A formermill town, Bolton has been a centre for textile production since the 14th century whenFlemish weavers settled in the area, introducing a wool and cotton-weaving tradition. It was a 19th-centuryboomtown, development largely coincided with the introduction oftextile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution. At its peak in 1929, its 216 cotton mills and 26 bleaching and dyeing works made it one of the largest and most productive centres ofcotton spinning in the world. The British cotton industry declined sharply after theFirst World War and, by the 1980s, cotton manufacture had virtually ceased in the town.
The town has a population of 184,073, whilst the wider metropolitan borough has a population of 296,169. Bolton originated as a small settlement in the moorland known asBolton le Moors. In theEnglish Civil War, the town was aParliamentarian outpost in 1644 in a staunchlyRoyalist region and, as a result, the RoyalistPrince Rupert of the Rhine ledthe 1644 storming of Bolton of 3,000 Royalist troops, which is also referred to asThe Bolton Massacre, with 1,600 residents perished and 700 were taken prisoner.
Bolton is a common Northern English name derived from theOld Englishbothl-tun, meaning a settlement with a dwelling.[3][4] The first recorded use of the name, in the formBoelton, dates from 1185 to describe Bolton le Moors, though this may not be in relation to a dwelling.[5] It was recorded as Bothelton in 1212, Botelton in 1257, Boulton in 1288, and Bolton after 1307.[6]Later forms of Botheltun were Bodeltown, Botheltun-le-Moors, Bowelton, Boltune, Bolton-super-Moras, Bolton-in-ye-Moors, Bolton-le-Moors.[7]
The town's motto ofSupera 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".[8] The name itself is referred to in thebadge of the Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council using a form of visual pun, arebus, in combining motifs of arrow for 'bolt' and heraldic crown for 'tun', the term for the central high point of a defensive position that is the etymon of the suffix of Bolton.[8]
There is evidence of human existence on the moors around Bolton since the early part of theBronze Age, including astone circle onCheetham Close aboveEgerton,[9] and Bronze Age burial mounds onWinter Hill.[10] A Bronze Age mound was excavated inVictorian times outside Haulgh Hall. The Romans built roads from Manchester toRibchester to the east and a road along what is now the A6 to the west. It is claimed thatAgricola built a fort atBlackrod by clearing land above the forest. Evidence of aSaxon settlement exists in the form of religious objects found when the Victorian parish church was built.[11]
In 1067Great Bolton was the property ofRoger de Poitou and after 1100, of Roger de Meresheys. Bolton became the property of thePilkington family until they forfeited the land in theWars of the Roses. The land was given to theStanley family and thus theEarls of Derby who became royalists in theEnglish Civil War. The area surrounding Bolton was subsequently divided into four parts including the Stanley family, theEarl of Bradford, aFreeman and various other parties.[12] Great Bolton andLittle 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.[13] The parish church in Bolton has an early foundation although the exact date is unknown; it was given by the lord of the manor to theGilbertine canons ofMattersey Priory in Nottinghamshire, founded by Roger de Marsey.[14]
A charter to hold amarket in Churchgate was granted on 14 December 1251 by KingHenry III of England.[15] Bolton became a market town and borough by a charter from the Earl of Derby, William de Ferrers, on 14 January 1253, and a market was held until the 18th century.Burgage plots were laid out on Churchgate and Deansgate in the centre of themedieval town close to whereYe Olde Man & Scythe public house, dating from 1251, is situated today.[16]In 1337 Flemish weavers settled and introduced the manufacture of woollen cloth.[17] More Flemish weavers, fleeing the persecution ofHuguenots, settled here in the 17th century. The second wave of settlers wovefustian, a rough cloth made of linen and cotton.[18] Diggingsea coal was recorded in 1374.[6] There was an outbreak of the plague in the town in 1623.[6]
During theEnglish Civil War, the people of Bolton werePuritans and supported theParliamentarian cause.[14] A parliamentary garrison in the town was attacked twice without success but on 28 May 1644 Prince Rupert's Royalist army with troops under the command of theEarl of Derby attacked again. The attack became known as theBolton Massacre in which 1,500 died, 700 were taken prisoner and the town plundered.[18] The attackers took to referring to the town as the "Geneva of the North", referencingGeneva's dominantCalvinism, although historian Malcolm Hardman says this was a description borne "more of irritation than accuracy".[19] 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. For his part in the massacre, he was executed outside Ye Olde Man & Scythe Inn on 15 October 1651.[6]
Bolton was a 19th-centuryboomtown and, at its zenith in 1929, its 216 cotton mills and 26 bleaching and dyeing works made it one of the largest and most productive centres ofcotton 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.
