Continuity & Change

These details are gleaned from "A Short History of Torrisholme Village" by Mr. H.N. Crawshaw. This little booklet was produced by the Torrisholme Festival Committee in June 1988. It cost 50p.

1876 Lancaster Methodists set up Torrisholme Mission Committee; independently some Morecambe Methodists built a chapel.  Legend has it that the idea was mooted in Robert Lawson's barber's shop by  Richard Crabtree. The building committee formed there and then from the waiting customers. Luke Eastwood presented land in Torrisholme Square that he had bought for £100. 

1877 Mrs Elizabeth Nixon, a widow was a sitting tenant. 

She  "deigned to remove her furniture in June " ; 

the foundation stone was laid in the July.                          

1878 The chapel opened on 28th March .

1900 Attendance was poor, propped up by Morecambe people; the  school room floor collapsed ; there was talk of closure. 

1912.The chapel closed.

1924 the chapel re-opened, the congregation grew.            

1933 they began to seek a new site; 

1957 the little Chapel was sold to the Roman Catholics. It became the 

RC Church of the Good Shepherd.

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From Lancaster Guardian: 

1957 Saturday 23rd February  Rev. J. H. Wroe knocked on the door of the new £16,500 Methodist church as part of the simple ceremony, it was opened to him by Mr. Sam Howarth, who is in his eighties, one of the oldest members of  Torrisholme Methodist Church.  The dedicatory service will be conducted by the Rev. W. S. Terry, Superintendent Minister of the Morecambe & Heysham Methodist Circuit, 

The whole scheme including furnishings will cost £21,000; already £17,000 is in hand. The church has seating  for 300 with a school hall seating 200. The architect is Mr. Edgar Middleton, of Lancaster, who has also designed the new Methodist Church to be built at Heysham.

The old church at Torrisholme which has served the district for 80 years will be sold.