ABSTRACT

By 1900, 50 per cent of employed males in Bolton were engaged in cotton textiles. Spinning produced the fine cloths and yarns which ensured that Bolton's pre-1914 prosperity was based on exports. The cotton industry continued to expand in Bolton until just before the Depression, with the last large mill, of Sir John Holden and Sons, being constructed at Astley Bridge in 1920. The number of equivalent spindles in Bolton increased from 4,853,000 in 1910 to 5,617,000 in 1938.4 Most of the raw cotton came from Egypt and the Sudan, the remaining 20 per cent coming from the Americas. Also of importance alongside cotton were the connected industries of engineering, especially of textile machinery, and coal mining. As John Walton has pointed out, 'cotton Lancashire' was also 'engineering Lancashire' .5 Pelling points out that engineering had become increasingly independent of the cotton industry, gaining ground while cotton remained static or declined.6 Textile engineering initially aided Lancashire's capture of world markets, but, as has been noted for Blackburn, also helped to dig the grave of the inter-war cotton industry. Bolton's textile machines were by the 1920s to build up the indigenous cotton industries of Lancashire's rivals. Apart from the production of cotton spinning machinery, general engineering was also important in Bolton. Although the borough was not in the first division in iron and steel founding, it was still an important industry in the town. The Dobson and Barlow foundry at Bradley Fold, though situated just outside the borough boundaries, employed around 3,000 workers from the town. The main production

of iron and steel was to help maintain plant in the local mills. Also of importance Sidings. Also of some significance was structural engineering, the chemical industry, brass and lead foundries, lubricating oils, paper manufacture, timber and brewing. Finally in 1938, the Montagu Burton clothing firm opened in Bolton.7