A tradition of cottage spinning and weaving and improvements to spinning technology by local inventors,Richard Arkwright andSamuel Crompton, led to rapid growth of the textile industry in the 19th century. Crompton, whilst living atHall i' th' Wood, invented thespinning mule in 1779. Streams draining the surroundingmoorland into the River Croal provided the water necessary for thebleach works that were a feature of this area.[20] Bleaching usingchlorine was introduced in the 1790s by the Ainsworths at Halliwell Bleachworks. Bolton and the surrounding villages had more than thirty bleachworks including theLever Bank Bleach Works in the Irwell Valley.[21] The mule revolutionised cotton spinning by combining the roller drafting of Arkwright's water frame with the carriage drafting and spindle tip twisting ofJames Hargreaves'sspinning jenny, producing a high quality yarn. Self-acting mules were used in Bolton mills until the 1960s producing fine yarn.[21] The earliest mills were situated by the streams and river as atBarrow Bridge, but steam power led to the construction of the large multi-storey mills and their chimneys that dominated Bolton's skyline, some of which survive today.[18]
Growth of the textile industry was assisted by the availability of coal in the area. By 1896 John Fletcher had coal mines atLadyshore inLittle Lever; The Earl of Bradford had a coal mine atGreat Lever; the Darcy Lever Coal Company had mines atDarcy Lever and there were coal mines atTonge,Breightmet,Deane andDoffcocker. Some of these pits were close to theManchester Bolton & Bury Canal providing the owners with markets in Bolton and Manchester.[22] Coal mining declined in the 20th century.
Important transport links contributed to the growth of the town and the textile industry; the Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal[18] constructed in 1791, connected the town toBury andManchester providing transport for coal and other basic materials. TheBolton and Leigh Railway, the oldest in Lancashire, opened to goods traffic in 1828 andGreat Moor Street station opened to passengers in 1831. The railway initially connected Bolton to theLeeds and Liverpool Canal inLeigh, an important link with theport of Liverpool for the import of rawcotton from America, but was extended in 1829 to link up with theManchester to Liverpool Line.[18] Local firms built locomotives for the railway, in 1830 "Union" was built byRothwell, Hick and Company and two locomotives, "Salamander" and "Veteran" were built by Crook and Dean.[23]
Bolton's first Mayor, Charles James Darbishire was sympathetic toChartism and a supporter of theAnti-Corn Law League. In August 1839 Bolton was besieged by Chartist rioters and theRiot Act was read and special constables sworn in. The mayor accompanied soldiers called to rescue special constables atLittle Bolton Town Hall, which was besieged by a mob, and the incident ended without bloodshed.[24]Derby Barracks was established in Fletcher Street in the early 1860s.[25]
One of two statues prominent on Victoria Square nearBolton Town Hall is that ofSamuel Taylor Chadwick (1809 – 3 May 1876) aphilanthropist who donated funds toBolton Hospital to create an ear, nose and throat ward; built houses for people living in cellars; through Bolton Council fought for better public health including cleaner water; established the Chadwick Orphanage; improved the BoltonWorkhouse and funded the town's natural history museum that was the basis of the presentBolton Museum at Le Mans Crescent (the original museum was in a building atQueens Park).[26] The second statue at Victoria Square is in memory of a former Bolton MayorSir Benjamin Alfred Dobson (1847–1898) who died in office in 1898, he was a textile machinery manufacturer and chairman ofDobson & Barlow, a significant employer in the town.[27][28][29] 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.[30]
By 1911 the textile industry in Bolton employed about 36,000 people.[33] As of 1920, theBolton Cardroom Union had more than 15,000 members, while theBolton Weavers' Association represented 13,500 workers.[34] The last mill to be constructed was Sir John Holden's Mill in 1927.[33] The cotton industry declined from the 1920s. A brief upturn after the Second World War was not sustained, and the industry had virtually vanished by the end of the 20th century.
