Bolton
Encyclopedia
Bolton is a town in Greater Manchester
, in the North West of England
. Close to the West Pennine Moors
, it is 10 miles (16.1 km) north west of the city of Manchester
. Bolton is surrounded by several smaller towns and villages which together form the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton
, of which Bolton is the administrative centre
. The town of Bolton has a population of 139,403, whilst the wider metropolitan borough has a population of 262,400.
Historically
a part of Lancashire
, Bolton originated as a small settlement in the moorland known as Bolton le Moors
. During the English Civil War
the town was a Parliamentarian
outpost in a staunchly Royalist
region, and as a result Bolton was stormed by 3,000 Royalist troops led by Prince Rupert of the Rhine
in 1644. In what became known as the Bolton Massacre
, 1,600 residents were killed and 700 were taken prisoner.
Noted as a former mill town
, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish
weavers settled in the area during the 15th century, developing a wool and cotton weaving tradition. The urbanisation and development of Bolton largely coincided with the introduction of textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution
. It was a boomtown
of the 19th century and at its zenith, in 1929, its 216 cotton mill
s and 26 bleaching and dying works made it one of the largest and most productive centres of cotton spinning
in the world. The British cotton industry declined sharply after the First World War
, and by the 1980s cotton manufacture had virtually ceased in Bolton.
Bolton has had notable success in sport; Premier League football club Bolton Wanderers
play home games at the Reebok Stadium
(Reebok
, the sportswear company, is based in the town) and The WBA World light-welterweight champion Amir Khan
was born in the town. Bolton also has several notable cultural aspects, including The Octagon Theatre
and the Bolton Museum
and Art Gallery, as well as one of the earliest public libraries established after the Public Libraries Act 1850
.
on Cheetham Close
above Egerton
and Bronze Age
burial mounds on Winter Hill. A Bronze Age mound was excavated in Victorian times outside Haulgh Hall. The Romans built roads from Manchester to Ribchester
to the east and a road along what is now the A6 to the west. It is claimed that Agricola
built a fort at Blackrod
by clearing land above the forest. Evidence of a Saxon
settlement exists in the form of religious objects found when the Victorian parish church was built.
In 1067 Great Bolton
was the property of Roger de Poitou and after 1100 Roger de Meresheys. Eventually it became property of the Pilkingtons
who forfeited it in the Civil War and the Stanleys who became Earls of Derby. Great Bolton and Little Bolton
were part of the Marsey fee, in 1212 Little Bolton was held by Roger de Bolton as plough-land, by the service of the twelfth part of a knight's fee to Randle de Marsey. The church in Bolton has an early foundation although the date is not known, it was given by the lord of the manor to the Gilbertine canons of Mattersey Priory
, in Nottinghamshire, which was founded by Roger de Marsey.
The town was given a charter to hold a market in Churchgate on 14 December 1251 by King Henry III of England
. It was made into a market town and borough by a charter from the Earl of Derby, William de Ferrers, on 14 January 1253. Burgage
plots were laid out on Churchgate and Deansgate in the centre of the medieval town near where Ye Olde Man and Scythe
dating from 1251 is situated and a market was held here until the 18th century.
In 1337 Flemish weavers settled here and introduced the manufacture of woollen cloth. More Flemish weavers fleeing the Huguenot
persecutions also settled here in the 17th century. This second wave of settlers wove fustian
, a rough cloth made of linen and cotton. Digging sea coal around Bolton was recorded in 1374. There was an outbreak of the plague in the town in 1623.
, Bolton supported Parliament and the Puritan
cause. There was a parliamentary garrison in the town which was twice unsuccessfully attacked but on 28 May 1644 Prince Rupert's army along with troops under the Earl of Derby
attacked again. There were 1,500 dead, and 700 taken prisoner and the town plundered. It became known as the Bolton Massacre. At the end of the Civil War Lord Derby was tried as a traitor at Chester and condemned to death. When his appeal for pardon to parliament was rejected he attempted to escape but was recaptured and executed outside Ye Olde Man & Scythe Inn at Bolton on 15 October 1651 for his part in the Bolton Massacre.
and Samuel Crompton
led to the rapid growth of Bolton in the 19th century. Crompton, whilst living at Hall i'th' Wood, invented the spinning mule in 1779. It revolutionised cotton spinning by combining the roller drafting of Arkwright's water frame with the carriage drafting and spindle tip twisting of James Hargreaves
's spinning jenny, producing a high quality yarn. Self-acting mules were used in Bolton mills until the 1960s producing fine yarn. The earliest mills were situated by the streams and river as seen today at Barrow Bridge, but steam power led to the construction of the large multi-storey mills and chimneys that came to dominate Bolton's skyline, some of which survive today. By 1911 the textile industry in Bolton employed about 36,000 people. The last mill to be constructed was Sir John Holden's Mill in 1927. The cotton industry declined in the 1920s. A brief upturn after World War II
was not sustained and the industry had virtually vanished by the end of the 20th century.
The streams draining the surrounding moors into the River Croal also provided the water necessary for the bleach
works that were a feature of this area. Bleaching using chlorine
was introduced in the 1790s by the Ainsworths at Halliwell Bleachworks. Bolton and the surrounding villages to the north had over 30 bleachworks including the Lever Bank Bleach Works
in the Irwell Valley.
Growth of the textile industry was also assisted by the availability of coal in the Bolton area. By 1896 John Fletcher owned coal mines at Ladyshore, Little Lever; The Earl of Bradford had a coal mine at Great Lever; the Darcy Lever Coal Company had mines at Darcy Lever and there were also coal mines at Tonge, Breightmet, Deane and Doffcocker. Some of these pits were close to the canal providing the owners with markets in Bolton and Manchester. Coal mining declined in the 20th century.
Important transport links also contributed to the growth of the town and the textile industry; Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal, constructed in 1791, connected the town to Bury
and Manchester
providing transport for coal and other basic materials. The Bolton and Leigh Railway
was the oldest in Lancashire, opening to goods traffic in 1828 and Great Moor Street station
opened to passengers in 1831. This railway was connected to the Leeds and Liverpool Canal
, an important link with the major port of Liverpool for the import of raw cotton
from America. Local firms built locomotives for the railway, in 1830 "Union" was built by Rothwell, Hick and Co.
and two locomotives, "Salamander" and "Veteran" were built by Crook and Dean.
Bolton's first Mayor, Charles James Darbishire was sympathetic to Chartism
and a supporter of the Anti-Corn Law League
. In August 1839 Bolton was besieged by Chartist rioters and the Riot Act
was read and special constables sworn in. The mayor accompanied soldiers who were called to rescue special constables at Little Bolton Town Hall which was besieged by a mob and the incident ended without bloodshed.
By 1900 Bolton was Lancashire's third largest engineering centre after Manchester and Oldham. About 9,000 men were employed in the industry, half of them working for Dobson and Barlow
in Kay Street. The firm made textile machinery. Another engineering company was Hick, Hargreaves & Co, based at the Soho Foundry. This firm made Lancashire Boilers and heavy machinery. Thomas Ryder and Son of Turner Bridge was an important producer of machine tools for the international motor industry.
Service industries including retail and leisure grew in the 1970s, partly replacing jobs in heavy industry. The first modern retail development was Crompton Place Shopping Centre, opened in 1971.
, bought Hall i'th' Wood as a memorial to Samuel Crompton inventor of the spinning mule. Lever restored the dilapidated building and presented it to the town in 1902, having turned it into a museum furnished with household goods typical of domestic family life in the 16th and 17th centuries. Lever re-endowed Bolton School
s, giving land and his house on Chorley New Road. He presented the town with 67 acres (271,139.6 m²) of land for a public park which the corporation named Leverhulme Park
in 1914. In 1902 he gave the people of Bolton Lever Park at Rivington
. In 1911, Lever consulted Thomas Mawson, landscape architect
and lecturer in Landscape Design at the University of Liverpool, regarding town planning in Bolton. Mawson published "Bolton – a Study in Town Planning and Civic Art" and gave lectures entitled "Bolton Housing and Town Planning Society" which formed the basis of an illustrated book "Bolton – as it is and as it might be". In 1924, Leverhulme presented Bolton with an ambitious plan to rebuild the town centre based on Mawson's designs funded partly by himself. The Council declined in favour of extending the Town Hall and building the Civic Centre.
commanded by Oberleutnant
Kurt Frankenburg of the Imperial German Navy
, dropped 21 bombs on the town, 5 of them on the working class area of Kirk Street, killing 13 and destroying 6 houses. Further attacks followed on other parts of the town, including three incendaries dropped close to the Town Hall.
, until the early 19th century, Great Bolton
and Little Bolton
were two of the eighteen township
s of the ecclesiastical parish
of Bolton le Moors
. These townships were separated by the River Croal
, Little Bolton on the north bank and Great Bolton on the south. Bolton Poor Law Union
was formed on 1 February 1837. It continued using existing poorhouses at Fletcher Street and Turton but in 1856 started to build a new workhouse
at Fishpool Farm in Farnworth. Townleys Hospital was built on the site which is now Royal Bolton Hospital.
In 1838, Great Bolton, most of Little Bolton and the Haulgh area of Tonge with Haulgh were incorporated under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835
as a municipal borough
, the second to be created in England. Further additions were made adding part of Rumworth
in 1872 and part of Halliwell
in 1877. In 1889, Bolton was granted County Borough
status and became self-governing and independent from Lancashire County Council
jurisdiction. In 1898, the borough was extended further by adding the civil parishes of Breightmet
, Darcy Lever
, Great Lever
, the rest of Halliwell, Heaton
, Lostock, Middle Hulton
, the rest of Rumworth which had been renamed Deane
in 1894, Smithills, and Tonge plus Astley Bridge Urban District, and part of Over Hulton
civil parish. The County Borough of Bolton
was abolished in 1974 and became a constituent part of the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton in Greater Manchester.
Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council is divided into 20 wards, each of which elects three councillors for a term of up to four years. As of January 2010 the Council has no party in overall control. The seats are divided, Labour
– 28, Conservative
– 23 and Liberal Democrats – 9.
Under the Reform Act of 1832
, a Parliamentary Borough
was established. The Bolton constituency
was represented by two Members of Parliament
. The Parliamentary Borough continued until 1950 when it was abolished and replaced with two parliamentary constituencies, Bolton East
and Bolton West
, each with one Member of Parliament. In 1983, Bolton East was abolished and two new constituencies were created, Bolton North East, and Bolton South East covering most of the former Farnworth constituency
. Also in 1983, there were major boundary changes to Bolton West, which took over most of the former Westhoughton constituency
.
Bolton applied for city status in 2011, the result will be known in 2012.
south east of Rivington Pike
(456 m). Bolton lies on relatively flat land on both sides of the clough or steep-banked valley through which the River Croal
flows in a south easterly direction towards the River Irwell
. The geological formation around Bolton consists of sandstones of the Carboniferous series and coal measures, in the northern part of Bolton the lower coal measures are mixed with underlying Millstone Grit
.
At the time of the United Kingdom Census 2001
, according to the Office for National Statistics
, the Urban Subdivision of Bolton was part of the Greater Manchester Urban Area
and had a total resident population of 139,403, of which 67,823 (48.7%) were male and 71,580 (51.3%) were female, living in 57,827 households. The settlement occupied 4446 hectares (17.2 sq mi), compared with 2992 hectares (11.6 sq mi) in the 1991 census, though it should be noted that the 2001 Urban census area contains a large rural area to the south of the town. Its population density was 31.35 people per hectare compared with an average of 40.20 across the Greater Manchester Urban Area. The median age of the population was 35, compared with 36 within the Greater Manchester Urban Area and 37 across England and Wales.
The majority of the population of Bolton were born in England (87.10%); 2.05% were born elsewhere within the United Kingdom, 1.45% within the rest of the European Union, and 9.38% elsewhere in the world.
Data on religious beliefs across the town in the 2001 census show that 67.9% declared themselves to be Christian
, 12.5% stated that they were Muslim
, 8.6% said they held no religion, and 3.4% reported themselves as Hindu
.
