500 mill jobs axed

IN Bolton's blackest Friday since 1972, nearly 500 local textile workers were being told this afternoon that they would be losing their jobs.

Tootals, the major textile group, announced it was closing Union Mill, Vernon Street, Bolton, costing 313 jobs, and cutting back its weaving production at Sunnyside Mill, Bolton, where 181 out of the 584 workers are to go. The company blames the pressure from low-priced imports as a major reason.

50 YEARS AGO From the Evening News, April 3, 1951

LIFE in Britain in 1951 will, in many ways, be "harsh and unpleasant" with the man in the street and his wife paying a good deal more for a little less, and a fall in the standard of living all round. The Government's Economic Survey calls for patience in face of what it calls "this unhappy prospect". It lays the blame for it at the door of the Kremlin for forcing Britain to spend £4,700,000,000 on defence in the next three years.

125 YEARS AGO From the Evening News, April 3, 1876

THE excitement in Blackburn with regard to the murder is still increasing. Large crowds of people are constantly assembling in the neighbourhood of the Police Office. The interest was considerably heightened when a telegram from the Bolton police was received in Blackburn, stating that a man answering to the description of the tramp who was supposed to have committed the murder, had been taken into custody in that town.

Shortly after the receipt of the telegram, Police-constable Pickup proceeded to Bolton by goods train, and returned this morning with the suspected man by the 8.35 train from Bolton. On arriving at the Blackburn Police Office was 25 minutes to ten, hundreds of persons were loitering about, and it seemed to be the general opinion that the right man had been caught.

The Bolton man was examined, but was not identified by the witnesses, though there was a marked resemblance to the man seen by the girl, Mary Ellen Eccles. He was therefore set at liberty, and he returned by the first train to Bolton.