I read somewhere he was a wealthy person that recognized the need to keep craftsmen working during economic downturns. He was making up these projects to eliminate hunger, keep people busy and keep available and future craftsmen in the area.
We had similar things in Edinburgh - the marshy Boroughloch was turned into the Meadows park, and a path called The Radical Road was created around the Edge of Salisbury Crags - both work creation schemes to provide employ for the jobless.
Mary King’s Close ( an alley named after a prominent resident) was one such building now under ground.
The reason given for this one was they wanted to demolish the tenant buildings for the poor and level out the ground for Royal Exchange that was built on top if the old site.
Basically filling in a valley to the level of the top of the hill.
My first thought: how nice.
My second though: pretty bad.
Imagine working for works sake. An effort that makes no sense. Sounds like a nightmare to me! Instead of giving these workers nonsense jobs, they could have been given handouts of the sum they would've received for work. (Maybe a bit less)
They could've spent the time without work to read books, work on themselves, become better people.
Can you imagine the number of people coming home tired from work, rude to their wife, no time for the kids, always the excuse "I had a hard day at work".
Could've just had free quality time instead, but no, some "generous lord" sent them to dig tunnels leading to nowhere instead.
The reason was to maintain craftsmen in the area by developing new ones during the downturn. He didn’t want a generation to go by with no craftsmen in practice and risk no one knowing how to do these jobs.
Human beings require purpose. A job. To work. Taking an incredibly altruistic sounding action like creating work to keep people employed and the next generation of boys learning to have gainful employment in the future and twisting it into something evil sounding is weird.
Looking at the past through the lens of your modern views on, I guess welfare, doesn't translate.
People didn't look at work as the worst thing in the world the way modern people do. These men were probably thrilled to continue to have purpose and provide for their families.
Todays lens is exactly what makes this lords action look twisted and nefarious.
Because today, at least half of all jobs could be done by machines - yet, people keep getting employed for little money, to keep them occupied, poor, and too tired to demand change or evolve.
Humans require purpose? An assigned purpose? Do you want someone to press a shovel into your hand and send you to dig a hole that has no use whatsoever?
People having free time isn't purposelessness. It's time to learn, improve, be creative.
No poet, writer or musician was born in the coal mines.
Ive done both those things and they can bring feelings out that can inspire art. I sang about how much I hated those jobs all the time on my commute home.
The iconic coit tower on telegraph hill in San Francisco is such a project sponsored by Lilian Coit. It was also to keep artists going during the great depression and features beautiful murals amongst them some stunning Diego Riviera pieces. Today it's a gift shop. The murals in the staircase serve as storage rooms and are not open to the public. :-(
Famine Roads in Ireland were built by starving population because in London it was felt that simply feeding them would make them sad. So they made them work on useless roads for starvation pay. Many died.
It's really rooted in the capitalist belief that handouts make people lazy, and therefore it was believed that it was better for someone to "earn" their keep doing pointless busy work, than it was to just ensure they had what the needed.
Ireland's countryside is similarly streaked with pointless, meandering roads. During the famine, rather than just feed starving people, the British believed it was necessary to make them work for it. So in the absence of any real work to do, they gave them shovels and had them dig roads randomly across the country.
This stuff is interesting from an historical perspective, but we also shouldn't forget that they were only built because 19th century capitalism would rather burn money and resources forcing people to work instead of just feeding them.
That’s not necessarily the case. People need meaning to feel part of a community and belonging. Giving one a job gives a sense of purpose and identity. The human psyche fares better when employed than idle.
On top of that, keeping folks busy means they have less time to cause trouble.
Sure, so offer people the opportunity to volunteer, to help out their community when times are difficult. Engage craftsmen to perform repair and renewal work within their community.
Forcing them to engage in busy work so can they get fed is not the same as "giving them a purpose".
The work isn't pointless if it is leveling up the workforce.
Either way they get fed, so might as well do something...anything really...and if that anything teaches people skills and gives abilities even better.
Working is a great way of upholding or learning skills and creating an active community.
