All was quiet at the old Baltic flour mill on South Shore Road, a stone's throw from the River Tyne at Gateshead 40 years ago.
It was November 1982, and the imposing factory building has just closed its doors for good. Its demise was part of the wider, more profound decline of the once bustling Quayside area. There were memories and echoes of former industrial and maritime glory everywhere, but by then the place was fading and increasingly down-at-heel.
The Baltic Flour Mill was built for Joseph Rank Limited. Construction work began on the factory in the late 1930s, but was discontinued when World War II broke out, before the flour mill was finally opened in 1950. The complex was a dual-purpose factory, producing both flour and animal feed. The silo building which remains today is only part of what was once a much bigger Baltic operation. Hundreds of people were employed there until it closed.
