By Harry Nuttall

Local historian

IN THE late 1930s just about everyone knew that war was coming – and that we had better start doing something about it. ICI, one of our major industrial manufacturers, began to make plans.

There was a lot to think about. When the balloon went up – or rather when the bombs came down – we had to be ready. And the best area in the whole country to tuck away a production centre for the manufacture of vital products such as Perspex – a new wonder material that almost no-one, anywhere, had ever heard of – was quickly decided on.

The Darwen valley!

Anyone living in Darwen in the inter-war years could have told researchers that the busy town on the edge of the Pennines was usually covered in cloud and splashed with rain. Damp, in a word – just as textile masters discovered over a hundred years earlier.

Early research had led to modest-scale manufacturing at the ICI site at Billingham, Stockton-on-Tees. But very quickly Darwen was discovered to have the heaviest and most consistent cloud-cover of any town in the country.

Near-perfect to throw the Luftwaffe off the scent.

Within a few months, production was shifted from the North East to East Lancashire.

Not long afterwards Royal Ordnance switched production of shell fuzes from Woolwich to a “shadow factory” at Lower Darwen, well before Woolwich Arsenal was hit by a hundred high explosive bombs and thousands of incendiaries on August 7 and 8, 1940.

Fifty people were killed in the raids but many key workers had already moved to Lancashire.

Perspex was a key feature of the RAF’s new Spitfire fighter plane. Its high molecular weight gave Perspex cast acrylic excellent strength, rigidity and resistance to weathering and was ideal for fighter cockpits.

The fledgling product would soon become an increasingly important part of the war effort.

Fifty 50 tons of Perspex were produced during that first year at Darwen. In the Battle of Britain year, production increased significantly to 455 tons and by 1944 Perspex production had grown to six thousand tons.

There were several improvements to the “Spit” during the war, but all of them sported the variations of the cockpits produced under the Darwen clouds.

Darwen had another claim to fame in the Second World War. It was the smallest town in the country to fund the purchase of its own Spitfire.

Early in the war two stray German bombers hit the town and several people were killed.

It so incensed locals that thousands of pounds were raised inside a few weeks to pay for R7219 “Borough of Darwen,” flown by Squad. Ldr. Trevor “Wimpy” Wade and W.O. William M Lamberton till it was shot down in a raid over German marshalling yards.

It was commemorated a few years ago by local firm WEC in a wonderful stainless steel replica made by the firm’s apprentices. It stands proud on a tall, sweeping pedestal overlooking the A666 through Darwen town centre.

Over 80 years since the end of the war, Perspex is still being produced in Darwen.

The Japanese-owned parent company, Lucite International, has announced a new research and development facility at Orchard Mill on Blackburn Road. The centre will support the Perspex and Lucite acrylic sheet, and the Lucite acrylic composites businesses.

A new Perspex Spectrum range of products has also been launched.

The three linked Lucite plants in Darwen form the world’s largest cell cast acrylic sheet operation.

Meanwhile, a plaque which was placed on the grassy area close to the WEC Spitfire memorial has been stolen. It was placed there by members of the two pilots’ families a few years ago in their memory. Did YOU nick it? Put it back.