During the night of 26 September 1916, Bolton was the target for an aerial offensive.L21, aZeppelin commanded byOberleutnant Kurt Frankenburg of theImperial German Navy, dropped twenty-one bombs on the town, five of them on the working class area of Kirk Street, killing thirteen residents and destroying six houses. Further attacks followed on other parts of the town, including three incendiaries dropped close to the Town Hall.[35][36]
Today Bolton has many industrial sites and is an important strategic location for the production and assembly of advanced guided missiles including ASRAAM, Brimstone, Meteor, CAMM, SPEAR making the town a high-value defence industrial target in the event of war to degrade Western missile capabilities.[37][38][39]The town was named in theRogozin list of primary targets for a Russiannuclear attack.[38][37][39]
In 1899 William Lever,Lord Leverhulme, 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-endowedBolton Schools, giving land and his house on Chorley New Road. He presented the town with 67 acres (270,000 m2) of land for a public park which the corporation namedLeverhulme Park in 1914.[40] In 1902 he gave the people of Bolton Lever Park atRivington. In 1911, Lever consultedThomas Mawson,landscape architect and lecturer in Landscape Design at the University of Liverpool, regardingtown 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 Council 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.[41]
In 1838 Great Bolton, most of Little Bolton and the Haulgh area ofTonge with Haulgh were incorporated under theMunicipal Corporations Act 1835 as amunicipal borough, the second to be created in England. Further additions were made adding part ofRumworth in 1872 and part ofHalliwell in 1877.[45][46] In 1889 Bolton was grantedCounty Borough status and became self-governing and independent fromLancashire County Council jurisdiction. In 1898, the borough was extended further by adding thecivil 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 ofOver Hulton civil parish.[45][46] TheCounty Borough of Bolton was abolished in 1974 and became a constituent part of the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton in Greater Manchester.[45][46] Bolton unsuccessfully applied for city status in 2011.[47][48]
Bolton Council is divided into twenty wards, each of which elects three councillors for a term of up to four years.[49]
It is surrounded by several neighbouring towns and villages that together form theBorough of Bolton, of which Bolton is theadministrative centre. The town of Bolton has a population of 139,403, whilst the wider metropolitan borough has a population of 262,400.
The early name, Bolton le Moors, described the position of the town amid the low hills on the edge of theWest Pennine Moors southeast ofRivington Pike (456 m). Bolton lies on relatively flat land on both sides of the clough or steep-banked valley through which theRiver Croal flows in a southeasterly direction towards theRiver Irwell.[6] The geological formation around Bolton consists ofsandstones of theCarboniferous series andCoal Measures; in the northern part of Bolton the lower Coal Measures are mixed with underlyingMillstone Grit.[14]
Climate in the Greater Manchester area is generally similar to theclimate of England, although owing to protection from the mountains in North Wales it experiences slightly lower than average rainfall except during the summer months, when rainfall is higher than average.[55] Bolton has mild differences between highs and lows, and there is adequate rainfall year-round. TheKöppen Climate Classification subtype for this climate is "Cfb" (Marine West Coast Climate/Oceanic climate).[56][57]
At the time of theUnited Kingdom Census 2001, according to theOffice for National Statistics, the Urban Subdivision of Bolton[59] was part of theGreater 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,[60] living in 57,827 households.[61] The settlement occupied 4,446 hectares (17.17 sq mi), compared with 2,992 hectares (11.55 sq mi) in the 1991 census, though 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.[60] The median age of the population was 35, compared with 36 within the Greater Manchester Urban Area and 37 across England and Wales.[62]
This section needs to beupdated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(June 2025)
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 European Union, and 9.38% elsewhere in the world.[63]
This section needs to beupdated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(June 2025)
Data on religious beliefs across the town in the 2001 census show that 67.9% declared themselves to beChristian, 12.5% stated that they wereMuslim, 8.6% said they held no religion, and 3.4% reported themselves asHindu.[64]
At the time of the 2001 Census, 56,390 people resident in Bolton were in employment. 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.[70]
