St Margaret’s Maggie back in her natural habitat, thanks to two Year Six pupils

Maggie with her saviours

Maggie, the St Margaret's Gorilla who had been subjected to a senseless act of vandalism before summer, is now back in her natural habitat in the school’s nature garden.

Thanks to the hard work of two Year Six pupils who used plaster of Paris to repair all her injuries, Maggie, one of nine Heywood Monkey Town Trail sculptures, is battered, bruised but unbowed.

Following the parade last year, the apes – Posse, Smiggle, Harambe II, Glissando Babboono, Beau, Phoo Dow, Bridget, Big Heap and Maggie – were dotted around Heywood on a three-mile Monkey Trail.

https://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/109893/heywood-goes-bananas-for-monkey-town-goes-ape-parade

In the 19th Century, the town of Heywood was built around the area today known as Heap Bridge. Irish ‘navvies’ working on the railway with their native accents, sounded to locals as if they were referring to it as ‘Ape Bridge’.

Since that time, Heywood has been known locally as ‘Monkey Town’.