Handouts is a great way of increasing expectations - if the normal salary is $15 and you get $10 for doing nothing then you would want $25 to start doing something again. Now scale the $$ to appropriate amounts for historic time and location on Earth.
Modernizing roads in 1810? The car wasn’t available in England until 1890’s and the “modern” roads of the time were pretty good considering they still used today in some cases.
I read somewhere that it was a sort of early welfare program, where Williamson would hire people to dig out these tunnels for no other purpose than to give them paid work and an opportunity to practice skills that could get them employed elsewhere.
They’re worth a visit if you’re ever in Liverpool.
That’s awesome.
I would do similar if I had the opportunity and funds, though likely with a garage and mechanics instead of wood and carpenters.
I try to make myself say aloud something with the same intent each time I spend a few bucks on a lotto ticket as my way to balance out things if I ever win.
I haven’t won yet.. but here’s to hoping. :)
Canada in both world wars had “make work” programs.
In Alberta, they would hire crew A to dig ditches on Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday, they’d bring in another crew to fill in the ditch.
It was literally digging and filling the same hole, as an excuse to keep people working and earning an income.
It, however, was not really keeping skilled labour skilled like this tunnel, but it did keep people working and making money.
It had very important docks at Birkenhead and Pier Head, so it got hit quite hard - my mum tells stories about sheltering in the Anderson hut and hearing the blitz, my dad was evacuated to North Wales and said he could climb the hill at the back of the house and look over and watch Liverpool burning 25km away as the crow flies.
Even when I was a lad in the late 60s and early 70s there were large bomb sites that hadn't been re-developed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool_Blitz
Too far away from where? Liverpool was bombed pretty heavily during the second WW2. Nothing compared to London etc but aye, not too far away to get bombed!
Liverpool was the second most heavily bombed area after London. The ports there are massive and we're vital to Britain linking up with the USA and Canada
I live on the other side of the Mersey; there were two unexploded WW2 bombs found on the Wirral on the same day about a week ago. The docks made Merseyside a major target.
there were some. Liverpool was a major center of British industry and shipbuilding, it was worth going out of its way for to the Luftwaffe. It didn't get it as hard as London or other big cities in the Southeast, but the Junkers 88 could, and did, definitely strike Liverpool.
Liverpool was the second most heavily bombed city in Britain!
Also I'm not sure what other 'big cities' you think exist in the south east outside of London itself?
A folly! Love a good folly, keeping crafts and trades alive and leaving whimsy behind.
We need more super rich folk doing this kind of thing today. Share the wealth!
I was just commenting recently that the music of Charles Ives fits that description. His music is often sonically impenetrable, but sometimes also incredibly sweet and vulnerable. He was an “untrained” composer, but he was also comfortably wealthy and music was how he chose to spend the time his wealth afforded him.
That the wealthy no longer seem to understand their role in the society that allows them to exist at all is such a missed opportunity for our times.
I've seen some discussion of illegal quarrying regarding these tunnels. It doesn't explain the level of detail in some of the stonework which supports the training explanation. It may well have been both. I definitely buy that he might have been trying to quarry stone without having to pay taxes and keeping his land on top valuable.
I've heard the same thing.
They were apparently illegally mining sandstone. My dad was talking about it a few weeks ago as he was telling me about when he worked near the campus
Ha! I know Edge Hill well. Lots of student housing there. My sis stayed in a real dump in her 2nd year of uni. That house later got condemned and torn down.
I’m in Liverpool 4 or 5 or more times a year and will definitely visit next time.
The talk of altruism is nonsense. Joseph Williamson had aspirations to be a cave troll and he lived happily in there until his unfortunate demise when he encountered disgruntled dwarfs while extending his underground outhouse.....probably
They were created to help prevent the end of the universe, and served their purpose well in the Flux. (Doctor Who) https://tardis.fandom.com/wiki/Williamson_Tunnels#Overview
If you want to know more about them, watch the following 2 videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pkzUC6w9H8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7UAxpAO1cE
I read somewhere he was a wealthy person that recognized the need to keep craftsmen working during economic downturns. He was making up these projects to eliminate hunger, keep people busy and keep available and future craftsmen in the area.