At the time of the 2001 Census, there were 56,390 people in employment who were resident within Bolton. Of these, 21.13% worked in the wholesale and retail trade, including repair of motor vehicles; 18.71% worked within manufacturing industry; 11.00% worked within the health and social work sector and 6.81% were employed in the transport, storage and communication industries.
In the last quarter of the 20th century heavy industry was replaced by service-based activities including data processing, call centres, hi-tech electronics and IT companies. The town retains some traditional industries employing people in paper-manufacturing, packaging, textiles, transportation, steel foundries and building materials. Missiles were produced at the British Aerospace
(BAe) factory in Lostock, now closed. The Reebok
brand's European headquarters are located at the Reebok Stadium
. Bolton is also the home of the family bakery, Warburtons
, established in 1876 on Blackburn Road. On 13 February 2003, Bolton was granted Fairtrade Town
status.
Bolton attracts visitors to its shopping centres, markets, pubs, restaurants and cafes in the town centre
as well retail parks and leisure facilities close to the town centre and in the surrounding towns and suburbs. Tourism plays a part in the economy, visitor attractions include Hall i' th' Wood, Smithills Hall
and Country Park, Last Drop Village, Barrow Bridge and the Bolton Steam Museum
.
There are several regeneration projects planned for Bolton over the next ten years including Church Wharf by Ask Developments and Bluemantle costing £226 million, Merchants Quarter by local developer Charles Topham group costing £200 million, Bolton Innovation Zone(BIZ), a large £300 million development with the University of Bolton at its core. The central street development, by Wilson Bowden Developments Limited is a retail lead development costing £100 million.
In 2008, Watson Steel Structures of Lostock, Bolton was awarded the contract to build the steel structure for the 2012 Olympic arena. The mascots
for the 2012 games are based on two drops of steel from the Lostock firm.
building designed by William Hill and opened in June 1873 by Albert Edward, Prince of Wales
. In the 1930s, the building was extended by Bradshaw Gass & Hope
. Within the Town Hall are the Albert Halls and several function rooms. The original, single Albert Hall was destroyed by fire on 14 November 1981. After rebuilding work, it was replaced by the present Albert Halls, which were opened in 1985.
The Great Hall of Smithills Hall
was built in the 14th century when William de Radcliffe received the Manor of Smithills from the Hultons, the chapel dates from the 16th century and was extended during the 19th. Smithills Hall was where, in 1555, George Marsh
was tried for heresy during the Marian Persecutions
. After being "examined" at Smithills, according to local tradition, George Marsh stamped his foot so hard to re-affirm his faith, that a footprint was left in the stone floor. It is a Grade I listed building and is now a museum.
Hall i' th' Wood
, now a museum, is a late mediaeval yeoman farmer's house built by Laurence Brownlow. Around 1637 it was owned by the Norris family, who added the stone west wing. In the 18th century it was divided up into tenements. Samuel Crompton
lived and worked there. In the 19th century it deteriorated further until in 1895 it was bought by industrialist William Hesketh Lever, who restored it and presented it to Bolton Council
in 1900.
Bolton's 26 conservation areas contain 700 listed buildings, many of which are in the town centre, and there is parkland including the Victorian
Queen's Park
, Leverhulme Park
and other open spaces in the surrounding area. These include Le Mans Crescent, Ye Olde Man & Scythe, Little Bolton Town Hall, The Market Place, Wood Street and Holy Trinity Church. Outside the town centre can be found Mere Hall, Firwood Fold
, Haulgh Hall, Park Cottage, St Mary's Church, Deane, Lostock Hall Gatehouse and All Souls Church. Notable mills still overlooking parts of the town are Falcon Mill, Sir John Holden's Mill and the Swan Lane Mills Complex.
Most views northwards are dominated by Rivington Pike and the Winter Hill TV Mast on the West Pennine Moors above the town.
, passes to the west through Hunger Hill and Westhoughton.
The A666
dual carriageway
(sometimes referred to as 'The Devil's Highway' because of the numeric designation), is a spur from the M61
/M60
motorway interchange through the town centre to Astley Bridge, Egerton, Darwen and Blackburn. The M61
has three dedicated junctions serving the borough.
A network of local buses, coordinated by Transport for Greater Manchester and departing from the bus station
in Moor Lane or Bolton Interchange, serves the Bolton district and beyond. In March 2010, GMPTE launched a consultation which proposed relocating Bolton bus station from Moor Lane to a new site adjacent to Bolton Interchange to improve connections between bus and train services. Bus operators include Arriva North West
, First Manchester
, South Lancs Travel
and Maytree Travel. Bolton is served by the National Express
coach network.
Bolton Interchange is located on the Manchester loop of the West Coast Mainline which was served by Virgin West Coast trains passing through Manchester Piccadilly station
. Managed by Northern Rail
, the station is part of a town-centre transport interchange with services to Manchester, Wigan, Southport, Blackburn and intermediate stations operated by First TransPennine Express
and Northern
trains.
is an independent day school, whose Boys' Division originated around 1516,endowed by Robert Lever in 1641 and by William Hesketh Lever (later Lord Leverhulme) in 1898. It was rebuilt alongside a new Girls' Division in Chorley New Road. Another nearby school, Lord's Independent School, was established by Mr Lord, a local eccentric, in 1906. In 1855 the Bolton Church Institute was founded by Canon James Slade
near to the parish church. This became Canon Slade School
and has since relocated to Bradshaw
.
The town's other secondary schools include Ladybridge High School, Sharples School, Smithills School, Thornleigh Salesian College
, and Withins School. Bolton College
provides further education from sites throughout the borough. Bolton Sixth Form College
comprises the North Campus and Farnworth Campus, with a third campus which is due to open in 2010. The Bolton TIC
(Technical Innovation Centre), opened in 2006, supports local schools by providing additional technical training.
The University of Bolton
, formerly Bolton Institute of Higher Education gained university status in 2005.
There is evidence from Saxon times of Christian
churches and at the time of the Civil War a Puritan and nonconformist
presence in the town. The Unitarians
were among the early dissenting congregations which eventually included Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterian, Seventh Day Adventist and other denominations. Over 40 churches were built during the Victorian era but some are closed, demolished or put to other uses.
Today, the parish of Bolton-le-Moors covers a small area in the town centre, but until the 19th century it covered a much larger area and was divided into eighteen chapelries and townships. The neighbouring ancient parish of Deane
centred around St Mary's Church
once covered a large area to the west and south of Bolton, and the township of Great Lever
was part of the ancient parish of Middleton
.
The Parish Church of St Peter, commonly known as Bolton Parish Church, is an example of the gothic revival style
. Built between 1866 and 1871 of Longridge
stone to designs by Paley
, the church is 67 ft (20.4 m) in width, 156 ft (47.5 m) in length, and 82 ft (25 m) in height. The tower
is 180 ft (54.9 m) high with 13 bells
. The first church on the same site was built in Anglo-Saxon
times. It was rebuilt in Norman
times and again in the early 15th century. Little is known of the first two earlier churches, but the third building was a solid, squat building with a sturdy square tower at the west end. It was modified over the years until it fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1866. Fragments of stone and other artefacts from these first three buildings are displayed in the museum corner of the present church.
St Mary's Deane, once the only church in a parish of ten townships in the hundred of Salford, is a church established in Saxon times. The current building dates from 1250 with extensions and restoration in the 19th century and is a Grade II* listed building.
The red-brick St George's Church was built between 1794–96 when the Little Bolton area was a separate township. Built by Peter Rothwell it was paid for by the Ainsworth family. After the last service in 1975 it was leased to Bolton Council and became a craft centre in 1994.
The New Zakaria Mosque was the first mosque in Bolton and served the Muslim Community who arrived in Bolton from Pakistan and India in the 1960s. Hindus also settled in the town in the 1960s and their first place of worship was in the former St Barnabus Church that was converted to a Hindu temple.
is an English Football League club which was formed in 1874 and for 102 years played at Burnden Park
. The club moved to the Reebok Stadium
in Horwich
in 1997. The club has won four FA Cup
s, the most recent in 1958, and spent 69 seasons in the top division of the English league – more than any club never to have been league champions.
Bolton is home to one of North West England's largest Field Hockey Clubs, Bolton Hockey Club
. There are two local cricket leagues, the Bolton Cricket League
, and the Bolton Cricket Association. Bolton also has a rugby union
club, Bolton RUFC
formed in 1872 situated on Avenue Street. The club operates 4 senior teams, as well as women's and junior sections. Bolton Robots of Doom
is a baseball
club started in 2003, playing home games at The Ball Park at Stapleton Avenue. In addition to the adult team there is a junior team, Bolton Bears. Baseball in Bolton dates back to 1938 with a team called Bolton Scarlets. Bolton is also home to the Bolton Bulldogs, an American football team which plays home games at Smithills School operating varsity and junior varsity (JV) teams.
Speedway racing
, known as Dirt Track Racing, was staged at Raikes Park in the pioneer days – 1928 – but the venue was short lived.
Bolton born Amir Khan
became the WBA World light-welterweight champion on 18 July 2009 at the age of 22, making him Britain's third-youngest world champion boxer.
According to a survey of the British Association for the Advancement of Science
Boltonians are the friendliest people in Britain. Humphrey Spender
photographed Bolton calling it Worktown for the Mass-Observation
Project, a social research organization which aimed to record everyday life in Britain. His photographs provide a record of ordinary people living and working in a British pre-War industrial town.
Bolton has several theatres including the Octagon
and independent groups such as Bolton Little Theatre
and the Phoenix Theatre Company. Inside the Town Hall there is a theatre and conference complex, the Albert Halls. Le Mans Crescent, home to the central library, museum, art gallery, aquarium, magistrates' court and town hall, is to be the centre of a new Cultural Quarter. The library and museum are to be extended into the area now occupied by the Magistrates Court. Bolton Museum
and Art Gallery has a fine collection of both local and international art.
Bolton Central Library was one of the earliest public libraries established after the Public Libraries Act 1850
, opening in October 1853 in the Exchange Building on the old market square (Victoria Square) before moving to Le Mans Crescent in July 1938. The Bolton Symphony Orchestra performs regular concerts at the Albert Halls and Victoria Hall in the town centre.
The 2008 BBC Radio 3 Adult Choir of the Year and three times gold medal winning barbershop chorus The Cottontown Chorus is based in Bolton.
The town's daily newspaper is The Bolton News
, formerly the Bolton Evening News. There is a weekly free paper, the Bolton Journal and Bolton Council's monthly newspaper, Bolton Scene. The town is part of the BBC North West
and ITV Granada
television regions, served by the Winter Hill transmitter near Belmont
. Local radio is provided by Tower FM
which broadcasts across Bolton and Bury
and a new radio station, Bolton FM began broadcasting in 2009.
The industrial village of Barrow Bridge
became Millbank in Benjamin Disraeli's novel Coningsby
. Spring and Port Wine
by playwright, Bill Naughton
was filmed and set in Bolton and The Family Way
based on Naughton's play All in Good Time was also filmed and set in Bolton. Peter Kay
filmed comedy TV series That Peter Kay Thing
in the town.
Bolton buildings have stood in for other towns and cities. Le Mans Crescent has featured as a London street in the Jeremy Brett
version of Sherlock Holmes
and a Russian secret service building in the 1990s comedy series "Sleepers". The 1990s BBC drama "Between the Lines" also filmed an episode in Victoria Square.
force by Bolton Central Division which covers the town centre, Rumworth and Halliwell. Great Lever and Little Lever are covered by Farnworth Police Station, Astley Bridge Police Station covers, Tonge and The Haulgh, Breightmet and Crompton while Heaton and Lostock, and Smithills are served by Horwich Police (Middlebrook). The statutory emergency fire and rescue service is provided by the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service
, from Bolton Central, Bolton North, Horwich and Farnworth Fire Stations. Hospital services are provided by the Royal Bolton Hospital NHS Foundation Trust who provide an Accident and Emergency
and other services at Royal Bolton Hospital in Farnworth. Community health services, including GPs, district and community nurses, dentists and pharmacists, are co-ordinated by
the Bolton Primary Care Trust. Waste management is co-ordinated by the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority (GMWDA). Bolton's Distribution Network Operator for electricity is Electricity North West Ltd. United Utilities manage Bolton's drinking and waste water.
s, musician
s, sports personalities
, engineer
s, inventors, politician
s, authors and other notable people who made a mark in different periods of time, whether at local, national or international level. Among them were Protestant martyr George Marsh
, Samuel Crompton
, 1753–1827, the inventor of the spinning mule that revolutionised the textile industry, and industrialist William Hesketh Lever, 1851–1925, Lord Leverhulme
of Bolton-le-Moors.
