Fred clearly loved all aspects of British industry and was fascinated by the numerous ancient coal pits with their distinctive headgear that he saw when taking a regular walk along the towpath of the Manchester, Bury and Bolton Canal. He held these towering structures with great affection and he often related stories about the ‘hard men’, the chimney builders who erected them and of the men also, who maintained and repaired them: the steeplejacks. This is a used book - there is no escaping the fact it has been read by someone else and it will show signs of wear and previous use. The biographer of Fred Dibnah, he was also Fred's TV producer for many years, as well as a close personal friend, and has published a number of books celebrating Fred's life and interests.

For the young Fred Dibnah was captivated by the gigantic, gleaming steam engines with their enormous whirling flywheels that powered the cotton mills and that were jammed cheek by jowl into Bolton’s townscape.The Age of the Carpenter' sees Fred learn all about the way that carpenters have used their skills to transform medieval castles into homes. It's his biography that tells the story of his life, from childhood right through to his last years and it's heartwarmingly open, honest and genuine. The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products.

His name became synonymous with the stereo type no-nonsense, straight-talking Northern character, and of craftsmanship, hard graft and of daring-do. Fred's love for all things steam is also a practical one; for the last 27years, he has been renovating a steam boiler and engine in his back garden and it is now nearly complete. The numerous mill and other industrial chimneys scattered all over Bolton and the other neighbouring Lancashire cotton towns all radiating out from the hub: (Manchester, known as the cottonopolis), which for decades had been beautifully engineered and subsequently regularly repaired, would from now on require to be demolished. Mill, Royton and all are well documented and described – the author accompanying many of the drops himself upon his friend’s invitation.His latest work includes a documentary on Fred's garden and Founders of the Great Dynasties for History Channel International. This is a nice book to own if you were a fan of Fred’s or simply interested in entertaining stories about his exploits. as another giant chimney slid to earth behind him, he quickly became a genuine favourite with viewers. He was a most brilliant, natural speaker, and especially gifted in being able to ‘paint a picture’ in his distinctive Boltonian accent. His interest and vast knowledge of all things railway stem from being brought up in the North West of England as part of a railway family.

Well-known boilermaker (now retired) and author Alan McEwen has written a book on his good friend and Master Steeplejack, the late Fred Dibnah who died in 2004. On the 6th November 2004, Fred died after bravely battling with bladder cancer since autumn of 2001.Especially poignant for me, as my father died a few years back of cancer and he was very much build of the same stuff. Fred's passion for the glories of the Victorian age and his fascination with the landscape he grew up in, plus his admiration for the craftsmen and labourers who made it all possible, captivate us on every page. Never really took it on board, did his utmost to stop it preventing anything that he wanted to do and just got on with it. We are a sister company of the Slovenian Publishing House Pipinova Knjiga – which literary translates to Pipin’s Book.