25 YEARS AGO

IT'S been a grand year so far for grandparents for Mr and Mrs Maxwell Irvine, of Douglas Close, Horwich. Since January, they have become grandparents again . . . five times over! They have three other grandchildren.

BOLTON racing driver Jim Crawford has been picked to drive in the Italian Grand Prix in September, at Monza. Jim, aged 27, of Crompton Way, will drive a Team Lotus John Player Special as team mate to Ronnie Peterson.

50 YEARS AGO

From the Evening News, August 30, 1950

HORWICH is back to its football 'Derbys', and the two clubs with the fascinating nomenclature, the RMI and the ACI, are enjoying one aspect of their resumed joint membership of the Lancashire Combination (2nd Division).

IT hardly seems more than a few weeks since Bolton people were flocking into town to do their holiday shopping, but even now, before the September holidays, some shopkeepers are decorating their windows with cotton wool snow, hanging out the cards 'Join our Christmas club', and generally trying to convince people that it is much easier to shop early to avoid the rush.

125 YEARS AGO

CONSIDERABLE interest has lately been roused concerning the alleged physical deterioration of young persons employed in factory labour in Lancashire. To guard against such possible consequences, certain acts of Parliament were passed, enforcing rules as to hours of labour, the age at which children should be employed, and so on; and there was a belief that regulations of this nature had stemmed a serious growing evil. The truth seems to be that in this, as in a few other matters, acts of parliament are hopelessly inadequate to reach an acknowledged evil, which is not only physical, but moral. The law can punish offences, but it does not effectually check greed or any of the baser passions.

In short, it does not prevent expenditure on those wretched indulgences which tend to deteriorate the physical and moral qualities of the population. It may indeed be said that a reliance of Acts of Parliament for the removal of moral evils has, by relaxing individual effort, first and last done incalculable mischief.