Playwright and author Bill Naughton
was born in Ireland but brought up in Bolton from an early age. Fred Dibnah
, a Lancastrian steeplejack who became a much-loved television historian of Britain's industrial past, was born and lived in Bolton. More recently Bolton is known for world champion boxer, Amir Khan
, Peter Kay
, comedian, actor, writer and producer, and Philip Craven
, International Paralympic Committee
President.
Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 2.6 million. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the...
, in the North West of England
North West England
North West England, informally known as The North West, is one of the nine official regions of England.North West England had a 2006 estimated population of 6,853,201 the third most populated region after London and the South East...
. Close to the West Pennine Moors
West Pennine Moors
The West Pennine Moors cover an area of approximately of moorland and reservoirs in Lancashire and Greater Manchester, England.The West Pennine Moors are separated from the main Pennine range by the Irwell Valley. The moorland includes Withnell, Anglezarke and Rivington Moors in the extreme west,...
, it is 10 miles (16.1 km) north west of the city of Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
. Bolton is surrounded by several smaller towns and villages which together form the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton
Metropolitan Borough of Bolton
The Metropolitan Borough of Bolton is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It is named after its largest settlement, Bolton, but covers a far larger area which includes Blackrod, Farnworth, Horwich, Kearsley and Westhoughton, and a suburban and rural element from the West Pennine...
, of which Bolton is the administrative centre
Administrative centre
An administrative centre is a term often used in several countries to refer to a county town, or other seat of regional or local government, or the place where the central administration of a commune is located....
. The town of Bolton has a population of 139,403, whilst the wider metropolitan borough has a population of 262,400.
Historically
Historic counties of England
The historic counties of England are subdivisions of England established for administration by the Normans and in most cases based on earlier Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and shires...
a part of Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
, Bolton originated as a small settlement in the moorland known as Bolton le Moors
Bolton le Moors
Bolton le Moors was a civil parish and ecclesiastical parish of the hundred of Salford in the historic county of Lancashire, England...
. During the English Civil War
English Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...
the town was a Parliamentarian
Roundhead
"Roundhead" was the nickname given to the supporters of the Parliament during the English Civil War. Also known as Parliamentarians, they fought against King Charles I and his supporters, the Cavaliers , who claimed absolute power and the divine right of kings...
outpost in a staunchly Royalist
Cavalier
Cavalier was the name used by Parliamentarians for a Royalist supporter of King Charles I and son Charles II during the English Civil War, the Interregnum, and the Restoration...
region, and as a result Bolton was stormed by 3,000 Royalist troops led by Prince Rupert of the Rhine
Prince Rupert of the Rhine
Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Duke of Bavaria, 1st Duke of Cumberland, 1st Earl of Holderness , commonly called Prince Rupert of the Rhine, KG, FRS was a noted soldier, admiral, scientist, sportsman, colonial governor and amateur artist during the 17th century...
in 1644. In what became known as the Bolton Massacre
Bolton Massacre
The Bolton Massacre, sometimes recorded as the Storming of Bolton, was an episode in the English Civil War, on 28 May 1644. The strongly Parliamentarian town was stormed and captured by the Royalist forces under Prince Rupert of the Rhine. It was alleged that up to 1,600 of Bolton's defenders and...
, 1,600 residents were killed and 700 were taken prisoner.
Noted as a former mill town
Mill town
A mill town, also known as factory town or mill village, is typically a settlement that developed around one or more mills or factories .- United Kingdom:...
, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish
Flemish people
The Flemings or Flemish are the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of Belgium, where they are mostly found in the northern region of Flanders. They are one of two principal cultural-linguistic groups in Belgium, the other being the French-speaking Walloons...
weavers settled in the area during the 15th century, developing a wool and cotton weaving tradition. The urbanisation and development of Bolton largely coincided with the introduction of textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution
Textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution
The industrial revolution changed the nature of work and society. Opinion varies as to the exact date, but it is estimated that the First Industrial Revolution took place between 1750 and 1850, and the second phase or Second Industrial Revolution between 1860 and 1900. The three key drivers in...
. It was a boomtown
Boomtown
A boomtown is a community that experiences sudden and rapid population and economic growth. The growth is normally attributed to the nearby discovery of a precious resource such as gold, silver, or oil, although the term can also be applied to communities growing very rapidly for different reasons,...
of the 19th century and at its zenith, in 1929, its 216 cotton mill
Cotton mill
A cotton mill is a factory that houses spinning and weaving machinery. Typically built between 1775 and 1930, mills spun cotton which was an important product during the Industrial Revolution....
s and 26 bleaching and dying works made it one of the largest and most productive centres of cotton spinning
Spinning (textiles)
Spinning is a major industry. It is part of the textile manufacturing process where three types of fibre are converted into yarn, then fabric, then textiles. The textiles are then fabricated into clothes or other artifacts. There are three industrial processes available to spin yarn, and a...
in the world. The British cotton industry declined sharply after the First World War
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, and by the 1980s cotton manufacture had virtually ceased in Bolton.
Bolton has had notable success in sport; Premier League football club Bolton Wanderers
Bolton Wanderers F.C.
Bolton Wanderers Football Club is an English professional association football club based in the area of Horwich in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester. They began their current spell in the Premier League in 2001....
play home games at the Reebok Stadium
Reebok Stadium
The Reebok Stadium is the home stadium of English Premier League football club Bolton Wanderers, and is located on the Middlebrook Retail Park in Horwich, in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester. It is commonly known as 'The Reebok'...
(Reebok
Reebok
Reebok International Limited, a subsidiary of the German sportswear company Adidas since 2005, is a producer of Athletic shoes, apparel, and accessories. The name comes from the Afrikaans spelling of rhebok, a type of African antelope or gazelle...
, the sportswear company, is based in the town) and The WBA World light-welterweight champion Amir Khan
Amir Khan (boxer)
Amir Iqbal Khan , is a British Pakistani professional boxer who is currently the unified WBA & IBF light welterweight champion....
was born in the town. Bolton also has several notable cultural aspects, including The Octagon Theatre
Octagon Theatre, Bolton
The Octagon Theatre is a producing theatre located in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England.-Programme:The Octagon produces between eight and nine professional theatre productions a year in its Main Auditorium...
and the Bolton Museum
Bolton Museum
Bolton Museum is a public museum and art gallery in the town of Bolton, Greater Manchester, northern England, owned by Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council....
and Art Gallery, as well as one of the earliest public libraries established after the Public Libraries Act 1850
Public Libraries Act 1850
The Public Libraries Act 1850 was an Act of the United Kingdom Parliament which first gave local boroughs the power to establish free public libraries...
.
Toponymy
The name Bolton derives from the Old English bothel and tun, meaning a "settlement with a special building". The first record of the town dates from 1185 as Boelton. It was recorded as Bothelton in 1212, Bowelton in a charter granted by Henry III in 1251, Botelton in 1257, Boulton in 1288, and Bolton after 1307. The town's motto of Supera Moras means "overcome difficulties" (or "delays"), and is a pun on the Bolton-super-Moras version of the name meaning literally, 'Bolton on the moors'.Early history
Man has lived on the moors around Bolton for many thousands of years evidenced by a stone circleStone circle
A stone circle is a monument of standing stones arranged in a circle. Such monuments have been constructed across the world throughout history for many different reasons....
on Cheetham Close
Cheetham Close
Cheetham Close is a megalith and scheduled ancient monument located in Lancashire, very close to the boundary with Greater Manchester, England. The megalith was in good condition until a farmer from Turton sledgehammered the circle in the 1870s...
above Egerton
Egerton, Greater Manchester
Egerton, pronounced edgerton, is a village in the unparished area of South Turton, in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. Historically part of Lancashire, it is situated three miles north of Bolton and 12 miles north west of Manchester City Centre within the West...
and Bronze Age
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a period characterized by the use of copper and its alloy bronze as the chief hard materials in the manufacture of some implements and weapons. Chronologically, it stands between the Stone Age and Iron Age...
burial mounds on Winter Hill. A Bronze Age mound was excavated in Victorian times outside Haulgh Hall. The Romans built roads from Manchester to Ribchester
Ribchester
Ribchester is a village and civil parish within the Ribble Valley district of Lancashire, England. It lies on the banks of the River Ribble, northwest of Blackburn and east of Preston.The village has a long history with evidence of Bronze Age beginnings...
to the east and a road along what is now the A6 to the west. It is claimed that Agricola
Gnaeus Julius Agricola
Gnaeus Julius Agricola was a Roman general responsible for much of the Roman conquest of Britain. His biography, the De vita et moribus Iulii Agricolae, was the first published work of his son-in-law, the historian Tacitus, and is the source for most of what is known about him.Born to a noted...
built a fort at Blackrod
Blackrod
Blackrod is a settlement and civil parish of the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. It is north-northeast of Wigan and west of Bolton and, according to the United Kingdom Census 2001, has a population of 5,300....
by clearing land above the forest. Evidence of a Saxon
Saxons
The Saxons were a confederation of Germanic tribes originating on the North German plain. The Saxons earliest known area of settlement is Northern Albingia, an area approximately that of modern Holstein...
settlement exists in the form of religious objects found when the Victorian parish church was built.
In 1067 Great Bolton
Great Bolton
Great Bolton was a township of the civil and ecclesiastical parish of Bolton le Moors in the Salford hundred of Lancashire, England. Despite its name, Great Bolton had a smaller acreage than its northern neighbour Little Bolton from which it was separated by the River...
was the property of Roger de Poitou and after 1100 Roger de Meresheys. Eventually it became property of the Pilkingtons
Pilkington of Lancashire
The Pilkington family has its origins in the ancient township of Pilkington in the historic county of Lancashire, England. After about 1405 the family seat was Stand Old Hall which was built to replace Old Hall in Pilkington. The new hall was built on high land overlooking Pilkington's medieval...
who forfeited it in the Civil War and the Stanleys who became Earls of Derby. Great Bolton and Little Bolton
Little Bolton
Little Bolton was a township of the civil and ecclesiastical parish of Bolton le Moors in the Salford hundred of Lancashire, England. Besides the main part of Little Bolton, it had three detached parts which were separated by areas of Lower Sharples and Higher Sharples...
were part of the Marsey fee, in 1212 Little Bolton was held by Roger de Bolton as plough-land, by the service of the twelfth part of a knight's fee to Randle de Marsey. The church in Bolton has an early foundation although the date is not known, it was given by the lord of the manor to the Gilbertine canons of Mattersey Priory
Mattersey Priory
Mattersey Priory is an English Heritage property located near the village of Mattersey, Nottinghamshire, England. It was a Gilbertine monastery.It was founded by Roger son of Ranulph de Mattersey, around 1185....
, in Nottinghamshire, which was founded by Roger de Marsey.
The town was given a charter to hold a market in Churchgate on 14 December 1251 by King Henry III of England
Henry III of England
Henry III was the son and successor of John as King of England, reigning for 56 years from 1216 until his death. His contemporaries knew him as Henry of Winchester. He was the first child king in England since the reign of Æthelred the Unready...
. It was made into a market town and borough by a charter from the Earl of Derby, William de Ferrers, on 14 January 1253. Burgage
Burgage
Burgage is a medieval land term used in England and Scotland, well established by the 13th century. A burgage was a town rental property , owned by a king or lord. The property usually, and distinctly, consisted of a house on a long and narrow plot of land, with the narrow end facing the street...
plots were laid out on Churchgate and Deansgate in the centre of the medieval town near where Ye Olde Man and Scythe
The Man and Scythe
Ye Olde Man & Scythe is a public house located on Churchgate, in Bolton, England. The first recorded mention of it by name was in 1251 making it one of the ten oldest public houses in Britain and the oldest in Bolton...
dating from 1251 is situated and a market was held here until the 18th century.
