Station Road, and my favourite building in Methley - typical English19th century building. Always a source of mystery to me.   Who could have commissioned such a property?    Too  big for a station master.  The answer is in Jim Melvins book, see Methley census 1881.     The house was Clayton Villa home of  Murray Clayton, successful machine toolmaker and engineer  of Leeds - perfect for commuting to his  place of work in Leeds from Methley Station .    How did they manage to retain the cast iron railings throughout the war?  The house had been split into two for all the time that I have known it.

Methley Hall   -

  The original building which consisted of the cellars and the hall was re-built in 1588 and was  to be re-modelled and extended on a number of occasions after that.  It is probable that the site was the place where the Saxons Cnut and Osulf lived and later developed by Robert Waterton in the reign  of Henry IV in succession to the de Methley family who had lived there for three centuries.   It was agreat pity that the mock towers and superficial crenellations were  added to the frontage  spoiling (in my view) what was from the outside an extremely attractive regency style building
  Neglect of the building before and after the war and  an unsuccessful attempt to have it declared as a monument of historical interest along with the  effect of opencast workings on the once attractive park led to the decision to demolish the 60 room Hall in the early ‘60s. 
 In a Woodlands Report of 1799 - ‘Methley  Park encloses some 100 acres and is stocked with about 70 fallow deer. There are some very old oaks within the park but most of it (the park) was planted about 60 years ago(1739)’.   You don’t have to be an architect to sympathise with the view that the Salvin crenellated makeover changed a magnificent stylish building (Carr) into a heap of stones.

Buildings that have disappeared include :- Methley Grange, Carr Hall presumably demolished for the construction of Savile Colliery and West Hall, similarly demolished for Newmarket  Colliery.  Further enquiries to be made re West Hall.

Woodhall  Manor -  The three gabled mansion house fronted onto Main Street almost opposite to the Old Bay Horse.         An ornamental fireplace in the mansion carried the initials WRA 1677 which probably referred to Wm Roberts of Methley and Alice Taylor of the same toune (town) who were recorded in the Methley Parish register of 6th June 1654.

The house was one of 56 properties demolished as a result of a Local Authority resolution made in March 1956.   The clearance area affected, included the Top Fold, Denison Square (Jingo Nick), and sections  of Main Street along with appurtenances thereto  - these would have been the middens and ash pits. It seems a great pity that the mansion house could not have been spared and restored.

The resolution stated that upon  consideration of representations by the Medical Officer of Health, the dwelling houses were unfit for human habitation.  Reasons put forward were disrepair and sanitary defects , also narrowness of the streets which could be injurious to the health of the inhabitants.   It would appear then, that the mansion house was demolished for reasons of road safety because there was no pavement!!    

Archaeology

Methley Hall