The town of Denbigh, 10 miles or about 16km to the south of Rhyl, must be one of the oldest settlements around here - it dates back to the 1200s. Denbigh Castle is not the most photogenic monument but this undated aerial view is worth a look . . .
. . . and so is this 1950s view from the Southeast:
Here is an old picture of High Street (looking towards the public library and Vale Street). This is followed by a 1930s postcard of Crown Square looking towards the town hall - in foreground is the 'Winged Peace' war memorial, just one of Denbigh's interesting statues:
Click on any image to see a bigger version.
Denbigh had a fine railway station building (near what became Kwik Save) with busy lines to Rhyl, Chester, Mold and Ruthin. The station closed in the early 1960s.
Transport fans go here: http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/d/denbigh/
--
Howell's School in Peake's Lane, was a private school for girls. Below in the lower photo Howell's girls in the 1920s are doing the sort of jive that Rhyl convent girls used to do:
Howell's School died in 2013 but the corpse is twitching - apparently a new buyer has been found and the establishment renamed Myddelton College. Further info here:
http://www.myddeltoncollege.com/about-myddelton/
--
The above photo shows North Wales Hospital (known as Denbigh Mental or "the asylum") which was built in the 1840s and operated until the 1990s. Not long ago the building was bought by Denbighshire County Council by Compulsory Purchase Order against private owners who had failed to keep the site in a good state of repair.
--
The following references are added here for indexing purposes:
T A Roberts grocer, Dicks shop, Crown Hotel, Worthington brewery, Star Supply Shop, Hepworth tailor.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here in Rhyl I am disconcerted by the recent closure of the Cookbook Cafe, a place with a range of herbal teas and homemade cakes, attached to Rhyl Library I mean One Stop Shop.
Thanks to Lynn Roberts for alerting me to this catastrophe. The cafe was a special place.
Colin Jones / email: rhyl.colin.jones@live.co.uk
--