In 1337 Flemish weavers settled here and introduced the manufacture of woollen cloth. More Flemish weavers fleeing the Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
persecutions also settled here in the 17th century. This second wave of settlers wove fustian
Fustian
Fustian is a term for a variety of heavy woven, mostly cotton fabrics, chiefly prepared for menswear. It is also used to refer to pompous, inflated or pretentious writing or speech, from at least the time of Shakespeare...
, a rough cloth made of linen and cotton. Digging sea coal around Bolton was recorded in 1374. There was an outbreak of the plague in the town in 1623.
English Civil War
During the English Civil WarEnglish Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...
, Bolton supported Parliament and the Puritan
Puritan
The Puritans were a significant grouping of English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries. Puritanism in this sense was founded by some Marian exiles from the clergy shortly after the accession of Elizabeth I of England in 1558, as an activist movement within the Church of England...
cause. There was a parliamentary garrison in the town which was twice unsuccessfully attacked but on 28 May 1644 Prince Rupert's army along with troops under the Earl of Derby
James Stanley, 7th Earl of Derby
James Stanley, 7th Earl of Derby KG was a supporter of the Royalist cause in the English Civil War.Born at Knowsley, he is sometimes styled the Great Earl of Derby, eldest son of William Stanley, 6th Earl of Derby and Lady Elizabeth de Vere. During his father's life he was known as Lord Strange...
attacked again. There were 1,500 dead, and 700 taken prisoner and the town plundered. It became known as the Bolton Massacre. At the end of the Civil War Lord Derby was tried as a traitor at Chester and condemned to death. When his appeal for pardon to parliament was rejected he attempted to escape but was recaptured and executed outside Ye Olde Man & Scythe Inn at Bolton on 15 October 1651 for his part in the Bolton Massacre.
Industry
A tradition of cottage spinning and weaving and the mechanisation of the textile industry by local inventors, Richard ArkwrightRichard Arkwright
Sir Richard Arkwright , was an Englishman who, although the patents were eventually overturned, is often credited for inventing the spinning frame — later renamed the water frame following the transition to water power. He also patented a carding engine that could convert raw cotton into yarn...
and Samuel Crompton
Samuel Crompton
Samuel Crompton was an English inventor and pioneer of the spinning industry.- Early life :Samuel Crompton was born at 10 Firwood Fold, Bolton, Lancashire to George and Betty Crompton . Samuel had two younger sisters...
led to the rapid growth of Bolton in the 19th century. Crompton, whilst living at Hall i'th' Wood, invented the spinning mule in 1779. It revolutionised cotton spinning by combining the roller drafting of Arkwright's water frame with the carriage drafting and spindle tip twisting of James Hargreaves
James Hargreaves
James Hargreaves was a weaver, carpenter and an inventor in Lancashire, England. He is credited with inventing the spinning Jenny in 1764....
's spinning jenny, producing a high quality yarn. Self-acting mules were used in Bolton mills until the 1960s producing fine yarn. The earliest mills were situated by the streams and river as seen today at Barrow Bridge, but steam power led to the construction of the large multi-storey mills and chimneys that came to dominate Bolton's skyline, some of which survive today. By 1911 the textile industry in Bolton employed about 36,000 people. The last mill to be constructed was Sir John Holden's Mill in 1927. The cotton industry declined in the 1920s. A brief upturn after World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
was not sustained and the industry had virtually vanished by the end of the 20th century.
The streams draining the surrounding moors into the River Croal also provided the water necessary for the bleach
Bleach
Bleach refers to a number of chemicals that remove color, whiten, or disinfect, often via oxidation. Common chemical bleaches include household chlorine bleach , lye, oxygen bleach , and bleaching powder...
works that were a feature of this area. Bleaching using chlorine
Chlorine
Chlorine is the chemical element with atomic number 17 and symbol Cl. It is the second lightest halogen, found in the periodic table in group 17. The element forms diatomic molecules under standard conditions, called dichlorine...
was introduced in the 1790s by the Ainsworths at Halliwell Bleachworks. Bolton and the surrounding villages to the north had over 30 bleachworks including the Lever Bank Bleach Works
Lever Bank Bleach Works
Lever Bank Bleach Works was a Bleach Works at Ladyshore, near Little Lever, Bolton. The works was owned by Thomas Ridgway & Sons. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would appear to be a direct descendent of this family.-Location:...
in the Irwell Valley.
Growth of the textile industry was also assisted by the availability of coal in the Bolton area. By 1896 John Fletcher owned coal mines at Ladyshore, Little Lever; The Earl of Bradford had a coal mine at Great Lever; the Darcy Lever Coal Company had mines at Darcy Lever and there were also coal mines at Tonge, Breightmet, Deane and Doffcocker. Some of these pits were close to the canal providing the owners with markets in Bolton and Manchester. Coal mining declined in the 20th century.
Important transport links also contributed to the growth of the town and the textile industry; Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal, constructed in 1791, connected the town to Bury
Bury
Bury is a town in Greater Manchester, England. It lies on the River Irwell, east of Bolton, west-southwest of Rochdale, and north-northwest of the city of Manchester...
and Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
providing transport for coal and other basic materials. The Bolton and Leigh Railway
Bolton and Leigh Railway
The Bolton and Leigh Railway was the first public railway in the historic county of Lancashire, England. It opened in 1828 for goods.-History:...
was the oldest in Lancashire, opening to goods traffic in 1828 and Great Moor Street station
Bolton Great Moor Street railway station
Bolton Great Moor Street railway station was the first railway station in Bolton, opened on 11 June 1831 by the Bolton and Leigh Railway. Originally named simply Bolton, it was renamed Bolton Great Moor Street in October 1849...
opened to passengers in 1831. This railway was connected to the Leeds and Liverpool Canal
Leeds and Liverpool Canal
The Leeds and Liverpool Canal is a canal in Northern England, linking the cities of Leeds and Liverpool. Over a distance of , it crosses the Pennines, and includes 91 locks on the main line...
, an important link with the major port of Liverpool for the import of raw cotton
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....
from America. Local firms built locomotives for the railway, in 1830 "Union" was built by Rothwell, Hick and Co.
Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell
Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell was an engineering company in Bolton, England.Set up in 1830, the partners became interested in the production of steam locomotives after the Rainhill Trials...
and two locomotives, "Salamander" and "Veteran" were built by Crook and Dean.
Bolton's first Mayor, Charles James Darbishire was sympathetic to Chartism
Chartism
Chartism was a movement for political and social reform in the United Kingdom during the mid-19th century, between 1838 and 1859. It takes its name from the People's Charter of 1838. Chartism was possibly the first mass working class labour movement in the world...
and a supporter of the Anti-Corn Law League
Anti-Corn Law League
The Anti-Corn Law League was in effect the resumption of the Anti-Corn Law Association, which had been created in London in 1836 but did not obtain widespread popularity. The Anti-Corn Law League was founded in Manchester in 1838...
. In August 1839 Bolton was besieged by Chartist rioters and the Riot Act
Riot Act
The Riot Act was an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain that authorised local authorities to declare any group of twelve or more people to be unlawfully assembled, and thus have to disperse or face punitive action...
was read and special constables sworn in. The mayor accompanied soldiers who were called to rescue special constables at Little Bolton Town Hall which was besieged by a mob and the incident ended without bloodshed.
By 1900 Bolton was Lancashire's third largest engineering centre after Manchester and Oldham. About 9,000 men were employed in the industry, half of them working for Dobson and Barlow
Dobson & Barlow
Dobson and Barlow were textile machinery manufacturers from Bolton. The partnership was founded in 1851 between Benjamin Dobson and Edward Barlow, building on a production facilities extending back to 1790.-Later history:...
in Kay Street. The firm made textile machinery. Another engineering company was Hick, Hargreaves & Co, based at the Soho Foundry. This firm made Lancashire Boilers and heavy machinery. Thomas Ryder and Son of Turner Bridge was an important producer of machine tools for the international motor industry.
Service industries including retail and leisure grew in the 1970s, partly replacing jobs in heavy industry. The first modern retail development was Crompton Place Shopping Centre, opened in 1971.
Lord Leverhulme
In 1899 William Lever, Lord LeverhulmeWilliam Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme
William Hesketh Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme was an English industrialist, philanthropist, and politician....
, bought Hall i'th' Wood as a memorial to Samuel Crompton inventor of the spinning mule. Lever restored the dilapidated building and presented it to the town in 1902, having turned it into a museum furnished with household goods typical of domestic family life in the 16th and 17th centuries. Lever re-endowed Bolton School
Bolton School
Bolton School is an independent day school in Bolton, in the North-West of England. It comprises a co-educational Nursery and Infant School and single sex Junior and Senior Schools . With almost 2,400 pupils it is one of the largest independent day schools in the country.-History:Bolton School...
s, giving land and his house on Chorley New Road. He presented the town with 67 acres (271,139.6 m²) of land for a public park which the corporation named Leverhulme Park
Leverhulme Park
Leverhulme Park is the largest park in the town of Bolton, Greater Manchester. It was donated to the people of Bolton by, and named after, the late Lord Leverhulme. The park is bounded by the Breightmet, Darcy Lever, the Haulgh, and Tonge Fold. Since its earlier days as simply a park, Leverhulme...
in 1914. In 1902 he gave the people of Bolton Lever Park at Rivington
Rivington
Rivington is a small village and civil parish of the Borough of Chorley, Lancashire, England, occupying . It is about southeast of Chorley and about northwest of Bolton. Rivington is situated on the fringe of the West Pennine Moors, at the foot of Rivington Pike...
. In 1911, Lever consulted Thomas Mawson, landscape architect
Landscape architect
A landscape architect is a person involved in the planning, design and sometimes direction of a landscape, garden, or distinct space. The professional practice is known as landscape architecture....
and lecturer in Landscape Design at the University of Liverpool, regarding town planning in Bolton. Mawson published "Bolton – a Study in Town Planning and Civic Art" and gave lectures entitled "Bolton Housing and Town Planning Society" which formed the basis of an illustrated book "Bolton – as it is and as it might be". In 1924, Leverhulme presented Bolton with an ambitious plan to rebuild the town centre based on Mawson's designs funded partly by himself. The Council declined in favour of extending the Town Hall and building the Civic Centre.
First World War
During the night of 26 September 1916, Bolton was the target for one of the first aerial offensives in history. L21, a ZeppelinZeppelin
A Zeppelin is a type of rigid airship pioneered by the German Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin in the early 20th century. It was based on designs he had outlined in 1874 and detailed in 1893. His plans were reviewed by committee in 1894 and patented in the United States on 14 March 1899...
commanded by Oberleutnant
Oberleutnant
Oberleutnant is a junior officer rank in the militaries of Germany, Switzerland and Austria. In the German Army, it dates from the early 19th century. Translated as "Senior Lieutenant", the rank is typically bestowed upon commissioned officers after five to six years of active duty...
Kurt Frankenburg of the Imperial German Navy
Kaiserliche Marine
The Imperial German Navy was the German Navy created at the time of the formation of the German Empire. It existed between 1871 and 1919, growing out of the small Prussian Navy and Norddeutsche Bundesmarine, which primarily had the mission of coastal defense. Kaiser Wilhelm II greatly expanded...
, dropped 21 bombs on the town, 5 of them on the working class area of Kirk Street, killing 13 and destroying 6 houses. Further attacks followed on other parts of the town, including three incendaries dropped close to the Town Hall.
Governance
Lying within the county boundaries of LancashireLancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
, until the early 19th century, Great Bolton
Great Bolton
Great Bolton was a township of the civil and ecclesiastical parish of Bolton le Moors in the Salford hundred of Lancashire, England. Despite its name, Great Bolton had a smaller acreage than its northern neighbour Little Bolton from which it was separated by the River...
and Little Bolton
Little Bolton
Little Bolton was a township of the civil and ecclesiastical parish of Bolton le Moors in the Salford hundred of Lancashire, England. Besides the main part of Little Bolton, it had three detached parts which were separated by areas of Lower Sharples and Higher Sharples...
were two of the eighteen township
Township (England)
In England, a township is a local division or district of a large parish containing a village or small town usually having its own church...
s of the ecclesiastical parish
Parish
A parish is a territorial unit historically under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of one parish priest, who might be assisted in his pastoral duties by a curate or curates - also priests but not the parish priest - from a more or less central parish church with its associated organization...
of Bolton le Moors
Bolton le Moors
Bolton le Moors was a civil parish and ecclesiastical parish of the hundred of Salford in the historic county of Lancashire, England...