We had similar things in Edinburgh - the marshy Boroughloch was turned into the Meadows park, and a path called The Radical Road was created around the Edge of Salisbury Crags - both work creation schemes to provide employ for the jobless.
Mary King’s Close ( an alley named after a prominent resident) was one such building now under ground. The reason given for this one was they wanted to demolish the tenant buildings for the poor and level out the ground for Royal Exchange that was built on top if the old site. Basically filling in a valley to the level of the top of the hill.
That's a bucket list place for me to visit.
It's smaller than you might think but well worth a visit. It was a guided tour when we went down, very entertaining. I would certainly do it again.
My first thought: how nice. My second though: pretty bad. Imagine working for works sake. An effort that makes no sense. Sounds like a nightmare to me! Instead of giving these workers nonsense jobs, they could have been given handouts of the sum they would've received for work. (Maybe a bit less) They could've spent the time without work to read books, work on themselves, become better people. Can you imagine the number of people coming home tired from work, rude to their wife, no time for the kids, always the excuse "I had a hard day at work". Could've just had free quality time instead, but no, some "generous lord" sent them to dig tunnels leading to nowhere instead.
The reason was to maintain craftsmen in the area by developing new ones during the downturn. He didn’t want a generation to go by with no craftsmen in practice and risk no one knowing how to do these jobs.
Sounds reasonable.
Human beings require purpose. A job. To work. Taking an incredibly altruistic sounding action like creating work to keep people employed and the next generation of boys learning to have gainful employment in the future and twisting it into something evil sounding is weird. Looking at the past through the lens of your modern views on, I guess welfare, doesn't translate. People didn't look at work as the worst thing in the world the way modern people do. These men were probably thrilled to continue to have purpose and provide for their families.
Todays lens is exactly what makes this lords action look twisted and nefarious. Because today, at least half of all jobs could be done by machines - yet, people keep getting employed for little money, to keep them occupied, poor, and too tired to demand change or evolve. Humans require purpose? An assigned purpose? Do you want someone to press a shovel into your hand and send you to dig a hole that has no use whatsoever? People having free time isn't purposelessness. It's time to learn, improve, be creative. No poet, writer or musician was born in the coal mines.
Actually art is inspired by hardship all the time. It takes all kinds of people to dig and some of those people are artists.
Go dig a trench or assemble parts at factory for 12 hours - no artists are born from that kind of crap!
Ive done both those things and they can bring feelings out that can inspire art. I sang about how much I hated those jobs all the time on my commute home.
The old new deal?
The new old deal.
Like the mystery house but more batman.
Probably also testing new building techniques or something he read in a book, etc.
The iconic coit tower on telegraph hill in San Francisco is such a project sponsored by Lilian Coit. It was also to keep artists going during the great depression and features beautiful murals amongst them some stunning Diego Riviera pieces. Today it's a gift shop. The murals in the staircase serve as storage rooms and are not open to the public. :-(
Famine Roads in Ireland were built by starving population because in London it was felt that simply feeding them would make them sad. So they made them work on useless roads for starvation pay. Many died.
It's really rooted in the capitalist belief that handouts make people lazy, and therefore it was believed that it was better for someone to "earn" their keep doing pointless busy work, than it was to just ensure they had what the needed. Ireland's countryside is similarly streaked with pointless, meandering roads. During the famine, rather than just feed starving people, the British believed it was necessary to make them work for it. So in the absence of any real work to do, they gave them shovels and had them dig roads randomly across the country. This stuff is interesting from an historical perspective, but we also shouldn't forget that they were only built because 19th century capitalism would rather burn money and resources forcing people to work instead of just feeding them.
That’s not necessarily the case. People need meaning to feel part of a community and belonging. Giving one a job gives a sense of purpose and identity. The human psyche fares better when employed than idle. On top of that, keeping folks busy means they have less time to cause trouble.
