THE image above will be instantly recognisable to anyone who was around prior to the 1970s in the Accrington Road/Gannow Lane districts of Burnley.

It was taken in 1978, on the lower section of Cog Lane that has now been obliterated by the motorway.

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To the right would have been the huge bulk of Yatefield Mill, built in 1863 by the Haslam family as a cotton spinning mill.

The main contractor was James Duckett – in fact, it turned out to be his last building contract.

Following unfounded criticism of his workmanship by the family, he decided to go into into brick and sanitary ware manufacture instead.

So came into being the well-known firm of James Duckett and Sons, sanitary pipe manufacturers, with premises in Blannel Street and a huge clay delph near Barracks railway station.

The Haslam family, who also gave their name to nearby Haslam Street, remained at Yatefield Mill up to 1928.

The total weaving space on two floors was 16,530 yards, with 10,950 yards of floor space over five floorings for the spinning section. Water for the steam engines was taken from the Leeds and Liverpool Canal Although it was still in the ownership of the Haslams in 1935, all the power plant and machinery had been removed.

In 1934, it was reported that Yatefield Mill was being run by T Tunstill Ltd but at this time of depression in the industry all the 955 looms were stopped.

When I was a young lad, I recall the Cakeboards building, seen in the picture, being used as offices for Brook Bond Packaging who had moved into the building by the 1940s.

I recall as a boy watching through the railings across from the New Inn in Cog Lane, the tea being machine packed into rectangular paper bags.

Some of the bags were blue, others yellow, and green signifying different flavours of tea, and each of the paper packages carried a stamp, which we youngsters saved in a coupon card to be cashed in, when full.

Brooke Bond pulled out of Yatefield Mill in January 1970.

Cakeboards is still a household name in Burnley but owes its formation in the East End of London in 1953. The company moved to Yatefield mill in 1961 and in 1979, following its demolition, moved to premises in George Street.

Following a number of takeovers the company is still in business, albeit under another name, and works from premises off Rossendale Road.

The joinery business worked by J and R Simpson was my playground at weekends where I collected bits of wood that were thrown out to make forts and castles.

The two partners were John Simpson who lived in Padiham Road and Richard Simpson who lived at Hill Crest in Ightenhill Park Lane.

Between Simpson’s and the Cakeboard building, a steep incline which, incidentally, is still there, ran down to the canal revealing the portal of the Gannow tunnel.

The canal and the tow path were strictly out of bounds when I was a child, but it didn’t stop me or many other kids from ‘seeking adventure’ and avoiding the canal bailiff.One time, after being absent from home for a few hours, I returned back to a right telling off from my grandparents, and told I must never go on the canal again.I later found out that a child of about my age had gone into the joiner’s yard, and got on to the top of the arch of the tunnel, from where he slipped fell into the canal and drowned.Thinking back there were many drownings in the canal back then, and it’s perhaps ironic that when the canal tow paths were opened up these drowning ceased almost immediately because of the numbers of people aboutCaptions.

1. Yatefield Mill in Cog Lane, 1978., occupied by Cakeboards and J Simpson, joiners and shopfitters.

2. Gannow Lane, more than a century ago. Weavers outside one of the area’s many mills, 1911.