. These townships were separated by the River Croal
River Croal
The River Croal is a river located in Greater Manchester, England. It is a tributary of the River Irwell.Rising at the confluence of Middle Brook and Deane Church Brook, it flows eastwards through Bolton, collecting Gilnow Brook and the larger River Tonge at Darcy Lever...
, Little Bolton on the north bank and Great Bolton on the south. Bolton Poor Law Union
Poor Law Union
A Poor Law Union was a unit used for local government in the United Kingdom from the 19th century. The administration of the Poor Law was the responsibility of parishes, which varied wildly in their size, populations, financial resources, rateable values and requirements...
was formed on 1 February 1837. It continued using existing poorhouses at Fletcher Street and Turton but in 1856 started to build a new workhouse
Workhouse
In England and Wales a workhouse, colloquially known as a spike, was a place where those unable to support themselves were offered accommodation and employment...
at Fishpool Farm in Farnworth. Townleys Hospital was built on the site which is now Royal Bolton Hospital.
In 1838, Great Bolton, most of Little Bolton and the Haulgh area of Tonge with Haulgh were incorporated under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835
Municipal Corporations Act 1835
The Municipal Corporations Act 1835 – sometimes known as the Municipal Reform Act, was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in the incorporated boroughs of England and Wales...
as a municipal borough
Municipal borough
Municipal boroughs were a type of local government district which existed in England and Wales between 1835 and 1974, in Northern Ireland from 1840 to 1973 and in the Republic of Ireland from 1840 to 2002...
, the second to be created in England. Further additions were made adding part of Rumworth
Rumworth
Rumworth is an electoral ward of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. Historically it was part of the hundred of Salford in Lancashire and centre of the Parish of Deane which once covered roughly half of the present Metropolitan Borough of Bolton...
in 1872 and part of Halliwell
Halliwell, Greater Manchester
Halliwell is predominantly a residential area of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. It gives its name to an electoral ward of the wider Metropolitan Borough of Bolton. Halliwell lies about to the north west of Bolton town centre and is bounded by Tonge Moor to the east and Heaton to the south...
in 1877. In 1889, Bolton was granted County Borough
County borough
County borough is a term introduced in 1889 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland , to refer to a borough or a city independent of county council control. They were abolished by the Local Government Act 1972 in England and Wales, but continue in use for lieutenancy and shrievalty in...
status and became self-governing and independent from Lancashire County Council
Lancashire County Council
Lancashire County Council is the upper-tier local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Lancashire, England. It currently consists of 84 councillors, and is controlled by the Conservative Party, who won control of the council in the local council elections in June 2009, ending 28 years of...
jurisdiction. In 1898, the borough was extended further by adding the civil parishes of Breightmet
Breightmet
Breightmet is a neighbourhood of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. Historically a township of the civil and ecclesiastical parish of Bolton le Moors in the Salford hundred of Lancashire, it lies 2 miles north east of Bolton and 4 miles north-west of Bury...
, Darcy Lever
Darcy Lever
Darcy Lever is a township within the Metropoliton Borough of Bolton in Greater Manchester, England. Historically part of Lancashire, the village lies on the B6209 , between Bolton and Little Lever...
, Great Lever
Great Lever
Great Lever is mainly a residential suburb of Bolton in Greater Manchester, England. Historically within Lancashire, it is about 2½ miles south of Bolton town centre and the same distance north of Farnworth town centre. Great Lever has many shops and services serving the local community...
, the rest of Halliwell, Heaton
Heaton, Greater Manchester
Heaton is a mostly residential district and council ward of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. It lies about two miles north west of Bolton town centre...
, Lostock, Middle Hulton
Middle Hulton
Middle Hulton was a township of the civil and ecclesiastical parish of Deane in the Salford hundred of Lancashire, England. It was located miles south west of Bolton.-History:...
, the rest of Rumworth which had been renamed Deane
Deane, Greater Manchester
Deane is an area of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. It is about south west of Bolton and northwest of the city of Manchester.Historically a part of Lancashire, the Parish of Deane was once one of four parishes within the hundred of Salford and covered roughly half of the present...
in 1894, Smithills, and Tonge plus Astley Bridge Urban District, and part of Over Hulton
Over Hulton
Over Hulton is a suburb of Westhoughton within the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, in Greater Manchester,England.It lies south west of Bolton.-History:...
civil parish. The County Borough of Bolton
County Borough of Bolton
Bolton was, from 1838 to 1974, a local government district in the northwest of England, conterminate with the town of Bolton.-History:Bolton was created a free borough in 1253 when William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby granted a charter. However the borough did not develop into a self-governing...
was abolished in 1974 and became a constituent part of the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton in Greater Manchester.
Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council is divided into 20 wards, each of which elects three councillors for a term of up to four years. As of January 2010 the Council has no party in overall control. The seats are divided, Labour
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
– 28, Conservative
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
– 23 and Liberal Democrats – 9.
Under the Reform Act of 1832
Reform Act 1832
The Representation of the People Act 1832 was an Act of Parliament that introduced wide-ranging changes to the electoral system of England and Wales...
, a Parliamentary Borough
Parliamentary borough
Parliamentary boroughs are a type of administrative division, usually covering urban areas, that are entitled to representation in a Parliament...
was established. The Bolton constituency
Bolton (UK Parliament constituency)
Bolton was a borough constituency centred on the town of Bolton in the county of Lancashire. It returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons for the Parliament of the United Kingdom, elected by the bloc vote system....
was represented by two Members of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
. The Parliamentary Borough continued until 1950 when it was abolished and replaced with two parliamentary constituencies, Bolton East
Bolton East (UK Parliament constituency)
Bolton East was a borough constituency in the town of Bolton in Greater Manchester . It returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom....
and Bolton West
Bolton West (UK Parliament constituency)
Bolton West is a county constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election...
, each with one Member of Parliament. In 1983, Bolton East was abolished and two new constituencies were created, Bolton North East, and Bolton South East covering most of the former Farnworth constituency
Farnworth (UK Parliament constituency)
Farnworth was a county constituency in Lancashire which returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1918 until it was abolished for the 1983 general election.- Boundaries :...
. Also in 1983, there were major boundary changes to Bolton West, which took over most of the former Westhoughton constituency
Westhoughton (UK Parliament constituency)
Westhoughton was a parliamentary constituency in Lancashire, England. Centred on the former mining and cotton town of Westhoughton, it returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom....
.
Bolton applied for city status in 2011, the result will be known in 2012.
Geography
The early name Bolton le Moors described the position of the town amid the low hills on the edge of the West Pennine MoorsWest Pennine Moors
The West Pennine Moors cover an area of approximately of moorland and reservoirs in Lancashire and Greater Manchester, England.The West Pennine Moors are separated from the main Pennine range by the Irwell Valley. The moorland includes Withnell, Anglezarke and Rivington Moors in the extreme west,...
south east of Rivington Pike
Rivington Pike
Rivington Pike is a hill summit on Winter Hill, part of the West Pennine Moors, overlooking the village of Rivington in Lancashire, England. The nearest towns are Chorley and Horwich. The Pike is a prominent local landmark which derives its name from the Old English hreof plus ing meaning the rough...
(456 m). Bolton lies on relatively flat land on both sides of the clough or steep-banked valley through which the River Croal
River Croal
The River Croal is a river located in Greater Manchester, England. It is a tributary of the River Irwell.Rising at the confluence of Middle Brook and Deane Church Brook, it flows eastwards through Bolton, collecting Gilnow Brook and the larger River Tonge at Darcy Lever...
flows in a south easterly direction towards the River Irwell
River Irwell
The River Irwell is a long river which flows through the Irwell Valley in the counties of Lancashire and Greater Manchester in North West England. The river's source is at Irwell Springs on Deerplay Moor, approximately north of Bacup, in the parish of Cliviger, Lancashire...
. The geological formation around Bolton consists of sandstones of the Carboniferous series and coal measures, in the northern part of Bolton the lower coal measures are mixed with underlying Millstone Grit
Millstone Grit
Millstone Grit is the name given to any of a number of coarse-grained sandstones of Carboniferous age which occur in the Northern England. The name derives from its use in earlier times as a source of millstones for use principally in watermills...
.
Demography
| Bolton Compared | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 Census United Kingdom Census 2001 A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194.... |
Bolton | Bolton (borough) Metropolitan Borough of Bolton The Metropolitan Borough of Bolton is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It is named after its largest settlement, Bolton, but covers a far larger area which includes Blackrod, Farnworth, Horwich, Kearsley and Westhoughton, and a suburban and rural element from the West Pennine... |
GM Urban Area Greater Manchester Urban Area The Greater Manchester Urban Area is an area of land defined by the Office for National Statistics consisting of the large conurbation that encompasses the city of Manchester and the continuous metropolitan area that spreads outwards from it, forming much of Greater Manchester in North West England... |
England England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental... |
| Total population | 139,403 | 261,037 | 2,240,230 | 49,138,831 |
| White | 81.6% | 89.0% | 90.3% | 90.9% |
| Asian | 15.8% | 9.1% | 6.2% | 4.6% |
| Black | 0.9% | 0.6% | 1.3% | 2.3% |
| Source: Office for National Statistics | ||||
At the time of the United Kingdom Census 2001
United Kingdom Census 2001
A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194....
, according to the Office for National Statistics
Office for National Statistics
The Office for National Statistics is the executive office of the UK Statistics Authority, a non-ministerial department which reports directly to the Parliament of the United Kingdom.- Overview :...
, the Urban Subdivision of Bolton was part of the Greater Manchester Urban Area
Greater Manchester Urban Area
The Greater Manchester Urban Area is an area of land defined by the Office for National Statistics consisting of the large conurbation that encompasses the city of Manchester and the continuous metropolitan area that spreads outwards from it, forming much of Greater Manchester in North West England...
and had a total resident population of 139,403, of which 67,823 (48.7%) were male and 71,580 (51.3%) were female, living in 57,827 households. The settlement occupied 4446 hectares (17.2 sq mi), compared with 2992 hectares (11.6 sq mi) in the 1991 census, though it should be noted that the 2001 Urban census area contains a large rural area to the south of the town. Its population density was 31.35 people per hectare compared with an average of 40.20 across the Greater Manchester Urban Area. The median age of the population was 35, compared with 36 within the Greater Manchester Urban Area and 37 across England and Wales.
The majority of the population of Bolton were born in England (87.10%); 2.05% were born elsewhere within the United Kingdom, 1.45% within the rest of the European Union, and 9.38% elsewhere in the world.
Data on religious beliefs across the town in the 2001 census show that 67.9% declared themselves to be Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
, 12.5% stated that they were Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
, 8.6% said they held no religion, and 3.4% reported themselves as Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
.
