Forums Forums Wirral History : Chasing the Past Wirral History Where did the name Nanny Goats come from?

anyone know where it got its name from? and any history about the place!

Interested to hear of the Nanny Goat's Walk at Flaybrick. As a child, used to play on the Nanny Goat Mountains off Holm Lane, Prenton. These were in reality, mounds of soil/clay in the worked out parts of the Birkenhead Brick Works clay pit.(main entrance and kilns were in Woodchurch Rd.)

I always thought is was a unique term - obviously not!

So, as TRANSCENTRAL asks, where did the name come from ?

Ive always known them as the "nanny goats"
only recently have i heard the kids call them the "nanny's" ?

I can only assume Goats would graze up there?

I have no idea where the name nanny goat came from but the path that's there now used to be known as lower flaybrick road or on some maps it is know as old flaybrick road. it used to lead right up to the catholic chapel entrance at the rear of flaybrick cemetery, there is also evidence of brickwork in the rock halfway up suggesting there may have been buildings.

My mum was born in Naylor Road, Birkenhead North, which is near Flaybrick. She said that the rocky mounds just at the back of Naylor Road were known locally as the Nanny Goat Mountains and she climbed them as a child. It's funny that someone has said the same sort of thing about another place in Prenton. Perhaps it is a term used for a site that looks a bit like rocky mountains, but is merely a mound, adopted by locals around the Birkenhead area?? This one is a real puzzle in my book...LOL

Yeah I've noticed the brick work in the rock, as a kid I thought it was a blocked up entrance into the St James hospital ground. As for the name though,all I have thought is that the rocky area may have been ground for mountain goats (Nanny goats) in the time when it was all fields and farmland there is no reason why it couldn't have been....just a thought

very good info thankyou

anyone out there with any photos or more storys on this?

Long before the old Fever hospital was built ontop of "the Nanny Goats" the area from behind Claughton village going up towards Bidston Hill was mainly free land where anyone could allow the animals to graze including sheep and goats ...the book Auld Lang Syne mentions about the land ...so it doesn't take much stretch of one's imagination to see the connection.

I remember as a 10 year old climbing half-way up on one of the vertical faces that had hand and footholes dug into the sandstone and suddenly finding that I couldn't stretch far enough to reach the next handhold ....and couldn't find the previous foothold ....I was trapped ..I couldn't go up or down I clung to the rock-face for what seemed an eternity ...my little legs and arms began to tremble with fatigue...tears began filling my eyes at the thought of my small broken body lying at the base of the rocks ....images of my little Mum holding my lifeless form were all I could think of .....and then it happened ....my arm grew another 3-inches instantaneously...or so it seemed ....I reached out for the next handhold above and pulled myself up to the top ...I lay on my back looking up at the sky ...fully believing that a miracle had just occurred ...too this day I still have one arm 3-inches longer than the other.

Nice story Icarus, but with that name, why didn't you just fly up?

Cheers, Chris.

BTW, USA is a large place; give us a clue.

Love that story Icarus - the very same thing happened to me on the cliffs at Thurstaston. I remember being half way down and half way up holding onto a clump of grass for dear life thinking 'Oh dear' I somehow found the strength to get back up. I think I was about 9.

Same here at the quarry at the back of the Arno, its weird as a kid suddenly realising you are mortal after all - but then you survive and the immortality soon returns.

Then there was the roof ladder that broke when I was half way up it ........

Coz Chris ....last time I flew up anywhere ...me little wings melted .....you silly person .

Yes.... what really is strange, is that by the following day or two you are back to believing you are that fearless spunky kid that will never be harmed or injured .....and so you go ahead pushing ever outwards that envelope called "chance" .....but thank God ....we are still around to talk about these things ....mind you , some of those moments have been really scary ones ...no wonder my little Mum had so many grey hairs on her head ....guess I contributed to most of them ....no doubt just like you .