ABSTRACT
Historians of industrial relations have by and large concentrated their efforts on the trade union movement and as a result published material on employers is a little thin on the ground. However, one of the most fruitful areas of research has been the relationship between employers’ labour policy and the development of industrial welfare. The economic history of the Lancashire cotton industry between the wars has been well chronicled. Briefly, Lancashire cotton faced a difficult period of readjustment to new trading conditions. In order to assess the function of industrial welfare in a little more detail, the chapter examines the important role played by mill recreation. Recreational amenities were perhaps the most popular form of mill welfare. Since a number of historians have examined leisure as a form of ‘social control’, it may be illuminating to focus on the control functions of mill recreation.
