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Cookridge Street Baths

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Description:
17th November 1928. Also known as Oriental and General baths. Designed by Cuthbert Brodrick, costing £13,000, the baths were opened in 1867. With some alterations in 1882, they remained in use until finally closing in the late 1960s and subsequently being demolished, the only one of Cuthbert Brodrick's buildings in Leeds to suffer this fate. The site is now part of Millennium Square. This view shows the central entrance with notice for 'Ladies Turkish Bath'. There are separate entrance for men on the right, and women on the left. Posters extoll the benefits of 'sunbaths' for health.

User Comments:

Name:

Maureen Kershaw

Comment:

I used to swim regularly at the Baths also in the mid 60's, I attended for sun-ray treatments, perhaps these were the 'sunbaths' referred to. I think they were given to help build up resistance to colds, dont know whether they did - I just remember the hideous goggles!

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Name:

sally neish

Comment:

Our family business, A H Rutterford and Son was opposite the baths on the corner of Vernon Street and I used to be sent off by my mother in the school holidays to have a swim nearly every day. Also, as we had no bath at home she and I would buy a 'hot bath a towel and some soap' every week and wallow in the huge old stone baths in glorious hot water up to our chins.

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Name:

Ron Davies

Comment:

I used to swim at these baths on a Saturday morning. I think there was a seperate pool for beginners and younger children, although this could be a figment of my imagination, as it was about 55 years ago since my last visit.

Date:

10-Aug-2010

Email:

rondavies66@googlemail.com

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Name:

Chris Went (nee Rhodes)

Comment:

These were the swimming baths used by Thoresby High School in the 1950s/60s. Ron Davies is right - there was a small pool. It was oval, with the changing cubicles on a gallery above.

Date:

16-Nov-2011

Email:

madkatsmum@hotmail.co.uk

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Name:

Mark S.

Comment:

There were two pools in the Cookridge Street baths. The smaller of the two was (rather unusually)oval-shaped, and may indeed have been for beginners and younger children. As a teenager in the early sixties, I was a member of a swimming club which was allocated this pool for weekly sessions.

Date:

16-Nov-2011

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Name:

Peter Coultas

Comment:

Yes Ron you are correct, there was a small shallow bath for learners and young children as well as the main bath. We used to go there for swimming lessons from school and had a swimming gala day there every year. I was a slow learner but eventually made it!

Date:

16-Nov-2011

Email:

peecee49@btinternet.com

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Name:

Brian Thomas

Comment:

Its hard to understand that the decision to demolish this iconic building in the late sixties was a good one. Cuthbert Broderick left his talented mark on Leeds and his design of Leeds Town Hall is internationally acclaimed. Destruction of two of his other works is akin to burning works of fine art (in my humble of course).

Date:

16-Nov-2011

Email:

helensdad@mac.com

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Name:

Clare forshaw

Comment:

My dad Dennis Selina remembers going to the baths after exams at College of Technology in the mid 40's.

Date:

22-Aug-2015

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Name:

Carole McCulloch (Atkinson)

Comment:

I went swimming here with my mother in the late fifties. I think it was on Thursday nights. I recall we went to Leeds Ladies Swimming Club which I've always thought gave my swimming a grander title than it deserved. I learnt to swim at Holbeck baths, also long since gone.

Date:

10-Apr-2016

Email:

caroletdf@aol.co.uk

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Name:

Penny Corner nee Holmes

Comment:

I used to swim there on a Friday Evening in the late 50s, early 60s as a member of what was grandly called Leeds Olympic Training Scheme.

Date:

12-Sep-2016

Email:

cataddy@gmail.com

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Name:

Graham A. Schofield

Comment:

Have a look at picture number, 2003122_73641604. If Cuthbert Brodrick's mixture of Asian architecture had made it from the drawing-board into actuality, Brian Thomas's comment would have been even more poignant.

Date:

12-May-2017

Email:

GrahamScho@AOL.com

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Name:

Nigel Douthwaite

Comment:

I used to go there with my dear old dad and I think with School (not sure) Always remember the ritz crackers- 3 in a bag for a penny I think!

Date:

02-Feb-2018

Email:

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