A campaign by local Conservatives to remember an Old Skelmersdale community which was demolished to make way for the New Town has finally been realised.
Council offices at 49 Westgate in the Sandy Lane Centre will now be called "Elson House", after Elson Road, an old town street which was pulled down to make way for the new town shopping centre.
The renaming of the offices came after Conservative councillor David Sudworth presented a Motion to Full Council on behlaf of the Conservative Group proposing that 49 Westgate be renamed in memory of Elson Road. This motion came in the same year Skelmersdale celebrated 50 years as a New Town.
Councillor Adrian Owens, Conservative portfolio holder for Regeneration and Estates said: “It is important to remember Skelmersdale's history especially considering the 50th Anniversary of the new town. Elson House is a quiet reminder of what once stood prior to the developments in the 1960s.”
Cllr David Sudworth said: "I'm thoroughly delighted that, after more than 40 years, the name of Elson Road has been brought back into use again. The face of Skelmersdale changed significantly during the 1960s and 1970s and it is right that we remember the communities which many local people grew up in but were sacrificed for the New Town. I would like to thank fellow councillors, council officers and Skelmersdale Heritage Society Chairman Edward Appleton for supporting my bid to get Elson Road formally remembered."
Skelmersdale was designated a new town in October 1961, and the first families started moving into the first estate in 1964.