LOOKING Back was stumped when local history buff Mr J A Marsden asked if it could show him a picture of the old Yates's Wine Lodge that was in Lord Street until it and other buildings in the same block were demolished in 1977 to make way for the third phase of Blackburn's shopping precinct.

Memories of the singular supping spot still abound - of its bare wooden floors, whirling ceiling fans, ranch-type rails at the bar, drinks measured in 'docks' and 'samples' and bevies of elderly-women customers who, some knitting as they nattered, gave the place its nicknames of the Dressmakers' Arms and the Widows' Clinic.

But photographs of the Wine Lodge, it seems, are much rarer than the recollections - as old pubs and inns expert Mr Marsden, of Scarborough Road, has found, having drawn a blank not only here, but also in books on bygone Blackburn, at the local studies collections at the town's public library and at the Museum.

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