WHEN the Mass Observation exercise took place in the 1930s (southern academics were sent northwards to investigate a strange tribe) Bolton was transformed into "Worktown"

We had photogenic poverty, plenty of honest sons of toil to reflect the nobleness of our savages and quaint traditions like going to the pub and taking holidays in Blackpool.

Pictures taken by Humphrey Spender, who died recently, aged 94, are now owned by Bolton Council and - as many of you know - they form a wonderful record of life as it used to be in the days when Bolton was an industrial town.

If you have access to a computer thingy, you can see many of the photographs by going to www.ourtreasures.org and clicking on "People and Places of Bolton"

These brilliant images are uniquely fascinating and I suggest it is time to repeat the exercise in some way.

Maybe this is something (with appropriate large grants) which could be tackled by various local bodies such as the council and the new University of Bolton.

Because Bolton is no longer sure what kind of place it is any more, the title would probably have to be "????town"

Should this come to pass and diligent researchers with cameras roam the streets once more, I would like to suggest one or two areas worth studying.

work: I hope some latter-day Spender could capture the ambience of the modern office environment as the descendants of the Worktown participants stare in mounting fury at computer screens which frustrate their best efforts.

The images, of course, would be more compelling if they showed these fed-up folk - many of them in modern "dressed down" clothing - throwing their accursed machines through the windows.

But, this being an exercise in reality, the photographer would have to confine himself or herself to pained expressions showing resigned weariness.

Transport: A snapshot of life today would have to capture the mind-numbing irony which leads to ever more expensive and sophisticated vehicles being caught up in queues which prevent them going anywhere much.

Sociologists would also, no doubt, be fascinated by the scenes outside school gates as mums and dads demonstrate to their offspring that walking to and from school was something which poor people used to do in the olden days.

Shopping and leisure: Modern imagery abounds in supermarkets and on their crowded car parks as shoppers either battle with the system or even, as happens increasingly, chat with friends and acquaintances to the annoyance of those pressured souls - perhaps on their way home after a systems crash in the office - who wish relaxed old folk would simply get out of their way.

But definitive pictures of the age must surely be available on Friday and Saturday nights as scantily clad young people - desperate to forget everything that has happened to them during the working week - party to a worrying extent in Bradshawgate and other town centre thoroughfares.

This is real. It is what people do and should be recorded for the benefit of future generations.