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 theBritish Aerospace (BAe) factory inLostock, now closed.[citation needed] TheReebok brand's European headquarters were located at the Reebok Stadium (the presentToughsheet Community Stadium) until 2009 when its closure heralded the end of Reebok's presence in the town.[71] Bolton is also the home of the family bakery,Warburtons, established in 1876 on Blackburn Road.[72] On 13 February 2003, Bolton was grantedFairtrade Town status.[73]
Bolton attracts visitors to its shopping centres, markets, public houses, restaurants and cafes in the town centreas well retail parks and leisure facilities close to the town centre and in the surrounding towns and suburbs.[74][75] Tourism plays a part in the economy, visitor attractions includeHall i' th' Wood,Smithills Hall and Country Park, Last Drop Village,Barrow Bridge and theBolton Steam Museum.[76][77]
There are several regeneration projects planned for Bolton over the next ten years, including Church Wharf by Ask Developments and Bluemantle[78] and Merchant's Quarter by local developer Charles Topham group, which together will contribute 1,000,000 square feet (93,000 m2) of business space.[79] The Bolton Innovation Zone is a large £300 million development with the University of Bolton at its core. Bolton is pursuing major redevelopment projects in its town centre, including the regeneration of Crompton Place and Church Wharf areas, aimed at promoting residential, commercial, and leisure spaces.[80]
Situated in the town centre on the site of a former market is theGrade II* listedtown hall, an imposingneoclassical building designed by William Hill and opened in June 1873 byAlbert Edward, Prince of Wales.[16] In the 1930s the building was extended byBradshaw Gass & Hope.[16][81] 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 presentAlbert Halls, which were opened in 1985.[81] The halls underwent a major restoration project, reopening in 2017.[82]
The Great Hall ofSmithills 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 theMarian 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.[83][84]
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 industrialistWilliam Hesketh Lever, who restored it and presented it toBolton Council in 1900.[85]
Bolton's 26 conservation areas contain 700 listed buildings, many of which are in the town centre, and there is parkland including theVictorianQueen's Park,Leverhulme Park and other open spaces in the surrounding area.[86][87] These include Le Mans Crescent, Ye Olde Man & Scythe, Little Bolton Town Hall, the Market Place, Wood Street andHoly Trinity Church.The Market Hall of 1854 is a Grade II listed building.[88] Outside the town centre can be found Mere Hall,Firwood Fold, Haulgh Hall, Park Cottage, St Mary's Church, Deane, Lostock Hall Gatehouse andAll Souls Church. Notable mills still overlooking parts of the town are Sir John Holden's Mill[89] andSwan Lane Mills.[90]
Most views northwards are dominated by Rivington Pike and theWinter Hill TV Mast on the West Pennine Moors above the town.[91]
Bolton is well served by the local road network and national routes. TheA6, a major north–southtrunk road, passes to the west through Hunger Hill and Westhoughton.TheA666dual carriageway, is a spur to and from theM61 motorway through the town centre to Astley Bridge, Egerton, Darwen and Blackburn. The M61 has three dedicated junctions serving the borough.
Bolton Interchange is managed byNorthern; the railway station is part of a town centretransport interchange with services to Manchester, Wigan, Southport, Kirkby, Blackburn, Preston, Blackpool, Barrow in Furness, Windermere, Glasgow, Edinburgh and intermediate stations operated by Northern andTransPennine Express.[94][95]
There is evidence from Saxon times ofChristian churches and at the time of the Civil War a Puritan andnonconformist presence in the town. TheUnitarians were among the early dissenting congregations which eventually includedMethodists, Baptists, Seventh Day Adventist and other denominations. More than forty churches were built during the Victorian era, but some have now been closed, demolished or converted to other uses.[106][107]
Today, the parish ofBolton-le-Moors covers a small area in the town centre,[108] but until the 19th century it covered a much larger area, divided into eighteen chapelries and townships.[14][109] The neighbouring ancient parish ofDeane centred aroundSt Mary's Church once covered a large area to the west and south of Bolton,[110] and the township ofGreat Lever was part of the ancient parish ofMiddleton.[109]
TheChurch of St Peter, commonly known as Bolton Parish Church, is an example of thegothic revival style. Built between 1866 and 1871 ofLongridge stone to designs byPaley, thechurch is 67 ft (20.4 m) in width, 156 ft (47.5 m) in length, and 82 ft (25.0 m) in height. Thetower is 180 ft (54.9 m) high with 13bells.[11] The first church on the same site was built inAnglo-Saxon times. It was rebuilt inNorman 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.[14] Fragments of stone and other artefacts from these first three buildings are displayed in the museum corner of the present church.[11]
