Broadcaster Victoria Derbyshire has returned to the borough to discover nuggets of history about where she comes from.
The news presenter appeared on the Channel 5 show No Place Like Home and revisited Bury, Ramsbottom and Rochdale.
Although she was born in Bury, she moved to Littleborough in Rochdale as a child and during the show she learnt that her great great aunt, Mary Ellen, used to work in a cotton mill aged just 13 beside the Rochdale Canal.
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Derbyshire visited Bury Grammar School, where she studied, and recalled happy memories from small things like getting the bus with her friends.
She said: “I made some brilliant friends- I had a real laugh, and I had some gorgeous teachers.”
She also visited Bury Market where she tried Bury’s famous black pudding for the first time.
Speaking about the market, she said: “This is where I was born, people are really really nice, it’s a nice feeling.
“I haven’t been here for decades, we used to come here every Saturday.
“I’m a Bury girl, I’ve never had black pudding in my life, now is the time.”
The Bury black pudding, which dates back to medieval times proved to be a hit with Derbyshire as she said she was “very pleasantly surprised”.
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Derbyshire then travelled north to Ramsbottom, and revisited Holcombe Hill where she reconnected with part of her childhood.
She spoke about how she and her mother experienced domestic abuse from her father and how it was quite a normal part of her upbringing.
On Holcombe Hill, she visited a cairn, which is a memorial to a woman called Ellen Strange who was murdered on the moors by her drunken husband in 1761.
The memorial is now used to remember other victims and the tradition is to stand around the cairn and read some of the names aloud which Derbyshire emotionally did.
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Ending her visit at Peel Tower, she said: “When I was growing up, I barely knew anything about the history of this area.
“I am totally overwhelmed and taken aback by how much history has been right on my doorstep growing up and I had no idea.
“I am a product of this area and these people, but I didn’t know that until now.
“I feel totally bonded now with this place and that’s a good feeling.”
If you have a story tweet @BuryTimes or @Alicegerrard157 or email alice.gerrard@newsquest.co.uk.
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