First visited : 16 October 1988
Now then, there's a couple of stories attached to this one.
I first visited it when it was known as "Gulliver's" as part of the Red Lion pool team in 1988 on a Monday evening. I can't remember if I won my match but it was a really good evening. The owners really put the boat out as far as giving us a supper was concerned with a full buffet. I remember another team member, an Irish guy called BJ saying " We should apologise now for when they come to our place ! " referring to our landlord's stingy unchanging plate of stale ham rolls. It was this embarrassment that led to the team's decamping to another pub at the end of the season.
Also that night I won a bit of money on the quiz machine and then I won the football card that had been passed round with Halifax Town. My team mate Phil was much amused that I'd picked them because Halifax had just thrashed Dale on the previous Saturday which is how I'm able to date my first visit with precision.
By the time of my next visit in November 1996 it had had another makeover and was now "The Mucky Duck". My appearance there had a very different purpose. I've recounted in some detail on my Walks blog how in the mid-nineties I was in a group called the Manchester Christian Social Group and involved in a messy dispute which led to the Group splitting in two. The biggest problem this caused me was that I ended up in the opposite camp to the guy who'd consistently been my best friend in the Group , a teacher-cum-snake breeder called Pete. Despite the highly poisonous atmosphere at the time neither of us wanted to lose touch so Pete, who had friends in Rochdale, suggested I see him at The Mucky Duck where he went on a Thursday night to see a live band ,usually with a lady friend called Val.
It became a regular thing on a Thursday. I'd usually have one orange WKD then go on to soft drinks so I could still drive home. Pete didn't drive so he caught the last number 17 bus back to Blackley. The conversation was good but a little wary as both of us were trying to find out from each other how the other group was getting along. I don't know what Val, a pleasant enough fortysomething lady, thought about it all.
When I mentioned I was going there to another friend, Sean, he pulled a face and said he avoided it because the local National Front were based there. He was probably right because there usually was a small contingent of skinheads at the far end of the bar including a familiar face. It was a very tall guy who'd been in my year at school called Ian; I do recall his surname but it's probably best not to broadcast it. We hadn't got on but I remember he had a reputation for being very soft. Unlike me he left school at 16 but I soon saw him again as part of the small aggressive contingent at the Dale during my first few years supporting them though I never saw him do any actual fighting. By the end of the eighties he'd disappeared and I didn't see him again until I started going to The Mucky Duck. It turned out Pete now knew him slightly and recalled a conversation where Ian had started bemoaning the lack of celebrations on St George's Day. He said he'd been trying to work out how racist Ian actually was. We never acknowledged each other; perhaps he didn't remember me.
These Thursday nights stopped a year later when I got married and moved out of Littleborough but I did pay it one last visit , accompanied by Julie, the following summer. We'd recently seen another member of the Group with whom Pete had had a serious disagreement which hadn't been forgotten. When I unwisely mentioned this, Pete made a startling revelation about that other person's past ( I'd already guessed half of it but the full story was still shocking ) which I thought was a dangerous thing for Julie to know. Fortunately we haven't seen the other guy since but I thought it would be better after that to keep Pete and Julie apart and let it recede from her memory. They haven't met since either.
I heard no more about the place until a guy was killed outside it in March last year after an argument over a spilled drink. It was closed for a period while its license was reviewed. It opened again but has had another name change and is now called "Last Orders".