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 aGrade II*listed building.[111]
St George's Church was built between 1794 and 1796 when Little Bolton was a separate township. Built by Peter Rothwell and paid for by the Ainsworth family.[112] in 1975 it was leased to Bolton Council, and became a craft centre in 1994.[113]St Patrick's Roman Catholic Church on Great Moor Street, was built in 1861.[114]
The New Zakaria Mosque, the first mosque in Bolton, served the Muslim community from Pakistan and India from the 1960s. The first place of worship for Hindus was in the former St Barnabas Church, converted into a Hindu temple.[106]
Bolton Hockey Club fields women's, men's, and junior teams and has more than 120 playing members.[117] The town has a local cricket leagues, theBolton Cricket League,[118] Bolton also has arugby union club,Bolton RUFC formed in 1872 situated on Avenue Street. The club operates four senior teams, as well as women's and junior sections.[119]Bolton Robots of Doom is abaseball club started in 2003, playing home games 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.[120] An American football team, the Bolton Bulldogs, plays home games at Smithills School operating varsity and junior varsity teams.[121]Speedway racing, known as Dirt Track Racing, was staged atRaikes Park in the pioneering days of 1928, but the speedway was short-lived.[122]Greyhound racing took place at theRaikes Park Greyhound Stadium from 1927 until 1996.[123]
Humphrey Spender photographed Bolton calling itWorktown for theMass-Observation Project, a social research organisation which aimed to record everyday life in Britain. His photographs provide a record of ordinary people living and working in a British pre-World War Two industrial town.[124] According to a 2003 survey of theBritish Association for the Advancement of Science, Boltonians are the friendliest people in Britain.[125]
Bolton has several theatres including theOctagon and independent groups such asBolton Little Theatre and the Phoenix Theatre Company. ComedianPeter Kay was a member of the Octagon youth theatre and worked in the box office for about four months, until being dismissed. ActressMaxine Peake made her professional debut at the Octagon and directorDanny Boyle was inspired to start his career when he worked there as an usher.[126] 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 houses a collection of local and international art.[127]Bolton Steam Museum houses a variety of preservedsteam engines in part of the old Atlas Mill.[128] A noted 1953 painting byL. S. Lowry depicts match-day crowds atBurnden Park, the former home stadium ofBolton Wanderers Football Club. The painting is in the collection ofThe Lowry arts centre inSalford, and was exhibited at Bolton Museum and Art Gallery in 2023.[129]
Bolton Central Library was one of the earliest public libraries established after thePublic 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.[130] The Bolton Symphony Orchestra performs regular concerts at the Albert Halls and Victoria Hall in the town centre.[131]The 2008 BBC Radio 3 Adult Choir of the Year[132] and five times gold-medal winning barbershop chorus The Cottontown Chorus is based in Bolton.[133]
Bolton Community and Voluntary Services supports voluntary and community activities.[134] A network of volunteer groups look after the environment in Bolton supported by Bolton Green Umbrella.[135]
The firstBolton LGBT+ Pride was held in 2015 and has been an ongoing annual event which since its second year has included a parade and live music.[136][137]
Bolton has been used as a setting for film and television drama. Le Mans Crescent has featured as a London street in theJeremy Brett version ofSherlock Holmes, a Russian secret service building in the 1990s comedy seriesSleepers and inPeaky Blinders in 2014.[140] The 1990s BBC dramaBetween the Lines filmed an episode in Victoria Square.[141]
Bolton is policed by the Bolton Division ofGreater Manchester Police. The statutory emergency fire and rescue service is provided by theGreater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service, from Bolton Central, Bolton North, Horwich and Farnworth Fire Stations.[143] Hospital services are provided by theBolton NHS Foundation Trust, which providesAccident and Emergency and other services at Royal Bolton Hospital in Farnworth.[144] Community health services, including GPs, district and community nurses, dentists and pharmacists, are co-ordinated bythe Bolton Primary Care Trust.[145] Waste management is co-ordinated by the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority.[146] Bolton's Distribution Network Operator for electricity is Electricity North West Ltd.[147] United Utilities manage Bolton's drinking and waste water.[148]
Among the notable people born in Bolton are the Protestant martyrGeorge Marsh, 1515–1555,[84] the inventor of the spinning mule that revolutionised the textile industry,Samuel Crompton, 1753–1827,[149] and industrialistLord Leverhulme of Bolton-le-Moors, 1851–1925.[41]
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