This picture from 1946 would be fascinating enough in its own right.

Pioneer Mill, Mill Hill, 1946 (Picture: Newsquest)Taken in November that year it shows the weaving shed at the Pioneer Mill in Blackburn.

It was the last mill built in Mill Hill, next to the Leeds-Liverpool Canal at King’s Bridge and opened at the turn of the last century.

A cotton mill, it ran 620 looms and employed 230 people.

But the Pioneer Mill’s real claim to fame came in 1958 when the company’s managing director Brian Mercer began to produce a new plastic mesh on a machine which had been developed in secret at the mill.

This was the beginning of Netlon which exported all over the world for a variety of uses.

In 1964 Pioneer Mill ceased to be a cotton mill and production turned full time to the revolutionary new mesh which would put Blackburn on the map.