Brick & Tile Works
The information on this page is extracted from "The Greasby Brickworks" which was written by Jim O'Neil and Jeff Rickards. The original article was published in the Wirral Journal, volume 1, number 6.
'The Greasby Brick and Tile Works' was one of about thirty brickfields on the Wirral.
Details of the boundaries of the Greasby Works: - The path running from Greasby Road to Norwood Court is the western boundary and the eastern side is marked by the path from Greasby Road into Coronation Park. Greasby Road is the northern boundary and the south side is indicated by the path between Norwood Road and Coronation Park (alongside the playing fields of Brookdale Primary School).
The site occupied land slightly over four and a half acres.
Prior to its use as a Brickworks, the land was owned by John Ralph Shaw and was part of the Manor Farm lands.
The date of the opening of the Works is not known, but is likely to have been in the mid 1850s.
It is believed that the earliest proprietor was George Mason.
Much of the stone for the road from Frankby to Upton was supplied from the Greasby Brickworks.
Alfred Harris (brother of Nurse Mary Harris of Malvern House) became the proprietor around 1900, at which time some six or seven men worked there.
The Works closed around 1905.
The claypit was eventually filled with spoil from the first Mersey Tunnel (built between 1925 and 1934).
There is little remaining evidence of the existence of the Brick and Tile Works. The grinding stone from the business was set into a concrete mound as a visual feature outside Norwood Court in October 1977. It is 48 inches (122cm) in diameter, four inches (10cm) thick, with a central hole three inches (7.6cm) square.
Another possible relic of the Brickworks stands at the beginning of the path from Greasby Road to Malvern House (now leads to Norwood Court). This post has the letters AH carved into the wood, matching the initials of Alfred Harris. They are now at 90º to horizontal and were carved before the timber was in use as a gatepost. Cut-outs in the timber suggest it could have previously been a lintel at the Brickworks.
