured animals'. This was before I told her what used to stand on the site of her house! She held some kind of exorcism and still lives there... spooky