Population change
| Between the 1801 and 1891 censuses Census in the United Kingdom Coincident full censuses have taken place in the different jurisdictions of the United Kingdom every ten years since 1801, with the exceptions of 1941 and in both Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State in 1921; simultaneous censuses were taken in the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, with... , given population figures are for the former townships of Great Bolton and Little Bolton. |
||||||||||
| Year | 1801 | 1811 | 1821 | 1831 | 1841 | 1851 | 1861 | 1871 | 1881 | 1891 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Great Bolton | 12,549 | 17,070 | 22,037 | 28,299 | 33,449 | 39,923 | 43,435 | 45,313 | 45,694 | 47,067 |
| Little Bolton | 4,867 | 7,099 | 9,258 | 12,896 | 15,707 | 19,888 | 24,942 | 35,013 | 41,937 | 44,307 |
| Sources: Local population statistics. Great Bolton Tn/CP: Total Population. Little Bolton Tn/CP: Total Population. | ||||||||||
| Between the 1901 and 2001 censuses Census in the United Kingdom Coincident full censuses have taken place in the different jurisdictions of the United Kingdom every ten years since 1801, with the exceptions of 1941 and in both Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State in 1921; simultaneous censuses were taken in the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, with... , given population figures are for the total area of Bolton. |
|||||||||||
| Year | 1901 | 1911 | 1921 | 1931 | 1939 | 1951 | 1961 | 1971 | 1981 | 1991 | 2001 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Population | 168,215 | 180,851 | 178,683 | 177,250 | 163,823 | 167,167 | 160,789 | 154,223 | 143,921 | 139,020 | 139,403 |
| Sources: County Borough 1901–1971 Urban Subdivision 1981–2001 | |||||||||||
Economy
| Bolton Compared | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 UK Census United Kingdom Census 2001 A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194.... |
Bolton | GM Urban Area Greater Manchester Urban Area The Greater Manchester Urban Area is an area of land defined by the Office for National Statistics consisting of the large conurbation that encompasses the city of Manchester and the continuous metropolitan area that spreads outwards from it, forming much of Greater Manchester in North West England... |
England England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental... |
|
| Population (16–74) | 97,859 | 1,606,414 | 35,532,091 | |
| Full time employment | 37.0% | 40.1% | 40.8% | |
| Part time employment | 11.7% | 11.2% | 11.8% | |
| Self employed | 6.7% | 6.6% | 8.3% | |
| Unemployed | 4.2% | 3.6% | 3.3% | |
| Retired | 13.0% | 13.0% | 13.5% | |
| Source: Office for National Statistics | ||||
At the time of the 2001 Census, there were 56,390 people in employment who were resident within Bolton. Of these, 21.13% worked in the wholesale and retail trade, including repair of motor vehicles; 18.71% worked within manufacturing industry; 11.00% worked within the health and social work sector and 6.81% were employed in the transport, storage and communication industries.
In the last quarter of the 20th century heavy industry was replaced by service-based activities including data processing, call centres, hi-tech electronics and IT companies. The town retains some traditional industries employing people in paper-manufacturing, packaging, textiles, transportation, steel foundries and building materials. Missiles were produced at the British Aerospace
British Aerospace
British Aerospace plc was a UK aircraft, munitions and defence-systems manufacturer. Its head office was in the Warwick House in the Farnborough Aerospace Centre in Farnborough, Hampshire...
(BAe) factory in Lostock, now closed. The Reebok
Reebok
Reebok International Limited, a subsidiary of the German sportswear company Adidas since 2005, is a producer of Athletic shoes, apparel, and accessories. The name comes from the Afrikaans spelling of rhebok, a type of African antelope or gazelle...
brand's European headquarters are located at the Reebok Stadium
Reebok Stadium
The Reebok Stadium is the home stadium of English Premier League football club Bolton Wanderers, and is located on the Middlebrook Retail Park in Horwich, in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester. It is commonly known as 'The Reebok'...
. Bolton is also the home of the family bakery, Warburtons
Warburtons
Warburtons is a British baking firm based founded by Thomas Warburton in 1876 in Bolton, then in Lancashire, now in Greater Manchester, England. For much of its history Warburtons only had bakeries in Lancashire and it remains a family-owned company....
, established in 1876 on Blackburn Road. On 13 February 2003, Bolton was granted Fairtrade Town
Fairtrade Town
Fairtrade Town is a status awarded by a recognized Fairtrade certification body describing an area which is committed to the promotion of Fairtrade certified goods...
status.
Bolton attracts visitors to its shopping centres, markets, pubs, restaurants and cafes in the town centre
as well retail parks and leisure facilities close to the town centre and in the surrounding towns and suburbs. Tourism plays a part in the economy, visitor attractions include Hall i' th' Wood, Smithills Hall
Smithills Hall
Smithills Hall is a Grade I listed manor house, and a Scheduled Monument in the township of Halliwell, now in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. it stands on the slopes of the moors above Bolton at a height of 500 feet, two miles north west of the town centre. It occupies a defensive site near...
and Country Park, Last Drop Village, Barrow Bridge and the Bolton Steam Museum
Bolton Steam Museum
Bolton Steam Museum is a museum in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England, which houses a variety of preserved steam engines. It is owned and run by the Northern Mill Engine Society .-Overview:...
.
There are several regeneration projects planned for Bolton over the next ten years including Church Wharf by Ask Developments and Bluemantle costing £226 million, Merchants Quarter by local developer Charles Topham group costing £200 million, Bolton Innovation Zone(BIZ), a large £300 million development with the University of Bolton at its core. The central street development, by Wilson Bowden Developments Limited is a retail lead development costing £100 million.
In 2008, Watson Steel Structures of Lostock, Bolton was awarded the contract to build the steel structure for the 2012 Olympic arena. The mascots
Wenlock and Mandeville
Wenlock and Mandeville are the official mascots for the 2012 Summer Olympics and Paralympics being held in London, United Kingdom.The mascots were unveiled on 19 May 2010; this marks the second time that both Olympic and Paralympic mascots were unveiled at the same time...
for the 2012 games are based on two drops of steel from the Lostock firm.
Landmarks
Situated in the town centre on the site of a former market is the Grade II* listed Town Hall, an imposing neoclassicalNeoclassical architecture
Neoclassical architecture was an architectural style produced by the neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century, manifested both in its details as a reaction against the Rococo style of naturalistic ornament, and in its architectural formulas as an outgrowth of some classicizing...
building designed by William Hill and opened in June 1873 by Albert Edward, Prince of Wales
Edward VII of the United Kingdom
Edward VII was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910...
. In the 1930s, the building was extended by Bradshaw Gass & Hope
Bradshaw Gass & Hope
Bradshaw Gass & Hope is an English firm of architects founded in 1862 by Jonas James Bradshaw . The style "Bradshaw Gass & Hope" was adopted after J. J...
. Within the Town Hall are the Albert Halls and several function rooms. The original, single Albert Hall was destroyed by fire on 14 November 1981. After rebuilding work, it was replaced by the present Albert Halls, which were opened in 1985.
The Great Hall of Smithills Hall
Smithills Hall
Smithills Hall is a Grade I listed manor house, and a Scheduled Monument in the township of Halliwell, now in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. it stands on the slopes of the moors above Bolton at a height of 500 feet, two miles north west of the town centre. It occupies a defensive site near...
was built in the 14th century when William de Radcliffe received the Manor of Smithills from the Hultons, the chapel dates from the 16th century and was extended during the 19th. Smithills Hall was where, in 1555, George Marsh
George Marsh (martyr)
George Marsh was a Protestant Martyr who was born in the parish of Deane, near Bolton in 1515. He died in Boughton, Chester on 24 April 1555 as a result of the Marian Persecutions which were carried out against religious reformers, Protestants, and other dissenters for their beliefs during the...
was tried for heresy during the Marian Persecutions
Marian Persecutions
The Marian Persecutions were carried out against religious reformers, Protestants, and other dissenters for their heretical beliefs during the reign of Mary I of England. The excesses of this period were mythologized in the historical record of Foxe's Book of Martyrs...
. After being "examined" at Smithills, according to local tradition, George Marsh stamped his foot so hard to re-affirm his faith, that a footprint was left in the stone floor. It is a Grade I listed building and is now a museum.
Hall i' th' Wood
Hall i' th' Wood
Hall i' th' Wood is an early 16th century manor house in Bolton, Greater Manchester . It is a Grade I listed building and is currently used as a museum by Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council. The original building is timber framed and has a stone flagged roof; there were later additions to the...
, now a museum, is a late mediaeval yeoman farmer's house built by Laurence Brownlow. Around 1637 it was owned by the Norris family, who added the stone west wing. In the 18th century it was divided up into tenements. Samuel Crompton
Samuel Crompton
Samuel Crompton was an English inventor and pioneer of the spinning industry.- Early life :Samuel Crompton was born at 10 Firwood Fold, Bolton, Lancashire to George and Betty Crompton . Samuel had two younger sisters...
lived and worked there. In the 19th century it deteriorated further until in 1895 it was bought by industrialist William Hesketh Lever, who restored it and presented it to Bolton Council
Metropolitan Borough of Bolton
The Metropolitan Borough of Bolton is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It is named after its largest settlement, Bolton, but covers a far larger area which includes Blackrod, Farnworth, Horwich, Kearsley and Westhoughton, and a suburban and rural element from the West Pennine...
in 1900.
Bolton's 26 conservation areas contain 700 listed buildings, many of which are in the town centre, and there is parkland including the Victorian
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
Queen's Park
Queen's Park, Bolton
Queen's Park is a Victorian park lying to the north-west of Bolton town centre, in Greater Manchester. It was named in 1897 in honour of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. It opened on May 24, 1866 by Lord Bradford. Queen's Park was had a natural history museum, Chadwick Museum, started in 1878 by...
, Leverhulme Park
Leverhulme Park
Leverhulme Park is the largest park in the town of Bolton, Greater Manchester. It was donated to the people of Bolton by, and named after, the late Lord Leverhulme. The park is bounded by the Breightmet, Darcy Lever, the Haulgh, and Tonge Fold. Since its earlier days as simply a park, Leverhulme...
and other open spaces in the surrounding area. These include Le Mans Crescent, Ye Olde Man & Scythe, Little Bolton Town Hall, The Market Place, Wood Street and Holy Trinity Church. Outside the town centre can be found Mere Hall, Firwood Fold
10 Firwood Fold
10 Firwood Fold is a 16th century house in Bolton, Greater Manchester . It is a Grade I listed building and the birthplace of Samuel Crompton....
, Haulgh Hall, Park Cottage, St Mary's Church, Deane, Lostock Hall Gatehouse and All Souls Church. Notable mills still overlooking parts of the town are Falcon Mill, Sir John Holden's Mill and the Swan Lane Mills Complex.
Most views northwards are dominated by Rivington Pike and the Winter Hill TV Mast on the West Pennine Moors above the town.
Transport
Bolton is well served by the local road network and national routes. The A6, a major north–south trunk roadTrunk road
A trunk road, trunk highway, or strategic road is a major road—usually connecting two or more cities, ports, airports, and other things.—which is the recommended route for long-distance and freight traffic...
, passes to the west through Hunger Hill and Westhoughton.
The A666
A666 road
The A666 is a major road in Greater Manchester and Lancashire, England. Known as Manchester Road, Bolton Road, or Blackburn Road, depending on which area it is in, it runs from its junction with A6 and A580 at the Irlams o' th' Height boundary with Pendlebury near Manchester, through Pendlebury,...
dual carriageway
Dual carriageway
A dual carriageway is a class of highway with two carriageways for traffic travelling in opposite directions separated by a central reservation...
(sometimes referred to as 'The Devil's Highway' because of the numeric designation), is a spur from the M61
M61 motorway
The M61 motorway is a motorway in North West England. It runs from the M60 motorway northwest of Manchester and heads northwest past Bolton and Chorley to join the M6 just north of the junction between the M6 and M65 motorways to the south of Preston....
/M60
M60 motorway
The M60 motorway, or Manchester Orbital, is an orbital motorway circling Greater Manchester, a metropolitan county in North West England. It passes through all Greater Manchester's metropolitan boroughs except for Wigan and Bolton...
motorway interchange through the town centre to Astley Bridge, Egerton, Darwen and Blackburn. The M61
M61 motorway
The M61 motorway is a motorway in North West England. It runs from the M60 motorway northwest of Manchester and heads northwest past Bolton and Chorley to join the M6 just north of the junction between the M6 and M65 motorways to the south of Preston....
has three dedicated junctions serving the borough.
A network of local buses, coordinated by Transport for Greater Manchester and departing from the bus station
Bus station
A bus station is a structure where city or intercity buses stop to pick up and drop off passengers. It is larger than a bus stop, which is usually simply a place on the roadside, where buses can stop...
in Moor Lane or Bolton Interchange, serves the Bolton district and beyond. In March 2010, GMPTE launched a consultation which proposed relocating Bolton bus station from Moor Lane to a new site adjacent to Bolton Interchange to improve connections between bus and train services. Bus operators include Arriva North West
Arriva North West
Arriva North West is a division of Arriva that operates bus services around North West England. It consists of two companies: Arriva North West Ltd and Arriva Merseyside Ltd....
