Mills

Queen Street Mill at Harle Syke, Burnley, was built in 1894 for the Queen Street Manufacturing Company for weaving plain cotton fabric. The business saw little modernisation up to closure in 1982 since when the mill has been run as a museum, still operated by the 500 hp steam engine. The weaving shed once housed nearly 1,000 Lancashire looms and even today there are 300 looms. When running the noise is deafening. Sadly Lancashire County Council have announced closure of the museum and there is little future for the looms and engine which will surely be subject to the depredations of scrap thieves and vandals.

Boilerman firing one of the two Lancashire boilers at Queen Street Milll, Burnley.

Rolls of newsprint after cutting to width at the UPM paper mill, Shotton, Deeside. The mill produces about 22% of the UK newsprint requirement.

Boilerman and boiler front at Queen Street Mill, Burnley.

The No.3 Mill in the Belgrave complex was built to the design of F. W. Dixon and Son in 1910. It was electrically powered from the start.Spinning ceased in 1960 after which it has been used for clothing production and later for the manufacture of foam, polyester and feathers for the furniture and clothing industries.

In the engine house at Queen Street Mill is this 500 hp horizontal tandem engine. It is named "PEACE" and was built by William Roberts & Co of Nelson in 1894.

Virginia Mills, Higher Hillgate, Stockport. This property is sometimes said to be a former cotton mill but it was actually built in the 1890s by Giles Atherton as a hat factory and possibly for the manufacture of hat-making machinery. The initials G A can be seen in the etched glass of some of the ground floor windows. Giles Atherton was born in 1852. He started off as a hatter and by 1881 was manufacturing hats and employed 30 women and 10 men at premises on Adswood Lane. He became an agent for Yule’s American hat manufacturing machinery. He visited America a number of times and during a visit to New York in the 1890’s, he was offered the patent rights to hat leather stitching machines. He became a J. P., a magistrate and the mayor in 1896, 1897 and 1903. He laid the foundation stone for the Town Hall and also for the north wing of the Infirmary. He was a property owner, with 12 houses on Charles Street, Hillgate and lived at Virginia Villa, Mile End. He died in 1931.