Hope you've all had a great Christmas and New Year, all the best for 2010.

As I've not updated for a while it's time to let you know what's going on at ww. Another re-write is underway, a screenshot (yeah, I know it's small but it's a teaser) can be seen with this post. Good old wiganworld colours are making a return with oodles of info and content on each page.

Lots of new features are planned like PM's (private messages), photo uploads to any section including new photos.

The 'old gallery' will disappear and will be merged with the album - it will simply be called 'Old Wigan'.

Other features include 'watch this photo' and 'view recent comments' etc etc...

I'm not going the whole hog and writing a new facebook... Having said that, if anyone has any suggestions or ideas for the new site, please leave a comment. It could become part of the new site.

Thanks to everyone that has emailed photos over the last few weeks. It's appreciated, there have been some crackers in the Photo-a-Day section.

Finally, the wiganworld streets section has seen many more photos uploaded. Thanks to Rev. David Long and Mick Byrne for lots of pics, and thanks to everyone else that have contributed. As I type this we have over 6,700 street photos and are over 82% complete! I'll be out with my camera when the weather picks up.

Once again, all the best for 2010.

If you have any comment, suggestion or idea please do leave a comment or email me.

Thanks.

Westwood and Howe Bridge cemetery indexes have just been improved.

As with the changes made to Wigan Cemetery Index on 20th October, I've added the same new feature to the other indexes that allow you to click a plot number and this will link to a new page which shows who else is buried in the same plot.

Westwood Cemetery Index.

Howe Bridge Cemetery Index.

Two books of great interest to local historians have been published, with particular emphasis on the Winstanley and Highfield areas.

The first, Founded on Coal, is a whopping 5MB PDF document containing over 90 pages of local history with photos.

The second book, a Further History of Winstanley and Highfield is another PDF document with over 200 pages of interesting reading.

The books were penned by Ray and Derek Winstanley. Sadly, Ray passed away - wiganworld is grateful for Derek's contributions of the books for us all to enjoy. Thanks Derek.

I can't believe the photo-a-day section has been going for over 3 years. Every photo published gets viewed by over 400 people on the first day.

Every now and again I get emails asking how to contribute. If you have taken a good'un, please send it in. Simply email the photo (the bigger the better) to brian@wiganworld.co.uk along with a title, brief description, make/model of camera and your name. I'll do the rest, thank you.

If anyone has received an email from me that is spam, I can assure you that it's not from me. Some bugger is spoofing me!

I have amended the DNS to include SPF (sorry about the jargon, its basically a method to prove that I am the legitimate sender of legitimate email) so any future spam emails should be detected as spam and deleted / junked.

I've added more local links including a useful link for any parent in and around Wigan. It is a Where to Go guide containing lists of events in and around Wigan for kids as well as things to do.

I'm aware that I haven't updated the blog for a while but work is still ongoing with other sections.

To come... more work on the cemetery indexes and more books.

Freda Chorlton has been working her magic again and I've added some more code to the Wigan Cemetery Index to bring 2 major new updates.

1. Due to Freda's hard work and determination, ALL records have a plot number. All 117,918 of them!

2. I've added a new feature that allows you to click a plot number and this will link to a new page which shows who else is buried in the same plot. Should be a useful tool for anyone doing their family research.

To see the new indexes in action:-

Take the image to the right, for example, search for Chipperfield and the plot number along with other details are displayed.

Click the plot number and the Cornish names and another name are displayed.

Just a few points to note:-

Information is provided in good faith based from records transcribed.

If lots of unexpected names appear, you could be viewing a public grave. An asterisk (*) usually indicates a public grave.

Thanks Freda.

View the new Wigan Cemetery (Lower Ince) Records Index.

Ex colliers and miners from the Wigan and St Helens area were invited to attend a special ceremony to see the unveiling of a permanent memorial to their late colleagues and predecessors.

The unveiling took place on the 10th of September and Tony Haslam has kindly submitted some photographs and a brief write-up of the event.

View the unveiling ceremony photos.

I've added a few more links of local interest.

Now for the books, some are brand new, others I've known about for a while but have only just got round to mentioning them.

344-A story of the Pretoria Pit Disaster
This is Andrea Jane Finney's book about the 1910 disaster, the third largest mining disaster in British history where 344 men and boys lost their lives. Will be of great interest to locals into mining and local history.

Mild & Bitter Were The Days
As author Ken explains... It was Wigan 1970 and football violence was beginning to dominate U.K. football, even non-league Wigan Athletic FC had 'boot boys' in their ranks. A love for Wigan's lowly football team, combined with bafflement by the fairer sex, leads Ken to assert at the time that "Life Wur pot".

Fred Dibnah - A Tribute
Following Fred's untimely death, Keith Langston embarked upon the creation of a book, drawing not only on his experiences with the Bolton born steeplejack and TV presenter, but in addition talking to a representative cross section of those persons who numbered themselves amongst Fred's many Friends. With over 300 unique colour photographs, this book is a must have for all Fred Dibnah fans.

And back to more links...

Jim Farrell has taken some wonderful photos around town. A peek inside Wigan Parish Church is a slideshow with captions and interesting info. Also, the town centre has been photographed extensively and can be viewed by photo or again, as a slideshow.

The last few weeks have been hectic. Many discussions, meet-ups and email correspondence later and the "Save Wigan" website is ready.

Please take a look. More content will be added on a regular basis. We also plan on having a section on the town's history that will be of interest to a wider audience.

If you are passionate about Wigan and are keen to keep what little we have left, please join us.

www.savewigan.co.uk

(PS. more updates on wiganworld soon)

Firstly, a new magbook has been published titled "Fred Dibnah: The Early Days", it's a cracking read with lots of unseen photos and information about his early career as a steeplejack.

There is also a free CD with the magbook of his last tour with tales including The Early Days, Canvey Island Disaster, Car Spotting and Donald at the Bottom...

More info here.

Secondly, I have created a "vanity domain" which contains a list of 101 things to do in 1,001 days!

Inspired by the Day Zero Project, you can find my 101 in 1,001 here:

Brian's 101 things to do in 1,001 days.

Basically, its a list of 101 things to do in 1,001 days (just over 2 and a half years). Some tasks are easy, some are difficult!

More soon...