, First Manchester
First Manchester
First Manchester is one of the bus companies serving Greater Manchester, a metropolitan county in North West England. It forms part of FirstGroup, a company operating transport services across the British Isles and in North America...
, South Lancs Travel
South Lancs Travel
South Lancs Travel is a privately owned bus operator in the districts of Bolton and Wigan in Greater Manchester operating an extensive commercial network along with tendered services on behalf of Transport for Greater Manchester. It also serves some areas of the districts of Salford & Trafford such...
and Maytree Travel. Bolton is served by the National Express
National Express
National Express Coaches, more commonly known as National Express, is a brand and company, owned by the National Express Group, under which the majority of long distance bus and coach services in Great Britain are operated,...
coach network.
Bolton Interchange is located on the Manchester loop of the West Coast Mainline which was served by Virgin West Coast trains passing through Manchester Piccadilly station
Manchester Piccadilly station
Manchester Piccadilly is the principal railway station in Manchester, England. It serves intercity routes to London Euston, Birmingham New Street, South Wales, the south coast of England, Edinburgh and Glasgow Central, and routes throughout northern England...
. Managed by Northern Rail
Northern Rail
Northern Rail is a British train operating company that has operated local passenger services in Northern England since 2004. Northern Rail's owner, Serco-Abellio, is a consortium formed of Abellio and Serco, an international operator of public transport systems...
, the station is part of a town-centre transport interchange with services to Manchester, Wigan, Southport, Blackburn and intermediate stations operated by First TransPennine Express
First TransPennine Express
First TransPennine Express is a British train operating company. It is a joint operation between First Group and Keolis . It operates regular passenger services in northern England, including services linking the west and east coasts across the Pennines...
and Northern
Northern Rail
Northern Rail is a British train operating company that has operated local passenger services in Northern England since 2004. Northern Rail's owner, Serco-Abellio, is a consortium formed of Abellio and Serco, an international operator of public transport systems...
trains.
Education
Bolton SchoolBolton School
Bolton School is an independent day school in Bolton, in the North-West of England. It comprises a co-educational Nursery and Infant School and single sex Junior and Senior Schools . With almost 2,400 pupils it is one of the largest independent day schools in the country.-History:Bolton School...
is an independent day school, whose Boys' Division originated around 1516,endowed by Robert Lever in 1641 and by William Hesketh Lever (later Lord Leverhulme) in 1898. It was rebuilt alongside a new Girls' Division in Chorley New Road. Another nearby school, Lord's Independent School, was established by Mr Lord, a local eccentric, in 1906. In 1855 the Bolton Church Institute was founded by Canon James Slade
James Slade
James Slade, M.A. , generally remembered as Canon Slade, was the Vicar of St Peter's Church, Bolton le Moors, Lancashire, England from 1817 to 1856....
near to the parish church. This became Canon Slade School
Canon Slade School
Canon Slade School is a Church of England secondary school on Bradshaw Brow in Bradshaw, in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England.-History:...
and has since relocated to Bradshaw
Bradshaw, Greater Manchester
Bradshaw is suburb of the unparished area of South Turton, in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. Historically part of Lancashire, it lies on the southern edge of the West Pennine Moors.-History:...
.
The town's other secondary schools include Ladybridge High School, Sharples School, Smithills School, Thornleigh Salesian College
Thornleigh Salesian College
Thornleigh Salesian College is a Salesian and Catholic secondary school in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England.- History :Thornleigh College was founded in 1925 by The Salesian Order of Don Bosco at the request of the Clergy of Bolton....
, and Withins School. Bolton College
Bolton College
Bolton College is a further education college located in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England.The college is primarily based in Bolton, but operates a number of Community Learning Centres in the surrounding area...
provides further education from sites throughout the borough. Bolton Sixth Form College
Bolton Sixth Form College
Bolton Sixth Form College is a further education college for students aged 16 and higher and is located on two sites in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England.- Overview :...
comprises the North Campus and Farnworth Campus, with a third campus which is due to open in 2010. The Bolton TIC
Bolton TIC
Bolton Technical Innovation Centre is a training centre in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. Its purpose is to provide facilities for technical training beyond the capabilities of local schools.-Aims:...
(Technical Innovation Centre), opened in 2006, supports local schools by providing additional technical training.
The University of Bolton
University of Bolton
The University of Bolton is a university in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. It has around 14,000 students across all sites and courses, with 700 academic and professional staff. Around 70% of its students come from Bolton and the North West region...
, formerly Bolton Institute of Higher Education gained university status in 2005.
Religion
| Religion in Bolton 2001 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| UK Census 2001 United Kingdom Census 2001 A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194.... |
Bolton (borough) Metropolitan Borough of Bolton The Metropolitan Borough of Bolton is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It is named after its largest settlement, Bolton, but covers a far larger area which includes Blackrod, Farnworth, Horwich, Kearsley and Westhoughton, and a suburban and rural element from the West Pennine... |
Greater Manchester Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 2.6 million. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the... |
England |
| Christian | 74.56% | 78.01% | 71.74% |
| No religion | 8.75% | 10.48% | 14.59% |
| Muslim | 7.07% | 3.04% | 3.1% |
| Buddhist | 0.10% | 0.18% | 0.28% |
| Hindu | 2.00% | 0.40% | 1.11% |
| Jewish | 0.06% | 0.42% | 0.52% |
| Sikh | 0.03% | 0.10% | 0.67% |
| Other religions | 0.15% | 0.16% | 0.29% |
| Religion not stated | 7.28% | 7.23% | 7.69% |
There is evidence from Saxon times of Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
churches and at the time of the Civil War a Puritan and nonconformist
Nonconformism
Nonconformity is the refusal to "conform" to, or follow, the governance and usages of the Church of England by the Protestant Christians of England and Wales.- Origins and use:...
presence in the town. The Unitarians
Unitarianism
Unitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....
were among the early dissenting congregations which eventually included Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterian, Seventh Day Adventist and other denominations. Over 40 churches were built during the Victorian era but some are closed, demolished or put to other uses.
Today, the parish of Bolton-le-Moors covers a small area in the town centre, but until the 19th century it covered a much larger area and was divided into eighteen chapelries and townships. The neighbouring ancient parish of Deane
Deane, Greater Manchester
Deane is an area of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. It is about south west of Bolton and northwest of the city of Manchester.Historically a part of Lancashire, the Parish of Deane was once one of four parishes within the hundred of Salford and covered roughly half of the present...
centred around St Mary's Church
St. Mary the Virgin, Deane
The Church of St Mary the Virgin, Deane, is a Church of England parish church in Deane, Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. It is a member of Deane deanery in the archdeaconry of Bolton, diocese of Manchester...
once covered a large area to the west and south of Bolton, and the township of Great Lever
Great Lever
Great Lever is mainly a residential suburb of Bolton in Greater Manchester, England. Historically within Lancashire, it is about 2½ miles south of Bolton town centre and the same distance north of Farnworth town centre. Great Lever has many shops and services serving the local community...
was part of the ancient parish of Middleton
Middleton, Greater Manchester
Middleton is a town within the Metropolitan Borough of Rochdale, in Greater Manchester, England. It stands on the River Irk, south-southwest of Rochdale, and north-northeast of the city of Manchester...
.
The Parish Church of St Peter, commonly known as Bolton Parish Church, is an example of the gothic revival style
Gothic Revival architecture
The Gothic Revival is an architectural movement that began in the 1740s in England...
. Built between 1866 and 1871 of Longridge
Longridge
Longridge is a small town and civil parish in the borough of Ribble Valley in Lancashire, England. It is situated north-east of the city of Preston, at the western end of Longridge Fell, a long ridge above the River Ribble. Its nearest neighbours are Grimsargh and the Roman town of Ribchester , ...
stone to designs by Paley
Edward Graham Paley
Edward Graham Paley, usually known as E. G. Paley, , was an English architect who practised in Lancaster, Lancashire, in the second half of the 19th century.-Education and career:...
, the church is 67 ft (20.4 m) in width, 156 ft (47.5 m) in length, and 82 ft (25 m) in height. The tower
Bell tower
A bell tower is a tower which contains one or more bells, or which is designed to hold bells, even if it has none. In the European tradition, such a tower most commonly serves as part of a church and contains church bells. When attached to a city hall or other civic building, especially in...
is 180 ft (54.9 m) high with 13 bells
Church bell
A church bell is a bell which is rung in a church either to signify the hour or the time for worshippers to go to church, perhaps to attend a wedding, funeral, or other service...
. The first church on the same site was built in Anglo-Saxon
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
times. It was rebuilt in Norman
Normans
The Normans were the people who gave their name to Normandy, a region in northern France. They were descended from Norse Viking conquerors of the territory and the native population of Frankish and Gallo-Roman stock...
times and again in the early 15th century. Little is known of the first two earlier churches, but the third building was a solid, squat building with a sturdy square tower at the west end. It was modified over the years until it fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1866. Fragments of stone and other artefacts from these first three buildings are displayed in the museum corner of the present church.
St Mary's Deane, once the only church in a parish of ten townships in the hundred of Salford, is a church established in Saxon times. The current building dates from 1250 with extensions and restoration in the 19th century and is a Grade II* listed building.
The red-brick St George's Church was built between 1794–96 when the Little Bolton area was a separate township. Built by Peter Rothwell it was paid for by the Ainsworth family. After the last service in 1975 it was leased to Bolton Council and became a craft centre in 1994.
The New Zakaria Mosque was the first mosque in Bolton and served the Muslim Community who arrived in Bolton from Pakistan and India in the 1960s. Hindus also settled in the town in the 1960s and their first place of worship was in the former St Barnabus Church that was converted to a Hindu temple.
Sport
The most significant club in the Bolton area, Bolton Wanderers F.C.Bolton Wanderers F.C.
Bolton Wanderers Football Club is an English professional association football club based in the area of Horwich in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester. They began their current spell in the Premier League in 2001....
is an English Football League club which was formed in 1874 and for 102 years played at Burnden Park
Burnden Park
Burnden Park was the home of English FA Premier League football club Bolton Wanderers who played home games here between 1895 and 1997. As well as hosting an FA Cup Final replay it was the scene of one of the greatest disasters in English football and the subject of an L. S...
. The club moved to the Reebok Stadium
Reebok Stadium
The Reebok Stadium is the home stadium of English Premier League football club Bolton Wanderers, and is located on the Middlebrook Retail Park in Horwich, in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester. It is commonly known as 'The Reebok'...
in Horwich
Horwich
Horwich is a town and civil parish within the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. It is southeast of Chorley, northwest of Bolton and northwest from the city of Manchester. It lies at the southern edge of the West Pennine Moors with the M61 motorway close to the...
in 1997. The club has won four FA Cup
FA Cup
The Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly known as the FA Cup, is a knockout cup competition in English football and is the oldest association football competition in the world. The "FA Cup" is run by and named after The Football Association and usually refers to the English men's...
s, the most recent in 1958, and spent 69 seasons in the top division of the English league – more than any club never to have been league champions.
Bolton is home to one of North West England's largest Field Hockey Clubs, Bolton Hockey Club
Bolton Hockey Club
Bolton Hockey Club is a Men’s and Ladies Field Hockey Club Based in Greater Manchester, England. It has over 180 members of which approximately 140 are playing members...
. There are two local cricket leagues, the Bolton Cricket League
Bolton Cricket League
The Bolton Cricket League is a cricket league comprising fourteen teams in and around Bolton, Greater Manchester in North West England. The league runs competitions at First Team, Second Team, Under 18, Under 15, Under 13 and Under 11 levels.-Teams:...