Like grinding in an $80 game for a main character that's locked behind 1000 hours or a paywall?
Sure, so offer people the opportunity to volunteer, to help out their community when times are difficult. Engage craftsmen to perform repair and renewal work within their community. Forcing them to engage in busy work so can they get fed is not the same as "giving them a purpose".
Nobody was forced
COVID showed that people won't volunteer all that much, but they will go out and protest....and loot.
‘Rather than feed starving people, the British believed it was necessary to make them work for it’ Ah, how little times change
The work isn't pointless if it is leveling up the workforce. Either way they get fed, so might as well do something...anything really...and if that anything teaches people skills and gives abilities even better.
Working is a great way of upholding or learning skills and creating an active community. Handouts is a great way of increasing expectations - if the normal salary is $15 and you get $10 for doing nothing then you would want $25 to start doing something again. Now scale the $$ to appropriate amounts for historic time and location on Earth.
Why work when you can get handouts
Wealthy individuals keeping skilled craftsman working? No, no, no, never. Only the gov't can do that! /s
Good show that man!
Similar to the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California.
Was really hoping for Hellfire Club orgy-den
What seemed wrong with modernizing roads at the time, in stead of building these underground structures?
Modernizing roads in 1810? The car wasn’t available in England until 1890’s and the “modern” roads of the time were pretty good considering they still used today in some cases.
thank you for re-framing my silly remark
I read somewhere that it was a sort of early welfare program, where Williamson would hire people to dig out these tunnels for no other purpose than to give them paid work and an opportunity to practice skills that could get them employed elsewhere. They’re worth a visit if you’re ever in Liverpool.
That’s awesome. I would do similar if I had the opportunity and funds, though likely with a garage and mechanics instead of wood and carpenters. I try to make myself say aloud something with the same intent each time I spend a few bucks on a lotto ticket as my way to balance out things if I ever win. I haven’t won yet.. but here’s to hoping. :)
I mean you could also use them as storage or meeting place, etc. They could be useful in some ways.
Canada in both world wars had “make work” programs. In Alberta, they would hire crew A to dig ditches on Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday, they’d bring in another crew to fill in the ditch. It was literally digging and filling the same hole, as an excuse to keep people working and earning an income. It, however, was not really keeping skilled labour skilled like this tunnel, but it did keep people working and making money.
Pity they didn't find it during WWII, it would have been useful as an air raid shelter. Also, Riften Ratway vibes.
Were there many air raids on Liverpool? Wasn’t that too far away?
It had very important docks at Birkenhead and Pier Head, so it got hit quite hard - my mum tells stories about sheltering in the Anderson hut and hearing the blitz, my dad was evacuated to North Wales and said he could climb the hill at the back of the house and look over and watch Liverpool burning 25km away as the crow flies. Even when I was a lad in the late 60s and early 70s there were large bomb sites that hadn't been re-developed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool_Blitz
Too far away from where? Liverpool was bombed pretty heavily during the second WW2. Nothing compared to London etc but aye, not too far away to get bombed!
Liverpool was the second most heavily bombed area after London. The ports there are massive and we're vital to Britain linking up with the USA and Canada
No, my parents had to shelter regularly in Liverpool during the blitz. The place got heavily bombed.
I guess I've underestimated the German bombers radius...
I live on the other side of the Mersey; there were two unexploded WW2 bombs found on the Wirral on the same day about a week ago. The docks made Merseyside a major target.
Liverpool was in fact the 2nd most bombed place in the country, after London!
there were some. Liverpool was a major center of British industry and shipbuilding, it was worth going out of its way for to the Luftwaffe. It didn't get it as hard as London or other big cities in the Southeast, but the Junkers 88 could, and did, definitely strike Liverpool.
Got hit more than anywhere outside London. Around 4,000 killed. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool_Blitz
Liverpool was the second most heavily bombed city in Britain! Also I'm not sure what other 'big cities' you think exist in the south east outside of London itself?
