Pub Sign Study – The Orwell At Wigan Pier

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Wigan Pier used to be so hard to locate that many people living outside Wigan wondered if Orwell had made it up in his famous study of homelessness, The Road To Wigan Pier. It is a real place, actually a former Leeds & Liverpool Canal barge loading jetty, which is now well sign-posted preserved museum, resembling a long wooden boardwalk. The name was a local joke comparing the extended bridge to nowhere extending over the murky water to a seaside pier though Wigan is inland and the pier was a workplace, not a pleasure walk-way. The original jetty has long since gone (It was named by George Formby’s comedy music hall act father, and Orwell was disappointed never to see it in its original form). The area is now used for flats and a local history museum. Orwell’s connection to the pier area meant the pub on the pier renovated in the 1990’s took his name, but the pub has closed now and the Pier has little worth seeing at present. It is in danger of returning to a state of decay & dilapidation. Arthur Chappell