, and the Bolton Cricket Association. Bolton also has a rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...
club, Bolton RUFC
Bolton rugby club
Bolton RUFC are an amateur rugby union team who play in the North Lancs 1 league of the English rugby union league system.- History :Bolton RUFC was first formed in 1872, seven years before Bolton Wanderers Football Club, and was first listed in the "Football Annual" of 1874.It reads: "Bolton...
formed in 1872 situated on Avenue Street. The club operates 4 senior teams, as well as women's and junior sections. Bolton Robots of Doom
Bolton Robots of Doom
Bolton Robots of Doom is an English baseball team from Bolton situated in the North West region of England, playing in the Northern AA/A Division under the British Baseball Federation.-History:...
is a baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...
club started in 2003, playing home games at The Ball Park at Stapleton Avenue. In addition to the adult team there is a junior team, Bolton Bears. Baseball in Bolton dates back to 1938 with a team called Bolton Scarlets. Bolton is also home to the Bolton Bulldogs, an American football team which plays home games at Smithills School operating varsity and junior varsity (JV) teams.
Speedway racing
Motorcycle speedway
Motorcycle speedway, usually referred to as speedway, is a motorcycle sport involving four and sometimes up to six riders competing over four anti-clockwise laps of an oval circuit. Speedway motorcycles use only one gear and have no brakes and racing takes place on a flat oval track usually...
, known as Dirt Track Racing, was staged at Raikes Park in the pioneer days – 1928 – but the venue was short lived.
Bolton born Amir Khan
Amir Khan (boxer)
Amir Iqbal Khan , is a British Pakistani professional boxer who is currently the unified WBA & IBF light welterweight champion....
became the WBA World light-welterweight champion on 18 July 2009 at the age of 22, making him Britain's third-youngest world champion boxer.
Culture and society
British Association for the Advancement of Science
frame|right|"The BA" logoThe British Association for the Advancement of Science or the British Science Association, formerly known as the BA, is a learned society with the object of promoting science, directing general attention to scientific matters, and facilitating interaction between...
Boltonians are the friendliest people in Britain. Humphrey Spender
Humphrey Spender
Humphrey Spender was an English photographer, painter, architect and designer.-Family:Humphrey Spender was the third son of Harold Spender, a Liberal journalist and writer who founded the Boys' Club movement with Arnold Toynbee. Humphrey's mother, Violet Schuster, came from a German family who had...
photographed Bolton calling it Worktown for the Mass-Observation
Mass-Observation
Mass Observation was a United Kingdom social research organisation founded in 1937. Their work ended in the mid 1960s but was revived in 1981. The Archive is housed at the University of Sussex....
Project, a social research organization which aimed to record everyday life in Britain. His photographs provide a record of ordinary people living and working in a British pre-War industrial town.
Bolton has several theatres including the Octagon
Octagon Theatre, Bolton
The Octagon Theatre is a producing theatre located in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England.-Programme:The Octagon produces between eight and nine professional theatre productions a year in its Main Auditorium...
and independent groups such as Bolton Little Theatre
Bolton Little Theatre
Bolton Little Theatre is a registered charity located at Hanover Street, Bolton BL1 4TG and has a small car park available. It was established in 1931. The theatre is a Member of The Bolton Amateur Theatre Societies, The Little Theatre Guild of Great Britain, which it joined in 1947 and The...
and the Phoenix Theatre Company. Inside the Town Hall there is a theatre and conference complex, the Albert Halls. Le Mans Crescent, home to the central library, museum, art gallery, aquarium, magistrates' court and town hall, is to be the centre of a new Cultural Quarter. The library and museum are to be extended into the area now occupied by the Magistrates Court. Bolton Museum
Bolton Museum
Bolton Museum is a public museum and art gallery in the town of Bolton, Greater Manchester, northern England, owned by Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council....
and Art Gallery has a fine collection of both local and international art.
Bolton Central Library was one of the earliest public libraries established after the Public Libraries Act 1850
Public Libraries Act 1850
The Public Libraries Act 1850 was an Act of the United Kingdom Parliament which first gave local boroughs the power to establish free public libraries...
, opening in October 1853 in the Exchange Building on the old market square (Victoria Square) before moving to Le Mans Crescent in July 1938. The Bolton Symphony Orchestra performs regular concerts at the Albert Halls and Victoria Hall in the town centre.
The 2008 BBC Radio 3 Adult Choir of the Year and three times gold medal winning barbershop chorus The Cottontown Chorus is based in Bolton.
The town's daily newspaper is The Bolton News
The Bolton News
The Bolton News - formerly the Bolton Evening News - is a daily newspaper covering the towns of Bolton and Bury in north-western England...
, formerly the Bolton Evening News. There is a weekly free paper, the Bolton Journal and Bolton Council's monthly newspaper, Bolton Scene. The town is part of the BBC North West
BBC North West
BBC North West is the BBC English Region serving Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside, Cheshire, Walsden in West Yorkshire, the Isle of Man , north-west Derbyshire, the Yorkshire Dales including Settle and Ribblesdale, and southern Cumbria.BBC North West television output is also broadcast in...
and ITV Granada
Granada Television
Granada Television is the ITV contractor for North West England. Based in Manchester since its inception, it is the only surviving original ITA franchisee from 1954 and is ITV's most successful....
television regions, served by the Winter Hill transmitter near Belmont
Belmont, Lancashire
Belmont is a village in Lancashire, England. It is close to Winter Hill between the towns of Bolton and Darwen. It has around 500 inhabitants and lies within the civil parish of North Turton in the unitary authority area of Blackburn with Darwen.-History:...
. Local radio is provided by Tower FM
Tower FM
Tower FM is a British Independent Local Radio station which broadcasts across the towns of Bolton and Bury and parts of north Manchester from its studios in Wigan....
which broadcasts across Bolton and Bury
Bury
Bury is a town in Greater Manchester, England. It lies on the River Irwell, east of Bolton, west-southwest of Rochdale, and north-northwest of the city of Manchester...
and a new radio station, Bolton FM began broadcasting in 2009.
The industrial village of Barrow Bridge
Barrow Bridge, Bolton
Barrow Bridge is a model village, in the township of Halliwell in Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. It was created in the Industrial Revolution but since the demolition of the mills is now a residential village....
became Millbank in Benjamin Disraeli's novel Coningsby
Coningsby (novel)
Coningsby, or The New Generation, is an English political novel by Benjamin Disraeli published in 1844.-Background:The book is set against a background of the real political events of the 1830s in England that followed the enactment of the Reform Bill of 1832...
. Spring and Port Wine
Spring and Port Wine
Spring and Port Wine is a stage play by Bill Naughton which was turned into a film .It began life under the title My Flesh, My Blood as a BBC Radio play, broadcast on 17 August 1957 in the Saturday Night Theatre strand...
by playwright, Bill Naughton
Bill Naughton
William John Francis Naughton, or Bill Naughton was an Irish-born British playwright and author, best known for his play Alfie.-Early life:...
was filmed and set in Bolton and The Family Way
The Family Way
The Family Way is a 1966 British comedy-drama film based on Bill Naughton's play All in Good Time . It began life in 1961 as a television play entitled Honeymoon Postponed....
based on Naughton's play All in Good Time was also filmed and set in Bolton. Peter Kay
Peter Kay
Peter John Kay is an English comedian, writer, actor, director and producer. His work includes That Peter Kay Thing , Phoenix Nights , Max and Paddy's Road to Nowhere , Britain's Got the Pop Factor... and other independent productions which have included two sell out tours.-Early career:Peter Kay...
filmed comedy TV series That Peter Kay Thing
That Peter Kay Thing
That Peter Kay Thing was a series of six spoof documentaries shown on Channel 4 in January 2000. Set in and around Bolton, these followed the lives of different characters and starred Peter Kay as the subject of each documentary. All of the episodes displayed Kay's penchant for nostalgic humour and...
in the town.
Bolton buildings have stood in for other towns and cities. Le Mans Crescent has featured as a London street in the Jeremy Brett
Jeremy Brett
Jeremy Brett , born Peter Jeremy William Huggins, was an English actor, most famous for his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes in four Granada TV series.-Early life:...
version of Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
and a Russian secret service building in the 1990s comedy series "Sleepers". The 1990s BBC drama "Between the Lines" also filmed an episode in Victoria Square.
Public services
Bolton is policed by the Greater Manchester PoliceGreater Manchester Police
Greater Manchester Police is the police force responsible for law enforcement within the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester in North West England...
force by Bolton Central Division which covers the town centre, Rumworth and Halliwell. Great Lever and Little Lever are covered by Farnworth Police Station, Astley Bridge Police Station covers, Tonge and The Haulgh, Breightmet and Crompton while Heaton and Lostock, and Smithills are served by Horwich Police (Middlebrook). The statutory emergency fire and rescue service is provided by the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service
Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service
Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service is the statutory emergency fire and rescue service for the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester, England.Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service covers an area of approximately...
, from Bolton Central, Bolton North, Horwich and Farnworth Fire Stations. Hospital services are provided by the Royal Bolton Hospital NHS Foundation Trust who provide an Accident and Emergency
Emergency department
An emergency department , also known as accident & emergency , emergency room , emergency ward , or casualty department is a medical treatment facility specialising in acute care of patients who present without prior appointment, either by their own means or by ambulance...
and other services at Royal Bolton Hospital in Farnworth. Community health services, including GPs, district and community nurses, dentists and pharmacists, are co-ordinated by
the Bolton Primary Care Trust. Waste management is co-ordinated by the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority (GMWDA). Bolton's Distribution Network Operator for electricity is Electricity North West Ltd. United Utilities manage Bolton's drinking and waste water.
Notable people
Bolton has produced actors, comedianComedian
A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience, primarily by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing situations, or acting a fool, as in slapstick, or employing prop comedy...
s, musician
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
s, sports personalities
Professional sports
Professional sports, as opposed to amateur sports, are sports in which athletes receive payment for their performance. Professional athleticism has come to the fore through a combination of developments. Mass media and increased leisure have brought larger audiences, so that sports organizations...
, engineer
Engineer
An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
s, inventors, politician
Politician
A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...
s, authors and other notable people who made a mark in different periods of time, whether at local, national or international level. Among them were Protestant martyr George Marsh
George Marsh (martyr)
George Marsh was a Protestant Martyr who was born in the parish of Deane, near Bolton in 1515. He died in Boughton, Chester on 24 April 1555 as a result of the Marian Persecutions which were carried out against religious reformers, Protestants, and other dissenters for their beliefs during the...
, Samuel Crompton
Samuel Crompton
Samuel Crompton was an English inventor and pioneer of the spinning industry.- Early life :Samuel Crompton was born at 10 Firwood Fold, Bolton, Lancashire to George and Betty Crompton . Samuel had two younger sisters...
, 1753–1827, the inventor of the spinning mule that revolutionised the textile industry, and industrialist William Hesketh Lever, 1851–1925, Lord Leverhulme
William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme
William Hesketh Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme was an English industrialist, philanthropist, and politician....
of Bolton-le-Moors.
Playwright and author Bill Naughton
Bill Naughton
William John Francis Naughton, or Bill Naughton was an Irish-born British playwright and author, best known for his play Alfie.-Early life:...
was born in Ireland but brought up in Bolton from an early age. Fred Dibnah
Fred Dibnah
Frederick "Fred" Dibnah MBE , born in Bolton, was an English steeplejack and eccentric with a keen interest in mechanical engineering who became a cult television personality....
, a Lancastrian steeplejack who became a much-loved television historian of Britain's industrial past, was born and lived in Bolton. More recently Bolton is known for world champion boxer, Amir Khan
Amir Khan (boxer)
Amir Iqbal Khan , is a British Pakistani professional boxer who is currently the unified WBA & IBF light welterweight champion....
, Peter Kay
Peter Kay
Peter John Kay is an English comedian, writer, actor, director and producer. His work includes That Peter Kay Thing , Phoenix Nights , Max and Paddy's Road to Nowhere , Britain's Got the Pop Factor... and other independent productions which have included two sell out tours.-Early career:Peter Kay...
, comedian, actor, writer and producer, and Philip Craven
Philip Craven
Sir Philip Craven MBE is a British sports official and former athlete. He is the second and current President of the International Paralympic Committee .-Education:...
, International Paralympic Committee
International Paralympic Committee
The International Paralympic Committee is an international non-profit organisation and the global governing body for the Paralympic Movement. The IPC organizes the Paralympic Games and functions as the international federation for nine sports...
President.