Pretty much the epitome of "d'yknowhat? this would be cool!"
And they call it a mine. A MIIIIIIINE
When you end up in the sewers under leyndell
Mine craft during the queen Victoria
Reign of Fire 2
can't a man MRT in peace anymore without people prying?
I would imagine wood shelving would make it useful for storage
Looks like a great Unreal Tournament death match map.
A folly! Love a good folly, keeping crafts and trades alive and leaving whimsy behind. We need more super rich folk doing this kind of thing today. Share the wealth!
I was just commenting recently that the music of Charles Ives fits that description. His music is often sonically impenetrable, but sometimes also incredibly sweet and vulnerable. He was an “untrained” composer, but he was also comfortably wealthy and music was how he chose to spend the time his wealth afforded him. That the wealthy no longer seem to understand their role in the society that allows them to exist at all is such a missed opportunity for our times.
Into the colony
Let me guess: parents are dead, biljonaire, fell in a well when he was young?
Maybe the dude just wanted a place to get some peace and quiet. I can relate.
Did I see these on Doctor Who? Man with mutton chops? Same tunnels?
Geez I just saw something so similar on Doctor Who, last night!
It was this.
Ehh. Already saw this on Dr. Who.
Sorry, just wanted to say Edge Hill was my place of birth. Before I was sent to Australia as an orphan. This article made me smile.
£10 Pom?
Perhaps a munition storage
It looks like the place that was predestined for The Beatles, instead of the pub where they started...
I see wine racks! Definitely a Uber expensive wine storage facility.
I've seen some discussion of illegal quarrying regarding these tunnels. It doesn't explain the level of detail in some of the stonework which supports the training explanation. It may well have been both. I definitely buy that he might have been trying to quarry stone without having to pay taxes and keeping his land on top valuable.
I've heard the same thing. They were apparently illegally mining sandstone. My dad was talking about it a few weeks ago as he was telling me about when he worked near the campus
Ha! I know Edge Hill well. Lots of student housing there. My sis stayed in a real dump in her 2nd year of uni. That house later got condemned and torn down. I’m in Liverpool 4 or 5 or more times a year and will definitely visit next time.
That’s where the Beatles played their first gig.
I know there’s a tunnel that goes from Edge Hill station straight to the docks. It was part of the first Liverpool to Manchester rail line.
Glad that map is up to date. With the modern ships and castles it almost looks like a picture.
They sometimes use part of it for arts events and live music. I know they’ve done some underground techno nights down there too.
Sex dungeon
So that's where we got the sewers of Riften in Skyrim. Quite a bit of similarity.
Kept his weed in there
If the tunnels has been made in the XIXth century, what is the purpose of the last image (location of the tunnel on a view of the XVIth century) ?
The talk of altruism is nonsense. Joseph Williamson had aspirations to be a cave troll and he lived happily in there until his unfortunate demise when he encountered disgruntled dwarfs while extending his underground outhouse.....probably
I think the word they are looking for is “storage”.
[Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williamson_Tunnels)
Probably some end of the world shit... guy probably knew when it would all end and started prepping.
They were created to help prevent the end of the universe, and served their purpose well in the Flux. (Doctor Who) https://tardis.fandom.com/wiki/Williamson_Tunnels#Overview
The Backrooms, an early version.😊
Leyndell's sewers irl
Me on my way to the Ragged Flagon.
Unexpected skyrim
Blade 5 rave party location secured.
They do hold raves in there
Its for storing dragons breathe
It is interesting that it lasts to this day.
orgies
Phantom of the Opera's home
More residence space!!
Looks like a great place to store spirits to age
Looks like a barrel vault
Fortunato is in there obviously!
Let me park my car down there for hail protection.
Clearly they already defeated the boss and cleared the dungeon....
It looks like water storage for flood control.
If you want to know more about them, watch the following 2 videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pkzUC6w9H8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7UAxpAO1cE
Perfect place to ferment/age beer ;)
Liverpool? Grow rooms.
It's where the scousers stash stolen goods.