Many of you will have passed this building without realising it used to be a police station. In the latest ‘Mark’s History’ column, MARK STEVENSON casts his photographic lens on Upper Wortley Police Station and its historic clock…
The Upper Wortley Police Station was built in 1899 to replace the earlier police station that was on the same site.
On the 31 March 1935 it became the headquarters of ‘D’ Division which had been transferred from the Kirkstall Road Police Station. The RSPCA took over the Kirkstall Road building.
The building itself is mainly of red brick and has some nice architectural details including a turret, a Leeds coat of arms, a pair of owls and a Potts clock.
The clock was installed by Wm Potts & Sons of Leeds in 1898. The weights of the clock hung through the first floor to the ground floor, the holes being used by the Inspector to overhear the conversations in the office below.
Wortley Police Station closed in 1978 when the new headquarters opened at Dawson’s Corner in Pudsey.