SOME time ago I received an e-mail from reader John Roden, who told me he had visited Botany Bay, near Chorley.

He is not a shopping fan, so he spent some time studying the building which, as most of you will know, stands near the M61 exit.

"Much of the steelwork had 'Knight & Brown, Bolton, 1855' on it," he writes. "I guess they must have done the steel work or the mill workings. I think the factory was run by Leyland for a while, and was a spinning mill of some kind before that. Any idea what the Bolton connection is here?"

Well, I have asked various sources and they cannot help. So does any reader know about Knight and Brown? If so, please let me know.